What is the competitor gap, and what is on the Competitors tab?

Every site has a Competitors tab, right after Keywords. It answers two questions: which sites the research treated as your competitors, and what each of them ranks for that you do not.

What the tab shows

The left column lists your competitors. For each one you see how it got there (Added by you or Found by research), how many searches it shares with you, and one line saying what happened to it in the latest research:

• Compared in the research on a date: its keywords were pulled and are in the table.
• Pulled a while ago: you pulled its keywords yourself, after the research.
• Pulling now: a pull is running, with a link to watch it.
• A reason it was not compared: a general platform rather than a competitor, a much bigger site or too few searches in common, judged not a comparable business, switched off, or beyond the five a research compares. Older research runs recorded only a count, so for those the line names the possible reasons without saying which.

Below them sit the domains the research saw ranking for the same searches as you but did not compare, with the same reason line, so nothing it found is hidden.

Where the keywords come from

Open a competitor and the table shows the keywords it ranks for in the top 20 of Google in your market, kept only where they are on your subject by the same vocabulary rule the research applies. A research pulls up to 500 ranking keywords per competitor, so the table is a filtered part of what a site ranks for, not all of it.

Each row shows:

• They rank: the competitor's best position, linked to the page that holds it.
• Monthly: the searches a month, from the keyword database or measured with Google Ads. A phrase with no measured volume shows unverified; it is shown, never dropped.
• You rank: your own position and page when you have one. A planned site has none yet.
• Fit: the stored judgment of whether someone typing this could become your customer, with the reason. See What do kept, dropped and unverified mean?.
• Page in your plan: when the keyword belongs to a group the research decided on, the decision (build, improve or skip) and a link to that page.
• From: which run stored the row, the research or a pull, with its date.

What "fit" means here

Fit is the same judgment the research makes on every keyword it finds: does the searcher want what this business sells, and are they on the customer's side of the sale? A competitor ranking for a keyword does not make it a fit for you. A marketplace that sells the same services will also rank for job searches, prices of its own plans and brand names, and those are set aside with the reason on the row. Keywords without a judgment say Not judged and why.

Pulling a competitor's keywords

Pull Its Keywords on a competitor, or on a domain you type in, starts a pull: 10 credits, about two minutes. It reads the keywords the competitor ranks for in the top 20, keeps the ones on your subject, measures the searches of any the database has no volume for, notes where you rank on each, and judges every one against your confirmed profile. Nothing is emailed; the keywords open on the tab when it finishes. Pulling also adds the domain to your competitors as one you named, so the next research compares it first.

The profile must be confirmed before a pull, because the keywords are judged against it. Only one pull of the same domain runs at a time.

When there is nothing to pull, the pull stops and the credits come back: the keyword database has no top-20 rankings for that domain in your market, or everything it ranks for is off your subject. The tab says which, next to the competitor.

No page decisions are invented

A pull makes no groups, no verdicts and no page decisions. The only page shown is the one your plan already has for the keyword, from the research. To get a decision on gap keywords, tick them and press Check Selected: each one gets the full check, live results, a read of the pages that rank and a decision, at 5 credits a keyword, up to 50 at a time. See How do I check keywords I already have in mind?.

Which competitors a research compares

A research compares up to five: the ones you added first, then the sites it found and judged comparable. Switch a competitor off to leave it out of the next research, or remove one you added. See How are competitors chosen, and can I change them?.

During a trial

While a trial plan is locked, the keywords are all shown, but the page links show only for your revealed decision. The rest open when the plan starts.