This is why your competitors rank higher

Beating your competitors to the top spot on Google can be the best feeling ever for business owners. Conversely, getting beaten to it, especially when you invest in SEO, can be extremely deflating.

But why exactly are your competitors beating you?

6 Reasons Why Your Competitors Are Doing Better – and How to Beat Them

Reason #1 – Their website is better than yours

A properly optimized website is one of the key factors when it comes to SEO. But you can only do so much with a bad website. That means your competitor can have a better website that is less optimized and still beat you.

How to beat them: Improve the design, structure and usability of your website. Make the code as small and streamlined as possible so that it loads as quickly as possible.

Reason #2 – They’re mobile optimized

The majority of online traffic came from smartphones last year. Google has also introduced a mobile-first index which gives preference to mobile-responsive websites. All that’s to say that your website needs to be mobile-friendly. If it isn’t, you’re going to have a hard time ranking, especially on smartphone searches.

How to beat them: Make your website mobile friendly or build a new mobile-only website to give your customers (and Google) the best user experience possible.

Reason #3 – Customers love them and their site

If you provide a service or have a physical location, it is essential to establish a great online reputation. That means garnering great reviews on sites like Google and Yelp. More and more search engines are using these reviews to fuel online search results, especially ones with a local focus.

How to beat them: Work hard to provide a service that customers love. But don’t forget to encourage them to share their experiences through online reviews.

Reason #4 – They’ve got great links

Perhaps the most obvious reason why your competitors are ranking better than you is because they’ve got great backlinks and you haven’t.

How to beat them: Don’t try and cheat Google by buying links or building spammy blog comment links. Instead, create great content and promote it to industry influencers. Try guest blogging, too, and other well-known link building tactics.

Reason #5 – They’ve got loads of citations.

Creating lots of online citations for your website and business will give Google the impression that you are a genuine business and give them the confidence to rank you. The more instances of your name, address, and phone number you can get, the better.

How to beat them: Add your website to business listings and review websites such as Yelp, and local directories.

Reason # 6 – They’ve been at it longer than you

If your competitors have older websites, that could be the only reason they are ranking above you. Google gives more weight to older websites and they’ll have had more chane to get links.

How to beat them: Do some competitor research and use their weaknesses to your advantage. If you can’t beat them for one keyword, try targeting more.