6 Best Competitor Keyword Analysis Tools for Market Insights

Understanding which keyword strategies work for your competitors can help you optimize your own strategy more effectively.

But what’s the best way to get a complete picture of the keywords your competitors are targeting?

With a competitor keyword analysis tool.

In this post, we’ll explore the leading competitor keyword analysis tools.

Before we dive into the details, here’s a top-level overview of each competitor keyword analysis tool.

Competitor keyword analysis tools streamline the process of gathering and analyzing data about your rivals’ keyword strategies.

This can mean looking at the keywords they target in either their pay-per-click (PPC) search campaigns or their non-paid, organic search (SEO) campaigns.

These tools quickly provide comprehensive insights about competitor keyword use. And are much more time-efficient than a manual approach to keyword research.

Here are some of the main advantages of using competitor keyword analysis tools:

• Improve SEO rankings. Learn how your competitors optimize their content for specific keywords. To identify ways to improve your own rankings for those terms.
• Identify content gaps. Discover keywords your competitors rank for that you do not. This can help you create new content to attract traffic currently going to your competitors.
• Optimize PPC bids. Study which keywords your competitors bid on to find terms with a high potential for clicks and conversions. You can choose to compete directly on these high-value keywords. Or strategically focus on less competitive terms to optimize your ad spend.
• Improve ad copy. Analyze the messaging and calls to action (CTAs) competitors use. To refine your own copy for the same keywords.
• Benchmark performance. Compare your keyword rankings, traffic, and engagement metrics with those of your competitors. This will help you track the progress of your own search engine marketing efforts over time.

Further reading: How to Find & Analyze Competitor Keywords

Let’s compare the best competitor keyword analysis tools (free and paid) and discuss their top use cases:

1. Organic Research Tool

Semrush’s Organic Research is a keyword competitor analysis tool that lets you see who your organic search rivals are. And what keywords they rank for.

To start, enter your domain and hit “Search.”

Next, open the “Competitors” report. 

Here, you’ll see a graph showing the main competitors for your domain based on their organic traffic and the number of keywords they rank for.

Scroll down to see a full list of competitor sites. 

By default, sites are listed in order of “Competition Level.” This metric is calculated based on the number of keywords you and your competitor rank for. And how many of these keywords you have in common.

Click on any competitor domain to learn more about the specific terms they rank for.

Then, under the “Positions” report, you’ll see a full list of your competitor’s organic keywords.

The table provides metrics such as the estimated organic traffic each keyword drives to the competitor. And tells you which URL ranks for that term.

The “Position Changes” report allows you to see how your competitor’s rankings fluctuate over time.

At the top of the report, you’ll see two widgets: “Position Changes Trend” and “Top Page Changes.” 

These provide an overview of the domain’s recent ranking gains and losses. And tell you which pages have experienced the biggest traffic changes.

Further down the report, you’ll see a full breakdown of recent position and traffic changes for different keywords.

Position changes fall into one of four categories: 

1. New
2. Improved
3. Declined
4. Lost 

Filter results based on these categories by using the “Position changes” drop-down. To find key opportunities to capitalize on competitor drops. Or to identify trending topics you might want to target.

Top Use Cases for This Tool

Organic Research is an ideal first stop for gathering competitive intelligence on your rivals’ organic keyword strategies.

The “Position Changes” report is especially helpful for identifying current weak spots in your competitors’ campaigns. 

For example, if a rival’s rankings are dropping for a particular keyword, it could mean their content is outdated. You could potentially create better, more up-to-date content targeting that term to capture more of the search demand for yourself.

Pricing

Organic Research is available on all Semrush plans.

Here’s a breakdown of pricing and limits for each plan:

• Free: $0.00/month (10 requests per day, 10 results per report, no historical data)
• Pro: $139.95/month (3,000 requests per day, 10,000 results per report, no historical data)
• Guru: $249.95/month (5,000 requests per day, 30,000 results per report, historical data included)
• Business: $499.95/month (10,000 requests per day, 50,000 results per report, historical data included)

2. Keyword Gap Tool

Keyword Gap allows you to compare your site’s keyword profile with up to four rival sites.

