The short answer
To find a competitor’s SEO keywords, enter their domain in an SEO tool such as Ahrefs Site Explorer, open Organic keywords, choose your country and filter to positions 1–10. Export the list, then group keywords by the page that ranks. Each group is a topic that already brings them traffic, and a page you could build better.
Before you start
By the end of this SOP
A sheet of a competitor’s top pages, the keywords each ranks for, and the topics you will target.
- Time
- About 1 hour
- You’ll need
- An SEO tool with competitor data (Ahrefs, Semrush or Ubersuggest) and Google Sheets.
- Who does this
- The person responsible for SEO.
About this SOP: why it matters, where and when
Why it matters: Proven topics with real traffic are the fastest wins for a new site.
Where: In Ahrefs (or similar) and Google Sheets.
When: When you start SEO for a business, then every couple of months.
Stage 1
Pick the right competitor
Choose someone your size or a bit bigger. Studying Wikipedia or a national brand won’t help a local business.
- 1
For one keyword: search it on Google in an incognito window and note the sites on page 1 that are similar to yours.
- 2
Across all keywords: enter your own domain in Ahrefs Site Explorer → Organic competitors, with your country selected.
Tip
Your SEO competitors aren’t always your business competitors. A blog can outrank a rival agency for the same keywords.
Stage 2
Export their keywords
- 1
Enter the competitor’s domain in Site Explorer and open Organic keywords.
- 2
Choose the country (e.g. India) and filter Position to 1–10.
- 3
Click Export and download the CSV. Your plan may limit how many rows you can export.
- 4
Shortcut: open Top pages to see which URLs get the most organic traffic and the main keyword for each.
Stage 3
Group keywords into topics
- 1
Import the CSV into Google Sheets. Add a column called Topic.
- 2
Sort by URL. For each page, read its keywords and write one topic that covers them, e.g. “digital marketing course fees”.
- 3
Make a pivot table by URL with total search volume, total traffic and average keyword difficulty.
- 4
Mark the topics you will target: relevant to your business, decent traffic, and a difficulty you can realistically compete on.
Note
Don’t copy their page. Make a better one: more useful, more local, more up to date.
Agency playbook
Doing this for a paying client
What a senior checks before calling the job done. Numbers are starting rules; compare them with the account’s own history.
What good looks like
- Every target topic maps to one URL on the client’s site, new or existing. No two pages target the same topic.
- Each keyword is labelled by intent: informational, commercial, transactional or local (e.g. “near me”, “Kochi”).
- Topics are ranked by business value, not volume. A 90-search “course fees Kochi” can beat a 5,000-search “what is SEO”.
- You checked the live Google results for the top topics, so the page type you plan matches what already ranks.
Mistakes we see on real accounts
- Trusting “0 volume” for local keywords. Tools miss many Kerala searches that convert well. Check Search Console and Keyword Planner.
- Targeting high-difficulty topics with a brand-new site. Months of writing go into pages that never reach page 1.
- Copying a competitor’s page structure and headings. You get a thin near-duplicate that Google has no reason to rank above the original.
- Building content around competitor brand names. It attracts the wrong visitors and can create trademark complaints.
Agency checklist before you call it done
- Save the raw export with date, tool and country database in the client folder. Never overwrite old exports.
- Cross-check volumes for key topics with Google Keyword Planner ranges. Tool volumes are estimates.
- Check the client’s Search Console first, so you don’t plan new pages for topics they already rank for.
- Add Malayalam and Manglish variants, e.g. “digital marketing course malayalam”, where they apply.
- Remove competitor brand names and irrelevant keywords, and write down the filters you used.
- Get client sign-off on the top 10 target topics before anyone starts writing.
- Add the agreed topics to the content plan and log the date in the change log.
Handover message to the client
Hi [Client name], we studied [competitor names] and picked [number] topics that already bring them customers from Google. The top three are [topics]. Please confirm these fit your services by [date], and we will start the content plan.
Senior tip
Run a content gap report with three competitors against the client. Keywords where two or more competitors rank but the client doesn’t are the strongest proof a topic matters.
Practice & check
Now do it for real
Reading is not doing. Open your own account and complete this task before you move on.
Practice task (5 min)
Pick one competitor of a real business and list its top 10 pages with a topic label for each. Choose 3 topics you would target first.
Prove it
Two questions. Get both right and this SOP is done.
Common questions
Can I find competitor keywords for free?
Partly. Ubersuggest and Ahrefs’ free tools show limited data. Google Search Console only shows your own site. For full lists you need a paid tool.
How many keywords should one page target?
One main topic per page, plus closely related phrases. If two keywords need different answers, they need different pages.
Done. That’s a real skill, not a certificate.
Next: SOP 090 — Analyse a Competitor’s Backlinks →
Want to do this on real client budgets, with a mentor checking your work? That’s Level 2 at Unlearn. See the Digital Marketing track