Competitors for my Niche are all authority sites, is that good or bad?

8 replies
When I do keyword research, Google Analytics show that my keywords have high competition. When I google search the keywords, the only websites that pop up are authority sites. I'm a noob at this but I did read somewhere in here that you can try to compete with authority sites as in outranking that authority sites single page for the product.
#authority #bad #competitors #good #niche #sites
  • Profile picture of the author The Niche Man
    First it's a good sign because tough competition means you're in a red hot market, filled with starving crowd buyers, ready, willing and able to spend money Now! But ...

    Bottom line, it's only a "Good" sign for 'YOU' IF ...
    • You can find a way to separate yourself from the competition. (You're faster, quicker, better quality, easier to use, offer more services for the money, more convenient, etc.). And you can communicate or demonstrate it effectively to your market.
    • You can find a niche in the market your competition is not focusing on, covering or not serving as good as you can.
    • Your product or service compliments or helps your market enjoy your competitors product or service even more. This is one most people never think about - but should always be explored as well. Otherwise you could be leaving money on the table.

    It's bad .. If You can't fulfill at least one of the categories above, regardless of your ranking philosophy. Even if you outrank them, you still better be ready to hit them with at least one or more of the categories above or they'll still eat you for lunch.
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    • Profile picture of the author williamtell
      Well my goal was to create a review site for the products in this niche, because I haven't come across one on the first page. I thought that was a sign that this niche wasn't a money maker. I figure if I could become the authority review site for this niche I'd be the only one people would go to who are looking to purchase the product. Thoughts?
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    • Profile picture of the author mentat47
      Originally Posted by The Niche Man View Post

      First it's a good sign because tough competitors means you're in a red hot market, filled with starving crowd buyers, ready, willing and able to spend money Now! But ...

      Bottom line, it's only a "Good" sign for 'YOU' IF ...
      • You can find a way to separate yourself from the competition. (You're faster, quicker, better quality, easier to use, offer more services for the money, more convenient, etc.). And you can communicate or demonstrate it effectively to your market.
      • You can find a niche in the market your competition is not focusing on, covering or not serving as good as you can.
      • Your product or service compliments or helps your market enjoy your competitors product or service even more. This is one most people never think about - but should always be explored as well. Otherwise you could be leaving money on the table.

      It's bad .. If You can't fulfill at least one of the categories above, regardless of your ranking philosophy. Even if you outrank them, you still better be ready to hit them with at least one or more of the categories above or they'll still eat you for lunch.
      I agree. the only way you'll be able to compete in that market is to find some way to separate yourself from the competition.
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  • Profile picture of the author writeaway
    Don't let the competition intimidate you...

    The fact that you are up against authority sites mean (as mentioned above) the niche you're targeting is LUCRATIVE.

    HERE ARE PRACTICAL SOLUTIONS (STEP BY STEP)

    Look for niche gray areas they may have missed

    Scrape their sites and get a keyword dump going

    Filter the keywords through Google keyword planner

    Find keywords that have LOW competition but HIGH user demand

    Focus on those and you BEAT your authority competitors in the 'gray area'

    Once you dominate those areas, scale out from there to challenge them on more conventional (ie., competitive) keywords.
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  • Profile picture of the author PHR
    Pretty cool post from The Niche Man!

    In general I would say that a little bit of competition isn't that bad. In your case I would not target the niche/keywords because of that "authority site".

    But in general, if I am planning a niche site, it's a good sign if there is already a site related to my keywords, because: This site is propably making some money!

    But in general the post from The Niche Man is a pretty nice "benchmark".

    Cheers!
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  • Profile picture of the author GarlandBergeron
    It's kind of good since it proves that you have a solid market but you would have to do your 150% to get much-needed exposure!

    Good luck
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  • Profile picture of the author winnermarketing
    I don t know what list you are talking about, o f course every niche has his competitors!
    With the right strategy you can have success in all niche!
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    • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
      Stop looking at the "competition" in the keyword planner. It doesn't mean what you think it does.

      You (and zillions of others) think that "high competition" means it will be tough to rank. All it tells you is that there are a lot of people using Adwords to target that phrase. Unless you are paying for Adwords, "high competition" is a good thing.
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