This Semrush tool shows how much your keywords overlap with your competitors. And which unique keywords your competitors rank for that you don’t.

You can use Keyword Gap to analyze organic, paid, and PLA (product listing ad) keywords.

Start by adding your domain and your competitors’ domains. And specify the type of keywords you want to analyze.

Then hit “Compare.”

You’ll see a graphic representing the keyword profile of each competitor. And how much they overlap with each other.

Scroll down to the main keyword table. This shows how each domain’s keyword profile intersects.

There are several intersection types:

• Shared: Keywords all sites rank for
• Missing: Keywords all sites rank for, except yours
• Weak: Keywords all sites rank for, but you’re ranking lowest
• Strong: Keywords for which you rank higher than the other sites
• Untapped: Keywords you don’t rank for but another site does
• Unique: Keywords only you rank for

Looking at “Missing” and “Weak” keywords helps you see where your site falls short compared to your competitors. Targeting these terms could help you capture some of the share of this traffic.

Meanwhile, “Strong” and “Unique” keywords represent your site’s competitive strengths. You could choose to double-down on high-volume terms within these categories to maximize your ranking potential. 

You could also begin targeting “Untapped” terms so your competitors no longer enjoy uncontested rankings. 

Top Use Cases for This Tool

Keyword Gap lets you quickly gauge where you stand in relation to your competitors.

The tool makes it easy to spot keyword opportunities to help you keep up with (and get ahead of) the pack.

You can also use the tool to find keywords competitors rank for but that have little or no advertising competition. You could potentially run a PPC campaign to target these terms and take some of the traffic for yourself. 

Pricing

Keyword Gap is available on all Semrush plans.

Here’s a breakdown of pricing:

• Free: $0.00/month (up to 10 searches per day)
• Pro: $139.95/month
• Guru: $249.95/month 
• Business: $499.95/month 

3. Advertising Research Tool

The Advertising Research tool lets you identify your closest paid search competitors, see which keywords they target, and view real examples of their ads.

It’s similar to the Organic Research tool we mentioned earlier. But for paid keywords.

To see who your main PPC competitors are, enter your domain into the search bar. Then click “Search.”

Next, head to the “Competitors” tab. 

Here, you’ll see a chart visualizing how much paid traffic you receive and how many keywords you pay for compared with competitors.

Scroll down to see a full list of your paid search competitors.

Click on any competitor site to dive into the details of their paid ad strategy.

At the top of the “Positions” report, you’ll see:

• How many keywords your competitor targets
• How much monthly traffic they receive from those keywords
• The total estimated cost for those ads

Scroll down to see a full list of all the keywords your competitor is ranking for in paid results.

The table includes metrics like the position, search volume, cost per click (CPC), landing page URL, and estimated paid traffic for each keyword.

And to view the specific ad that appears for each keyword, hover over the green “Ad” icon in the “Ad” column.

Top Use Cases for This Tool

Advertising Research provides a comprehensive view of your competitors’ PPC campaigns.

The tool allows you to see where your rivals are gaining and losing ad positions. And analyze real examples of ads they’ve run in the past. 

You can then use these insights to improve your own paid campaigns. For example, you might analyze the ads that worked best for a competitor for specific keywords. And emulate those copy elements in your own messaging. 

Further reading: The 6 Best PPC Keyword Tools to Elevate Your Ad Campaigns

Pricing

You can access Advertising Research on all Semrush plans.

Here are the prices and tool limits for each plan:

• Free: $0.00/month (10 requests per day, 10 results per report, no historical data)
• Pro: $139.95/month (3,000 requests per day, 10,000 results per report, no historical data)
• Guru: $249.95/month (5,000 requests per day, 30,000 results per report, historical data included)
• Business: $499.95/month (10,000 requests per day, 50,000 results per report, historical data included)

4. Google Keyword Planner

Keyword Planner is a free keyword research tool from Google.

