How to Do a PPC Competitor Analysis: 7 Tools (+ Checklist)

A PPC competitor analysis assesses the competition’s ad campaign strategies and performance, providing insights to help you improve your online marketing efforts.

Successful pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns increase visibility on search engines, drive search traffic, and generate conversions. But they don’t exist in isolation.

Competitors can shape how much you pay for ads and how (or if) your ads show up. As a result, it’s critical to keep an eye on your PPC competition, just as you would via a competitor analysis for SEO.

In this article, we’ll lay out everything you need for an effective and actionable analysis of your PPC competition, including insights from HawkSEM Lead Strategist and PPC expert Alyssa Galik.

How to conduct a competitor analysis for PPC

Follow these three steps to analyze your PPC competition.

1. Use PPC auction insights to identify your competitors

Start your analysis by determining who your PPC competition is, meaning those bidding on the same keywords as you.

To find this data, check the “Auction Insights” report on your Google Ads dashboard. Pay attention to metrics like:

• Impression share: The percentage of ad impressions you and your competitors received versus what you were eligible to receive
• Overlap rate: How often a competitor’s ad and your ad both receive an impression
• Position above rate: How often an advertiser’s ad appears in a higher position than yours when both ads displayed simultaneously
• Top of page rate: How often you or your competitor’s ad appeared at the top of the page
• Absolute top of page rate: How often you or your competitor’s ad appeared in the very top position on the page
• Outranking share: How often your ad ranked higher in the auction than the competitor’s

In addition to using the Google Ads UI to discover your competitors, you can also use a tool like Semrush or SpyFu to discover competitors. These tools show metrics and information like:

• Ad copy
• Cost per click (CPC)
• Keyword overlap
• Paid keywords
• Ad budget
• Recommended buys (keywords you might want to buy)

2. Analyze your competitors

Competitors are rarely created equal.

Some have big budgets, some are barely breaking through, and some compete with you on a few keywords. While these competitors could pose a significant threat to your success, others probably aren’t serious competition.

Understanding the types of competition can better inform your action plan. The different types of PPC competitors often include:

• Affiliates
• Comparison Shopping Engine (CSE)
• Online Travel Agency (OTA)
• Marketing partners
• Search arbitrage
• Reseller
• No trademark

It can be difficult to compete with non-approved trademark users and resellers. If an advertiser runs your trademark unapproved, the best way to handle it is to escalate the complaint through Google’s trademark policy channels.

You can use tools like AdGooroo and Semrush to monitor and track your (and your competition’s) top branded PPC keyword trends.

You can also run a direct channel activity comparison between your domain and a competitor’s domain to glean more insights.

Where are they competing with you?

You can’t pull and track every impression share and ad positioning for an entire account.

However, you need to be frugal but effective with your analysis to get the most vital KPIs. This way, you can better identify where you should focus your time to optimize your PPC.

Here are the easiest ways to determine where the competition is coming from:

• Label your top-performing keywords:  Use labels within the third-party or publishers’ bidding tools to monitor any major changes in your best-performing keywords. These will notify you if a competitor starts to push you out. You can also use the data to look for changes and adjust accordingly.
• Set up reports, alerts, and automated bidding rules: For your top-performing campaigns, ad groups, and keywords, set up automated search impression share reports. You can also prevent keywords from slipping from their positions with tools like Target Search Page Location or Microsoft Advertising’s automated rules.

Why are they competing?

The final step of identifying and understanding your PPC competition is to unveil why they’re competing with you.

Once in a while, you’ll run into a competitor domain that bids on your keywords simply to try to price you out of the running.

However, in most cases, your competitors have the same intentions you do. That means you might not succeed through bidding alone.

Because of this, it’s imperative to review your competitors’ strategies and develop an action plan around what you learn.

3. Check keyword competition and keyword gaps

You’ve done your keyword research, but have you dared to venture outside the proverbial box?

PPC advertising tools like Semrush and SpyFu can tell you more about your competitor keywords. You’ll see what they are bidding on and how much budget they invest.

