The fastest way to build an SEO plan for your app is to look at what already works for your competitors. If a competitor gets most of its search traffic from a handful of articles, those topics are proven: people search for them, and Google sends clicks.
This guide shows how to find the keywords your competitors rank for, starting with free methods and moving to paid tools, then how to turn the results into articles worth writing.
First, pick the right competitors
Your product competitors and your search competitors aren’t always the same. A habit-tracking app competes with other apps in the App Store, but on Google it also competes with productivity blogs and psychology sites.
List three kinds:
- Direct competitors: apps that do what yours does.
- Adjacent tools: broader apps your users might use instead (Notion, spreadsheets).
- Content sites: blogs that rank for the problems your app solves.
Five to ten domains is enough to start.
Free methods
1. Google itself
Search your main topics and note which domains keep showing up. Then search site:competitor.com to see roughly which pages Google has indexed, and look at the titles. Blog URLs reveal their content strategy.
Also look at the “People also ask” box and related searches at the bottom of the page. They’re real questions with search demand.
2. Their sitemap
Most sites publish a sitemap at /sitemap.xml. It lists every page, often with dates. You’ll see which topics they cover heavily and how often they publish.
3. Free tiers of SEO tools
Most paid SEO tools offer a limited free version: a few searches a day, or the top keywords for a domain. That’s often enough to see a competitor’s top 10 pages by estimated traffic.
4. Google Search Console (for your own site)
Not a competitor tool, but essential: it shows queries where you already appear. If you’re on page two for a term a competitor ranks top three for, that’s a target.
Paid methods
Paid tools estimate the full list of keywords a domain ranks for, with search volume, difficulty and estimated traffic. Estimates aren’t exact, but they’re good for comparing.
What to look for in a competitor report:
| Column | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Keyword | The search term |
| Position | Where they rank (top 3 gets most clicks) |
| Volume | Estimated monthly searches |
| Difficulty | How hard it would be for you to rank |
| URL | Which of their pages ranks |
| Est. traffic | Volume × likely click rate at that position |
Sort by estimated traffic. Usually a small number of pages bring most of a site’s visits.
Find the gaps
The most useful view is a keyword gap: terms where competitors rank and you don’t. Filter it like this:
- Keep keywords where at least one competitor is in the top 10.
- Remove terms that are too broad or irrelevant to your app.
- Keep difficulty low to medium for a new site.
- Prefer terms with commercial or problem intent over pure trivia.
What’s left is your shortlist.
Look at the pages, not just the keywords
For each shortlisted keyword, open the competitor’s ranking page and ask:
- What question does it answer, and how fast?
- What’s missing? Outdated info, no examples, no screenshots, no real experience.
- What format is it? List, guide, comparison, template.
- How long is it, and how is it structured?
Your article should answer the same question better, not just longer. Real examples from your app and your users are the easiest way to stand out.
Turn it into a plan
Group keywords into clusters around one topic, then plan one main article and a few supporting ones per cluster. For a first plan, mix comparison articles (closest to a signup) with how-to articles (more traffic). We suggest an order in the first 20 articles to write for your app.
A simple scoring rule to prioritize:
- High: low difficulty, clear link to your app, competitor ranks with a weak page.
- Medium: decent volume, moderate difficulty, indirect link to your app.
- Low: high difficulty or weak relevance. Park these for later.
Keep watching
Competitors publish new articles and climb for new terms. Check your list monthly: new pages that gain traffic quickly point to topics worth covering.
Soloreach’s competitor watch tracks the domains you add, flags new articles that start bringing them traffic, and shows keywords where you’re close to overtaking them. It sits next to their social videos, so you see their whole content strategy in one place.
A worked example
Say you’re launching a habit tracker. You add three domains: a direct competitor app, a broad productivity blog and a psychology site. A keyword gap report returns a few hundred terms. After filtering:
- “habit tracker for adhd”: a competitor ranks fifth with a short list post that hasn’t been updated in two years. Medium volume, low difficulty. High priority.
- “habit stacking examples”: the productivity blog ranks third with a strong, long guide. Decent volume, moderate difficulty. Medium priority, and only if you can add examples it doesn’t have.
- “best habit tracker app”: large sites own the top results. Low priority for now.
Three keywords, three different decisions. That’s the point of the exercise: you’re not trying to beat competitors everywhere, only where their page is weak and your app is relevant.
Mistakes to avoid
- Chasing volume alone. A keyword with huge volume and no link to your app brings visitors who never sign up.
- Ignoring search intent. If the top results are all videos or product pages, an article may not be what Google wants for that query.
- Writing one article per keyword variation. “Habit tracker ADHD” and “ADHD habit app” usually belong in the same article.
- Forgetting your existing pages. Sometimes the best move is improving an article you already have, not writing a new one.
FAQ
Are SEO tools’ traffic numbers accurate?
They’re estimates based on clickstream data and ranking models. Use them to compare pages and keywords, not as exact figures.
Can I rank for a keyword a big competitor owns?
Sometimes, with a more specific angle or a narrower audience. Start with long-tail variations of the term.
How many keywords should I target per article?
One main keyword and a handful of close variations. Different intents usually deserve different articles.
Is copying a competitor’s article structure OK?
Learning from structure is normal. Copying their text isn’t, and it won’t rank anyway. Write from your own experience and data.
