SEO has moved on

Things have moved on.
Nowadays, web masters are likely to work with the search websites, as Adwords and Adsense.
GoogleGuy is now the non-mysterious Matt Cutts, who helpfully asserts indexing changes before they occur, even if he is still rather imprecise on detail. Sadly , the collective "us " - web masters - don't share the same level of friendship we once did. As search selling is now above radar, competition levels have become aggressive. Usually website owners reverse-engineer competing sites.
Who is linking to them? What pages are linked? How old are the links? What keyword terms are they targeting? What are their preferred keywords? What Adwords are they running? What meta keyword tags are they using"? ; ) great questions - aside from the last one, manifestly - and a valid system for emulating high ranking sites. Tools like SEMRush provide a useful bit of knowledge into what our competition are doing. BTW : Not pimping, I have been using SEMRush a lot latterly, and I suspect it is a great tool : ) nonetheless there's more to it. We also must look at some other, non-technical factors that reveal something much more profitable and fascinating. Competitive research Competitive intelligence is a continuing, methodical research of our competition.
The objective of a rival analysis is to develop a profile of the character of methodology changes each rival might make, each competitor's possible reaction to the range of likely strategic moves other firms could make, and each competitor's likely reaction to industry changes and environmental shifts that might happen. Competitive intelligence ought to have a single-minded objective -- to develop the secrets and strategies important to transfer share of the market gainfully and regularly from precise rivals to the company. The necessary query underlying competitive research is this : "why do some web companies do far better than others? " vis search, we not only need to take a look at the technical facets of the sites positioned above us, but we also must analyse the markets in which they exist, what our competition goals are, their pricing and products, and even obscure details ,eg who they may be hiring and firing, and why. As can clearly be seen, it's not only about getting listed higher for a certain keyword term. It's about getting listed higher vis overall business performance. It's about seeing what market they capture, and where that market is heading in the future.
Once you have worked out that, you could be able to discover new keyword streams that the competition have missed, and may never think about. Ok, so how? Ways to Do Competitive research it might be nice if you might call up your competition and ask them precisely what they are doing, and where they're heading. But everyone knows that is not going to occur. We have got to do a little investigative digging. The issue is we don't really wish to do too much digging, as it is long and can be expensive. Fortunately, lots of the answers we need are sitting in front of us. Ask these questions : * what's the nature of competition? * Where does the rival compete? * Who does the rival compete against? * How does the competitor compete? The character of the contest is the market, and market forces. Have a look at Google Trends, trendwatching sites and other market analysis tools to work out where their market is now, and where it heading. Does the market need major resources? Why are these rivals in these markets? What related markets have they evaded, and why? A concrete example. 1 or 2 years back, many SEOs competed as service agencies. Market trends showed clearly that a lot of SEO was moving in-house, particularly at the top end. As S.E.O moved in-house, demand rose for coaching. Lots of SEOs are now engaged in coaching. Ask where your market will be in 5 years time. Where does the rival compete?For example, are they limited to a certain geography? Culture? Language? Have they got an offline presence? Who does the rival compete against? Create a list of the, say, top 10 competitors in a spot.
Compare and contrast their approaches and offerings. Compare their use of language and their relative place in the market. Who is entrenched? Who is up-and-coming? Who has got the most share of the market, and why? Are you able to grab some of this share?