You can even find out how long they’ve been bidding on them and what kind of results they’re seeing.

Once you know more about their keywords, you’ll be able to make educated choices for your own marketing strategy.

You may choose to stop bidding on certain words because you just don’t have the budget, or bid more heavily on others because you can afford it.

These tools can also help you find keyword gaps, or relevant terms your competitors aren’t bidding on. They can be great opportunities to cash in.

You may want to invest more ad spend here to get more traffic to your site without paying a premium.

Watch out, though. Your competitors may figure out what you’re doing and follow suit.

Pro tip: Take advantage of keyword gaps, they’re an easy place to get low-cost traffic. Just keep an eye on the search volume. It may not be enough to give you a real competitive advantage.

4. Review competitors’ ad copy

What kind of messaging are competitors using in their ads? An ad copy analysis reveals ad headlines and descriptions, giving you ideas for reframing your own ads.

After all, ad text is the first impression a brand has on its potential clients. Examining competitors’ offers, benefits, and features allows you to learn more about how they attract clientele.

Investigating the messaging that garners clicks shows you what you may be missing. They may include pricing, specific features, hours, or even sales.

What stands out to you? How could you change your ad copy based on what you see? Take note of these items:

• Headlines
• Calls to action
• Special offers
• Features or benefits
• Pricing
• Sales or discounts

Here’s an example of a HawkSEM ad with some of these elements:

“By analyzing competitors’ ad copy, you understand what pain points or benefits they are highlighting,” explains Galik.

“This helps you define how you want to position yourself and what value proposition you can outshine your competitors on.”

Pro tip: Use your competitors’ ads to get creative with ad copy. Making your ads more clickable will help you get more qualified traffic to your landing pages.

5. Examine competitors’ landing pages

Compile a list of competitor landing pages.

Review the offers, calls to action, and benefits. Where do you stand by comparison? Do you see places where you can improve?

Take note of how you can change your landing page if you see areas of concern. When you’re reviewing landing pages as part of your paid search competitor analysis, here are some questions to ask:

• Is it user-friendly?
• How does your call to action (CTA) compare to theirs?
• Is your offer competitive with theirs?
• Are your key features and benefits competitive with theirs?
• Are there key features or benefits you should add?
• As a whole, how does your page compare? Do you need changes?

Next, examine their site speed. Is it better or worse than yours?

Site speed is crucial to being competitive. Potential customers will click away if you make them wait too long.

After analyzing the landing page itself, consider if the ad leading to the landing page is relevant to the landing page. Are the target keywords on the page? Do they have the appropriate level of congruency?

Take a look from top to bottom, and consider how Google might rate it. Find copy and formatting that might inform and improve your own landing page strategies. Use your competitors’ websites to inspire improvements on your own site.

“It is critical to review competitors’ landing pages and conversion processes,” explains Galik.

“Observe the CTAs they use, how they generate leads, and what user experience they provide. Each of those pieces can help you develop a stronger PPC strategy than your competitors.”

Pro tip: A/B test elements and ideas you gain from your top competitors’ pages to see if they improve performance on your own landing pages.

7 PPC competitor analysis tools we use

1. Semrush
2. SpyFu
3. Brandverity
4. iSpionage
5. Ahrefs
6. BuiltWith
7. BuzzSumo

1. Semrush

Semrush is an online marketing platform with a complete set of PPC research and management tools. It allows you to generate competitive analysis reports and monitor competitor performance over time.

2. SpyFu

Spare yourself the trouble of building your PPC account by duplicating your competitors’ campaign. With SpyFu, you can download your competitors’ most profitable keywords and ads for organic and paid searches.

3. BrandVerity

BrandVerity is an excellent tool for monitoring, identifying, and removing harmful ads from appearing on your most popular branded keywords. It protects keywords from trademark infringement and affiliate programs from abuse.

4. iSpionage

iSpionage gives you access to 7 years’ worth of PPC and SEO keyword data for the top three search engines for your competitors. You can use this data to optimize your campaigns and improve your results.

5. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is a comprehensive SEO toolset designed to help you rank higher. Their site explorer tool combines organic search traffic analysis, a backlink checker, and paid traffic research all in one.

6. BuiltWith

BuiltWith is a competitive research tool that analyzes keywords, websites, technology, and more. Use it to find competitors with messaging that uses the same keywords you’re targeting.

7. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is a research and monitoring tool geared toward social media networks. It helps you find popular content on relevant topics and monitor both competitors and your brand.

Why is a competitor analysis for PPC important?

As you’re developing your strategy and building out a new PPC account, you need to know what your competitors are doing.

This can help you learn from their successes or failures, identify opportunities, and make educated decisions for your own. It can also eliminate guesswork and accelerate results.

But that’s not the only time you should be considering what the competition is doing.

During your optimization process (e.g., when optimizing Google Ads), you can also conduct routine analyses to ensure you know where you stand vs. your biggest competitors.

“Competitor analysis provides a visual of the PPC landscape before you enter it,” Galik shares from firsthand experience.

“It helps you understand how your strategy is working and where you may have gaps. Looking at the data on an ongoing basis provides information on position, budgets, copy, and opportunity.”

So, why does this kind of analysis matter?

It can inform your PPC ad performance

Competitive research tells the story behind why your campaigns are performing the way they do – because what your competition does affects you.

For example, this process can provide insight into rising cost per acquisition, loss in impression share, and “stolen” clicks.

If you want to scale your accounts and keep them on an upward trajectory, then it’s vital to keep an eye on the competitive landscape.

It allows you to monitor changes in the landscape

PPC marketing is a race in which you can never take your eyes off the road.

Doing competitor research allows you to keep your finger on the pulse of industry trends, changes in competition levels, and keywords and topics that are growing in popularity.

You’ll be able to discover new competitors as they come on the scene and track those rising up the ranks. After all, in PPC, you need to know who is bidding against you in auctions and not just businesses that are in your industry.

With marketplaces like Walmart and Amazon bidding in nearly every auction, it’s vital to look outside your sphere to maintain successful PPC campaigns.

What to look for during your competitor analysis

Leveraging tools during your competitor analysis for PPC allows you to peek into their campaigns in various ways. But what should you analyze?

Keywords and ad copy are the two highest priority areas, but you can discover additional insights from your competitors. You may also be able to gain visibility into:

• Keyword and offer opportunities you’ve missed
• Whether your budget is in line with others in the industry
• Changes in competitor spend
• Who you are currently competing with
• Potential threats
• Keywords you should buy that your competitors are not
• Get new ideas for ad copy and calls to action

Keep in mind these tools don’t give you the whole picture. They might tell you how often competitors’ ads appear at the top of search results and their average position.

But they can’t tell you their click-through rate (CTR) or how much revenue the ads generated.

As a result, you should avoid making wide-sweeping changes (such as a total keyword overhaul) overnight, just because a competitor is doing it differently.

Pro tip: Sometimes, the most useful thing you can learn is that your competitor is making a lot of mistakes that you can take action to avoid.

Competitive PPC Analysis Checklist

• Use Google Ads and Microsoft Ads auction insights to identify your competitors
• Segment your competitors
  • Where are they competing with you?

• Label your top-performing keywords
• Set up reports, alerts, and automated bidding rules
  • Why are they competing?
• Review competitors’ ad copy
• Analyze keyword competition and keyword gaps
• Examine competitors’ landing pages

The takeaway

The main purpose of running a competitor analysis for PPC is to identify your competition and come up with a strategy to improve your campaigns.

Of course, you don’t want to merely follow in others’ footsteps. When you’re armed with all this insider info, you can leverage some of your competitors’ techniques in your own unique way.

When you know who your competitors are and how they operate, you’ll be in a better position to outrank them on search engine results pages (SERPs).

From competitor research to PPC audits to campaign management, our experienced digital marketing team can help you every step of the way. Contact HawkSEM for a free PPC consultation.

This article has been updated and was originally published in September 2021.