The tool is primarily designed to help advertisers plan their PPC campaigns. But you can also use it to gather competitive keyword insights.

You can use Keyword Planner for free. You’ll just need to set up a Google Ads account to use it.

To get set up, go to Google Ads and hit “Start now” to sign in.

Next, click “Skip campaign creation.” This lets you use the tool without creating an ad campaign.

Follow the setup instructions. 

Then go to the “Tools” section in the Google Ads menu. Under “Planning,” select “Keyword Planner.”

Select “Discover new keywords.”

Next, select “Start with a website” and enter a competitor’s URL.

Click “Get results.”

The tool will then generate a list of keywords relevant to the content on your competitor’s site. 

You can then examine these suggestions to identify gaps in your own keyword list. 

In particular, look for any high-volume keywords that are related to your business that you don’t currently target.

Further reading: How to Use Google Keyword Planner to Find Keywords

Top Use Cases for This Tool

Keyword Planner is an easy-to-use tool that lets you see which keywords Google associates with your competitors. 

This gives you an idea of which terms your competitors may be targeting. And it helps you uncover new keywords that you might not have considered.

However, you may need to run an active Google Ads campaign (i.e., spend money) to unlock precise keyword data. Such as exact search volume numbers and detailed cost-per-click (CPC) estimates.

But as a free tool, it can be a useful place to start your competitor keyword research.

Pricing

Google Keyword Planner is free with a Google Ads account.

5. SpyFu

SpyFu is a competitive intelligence tool for SEO and PPC marketers.

It lets you see which keywords your competitors target, how much traffic they get from them, and how their search positions have changed over time.

Start by entering a competitor’s URL into the search bar and clicking “SEARCH.”

This will take you to an overview, where you’ll find several high-level performance metrics of your competitor’s SEO and PPC campaigns.

For example, it shows how much of the site’s Google traffic comes from paid versus organic search. 

In the “SEO Research” tab, you’ll find multiple reports about your competitor’s organic keywords.

And in the “PPC Research” tab, you can view a list of your competitor’s top paid keywords.

Top Use Cases for This Tool

SpyFu gives you a basic understanding of your competitors’ PPC and SEO keywords. You can see keywords they bid on and rank for, both now and in the past.

The tool can also show you profitable paid keywords your competitors are bidding on that you aren’t. And which keywords you’re bidding on that your competitors have already tried and stopped using.

Which can provide insight into how profitable a keyword might (or might not) be in the long run. 

Pricing

SpyFu offers two paid subscription plans:

• Basic: $39/month
• Professional: $79/month

6. Serpstat

Serpstat is a search marketing platform that includes competitor keyword analysis features. 

To get started, enter a competitor’s domain into the search bar and click “Search.”

This will take you to an overview page. 

Here, you’ll find several reports about your competitor’s search performance. Like the number of keywords they rank for by country.

On the “Keywords” tab, you’ll find more details about the domain’s SEO and PPC keywords. Like keyword difficulty, positions, and ranking URLs.

Serpstat also allows you to compare a site’s keyword profile with up to two other competitors.

Just go to the “Compare domains/URLs” tab, enter your chosen domains, and click “Search.”

A visualization will show how much these keyword profiles overlap. And where your competitors rank for these terms compared with your domain.

Top Use Cases for This Tool

Serpstat offers reports and filters to help you dig into your competitors’ SEO and PPC keyword strategies.

You can find the keywords they rank for and bid on, see which terms drive most traffic to their sites, and spot gaps in your own keyword strategy.

The ability to compare keywords with competitors helps you see if they’ve recently overtaken you in the search results. You can then revisit and update your content to try to regain your rankings. 

Pricing

Serpstat offers four plans:

• Free: $0.00/month
• Individual: $59/month
• Team: $119/month
• Agency: $479/month

Competitor keyword analysis is an integral part of developing a successful keyword strategy.

Tools like Organic Research, Keyword Gap, and Advertising Research make the task of identifying competitive keyword opportunities much easier. And faster.

Access these tools (and many more) with a Semrush free trial.