Anticipating 2027 and the strategies you’ll move forward with is crucial in the last quarter of the business year. Leaving a strategy until January puts your business at a disadvantage. Rushing risks potential delays and missing timely strategic opportunities that set the pace for the first quarter of the year.

The areas of your marketing strategy you need to consider

• Pay-per-click (PPC)
• Paid media
• SEO
• Content creation

Each area of a solid marketing strategy lays the foundation for a successful year. Assessing all areas of your marketing allows for a cohesive plan that marries each aspect of your marketing roadmap.

Reviewing your performance in 2026

Reviewing performance begins by analysing your channel performance, covering everything from your website and social channels to ad management tools.

Establishing your marketing objectives and KPI’s

Defining the goals and metrics for success for your upcoming business year is fundamental to setting measurable benchmarks for your business. Not only does it give your strategy something to work towards, but it allows for better analysis across the four quarters in 2027.

The kind of objectives you set are largely informed by the attainment of the current year and the aspirations your business has for growth. Recognising patterns from your performance reviews allows you to set attainable objectives and KPI’s.

Some of the more important objectives to potentially set for your business cover things like raising brand awareness and increasing visibility, setting goals around customer retention and audience building, as well as goals for website and content performance, to name just a few.

Marketing objective                            Potential KPI

Increase brand awareness       →        Brand searches, reach

Generate more leads                     →        Qualified enquiries, conversion rate

Improve customer retention    →        Retention rate, repeat purchases

Increase marketing ROI               →        Marketing-generated revenue, ROMI

Expand organic visibility               →       Organic traffic, keyword rankings

Anticipating customer behaviour changes along with your existing audience

Your audience’s expectations, interests and behaviours aren’t necessarily going to remain the same from one year to the next. Changes in purchasing habits, emerging trends and the way people interact with businesses online can all influence how effective your marketing activities are.

Looking ahead to 2027 means considering whether your existing approach still aligns with the people you’re trying to reach. Are your customers using different platforms to discover businesses? Have their expectations around service, communication or purchasing changed? These are all worthwhile considerations when planning your next marketing strategy.

It’s also important not to lose sight of your existing audience while looking to attract new customers. Understanding what keeps your current customers engaged, what encourages repeat business and where their needs may be changing helps you build a strategy that supports both acquisition and retention.

Auditing and analysing competitors

Understanding what your competitors are doing can help you identify opportunities that may otherwise go unnoticed. A competitor audit gives you a better understanding of how other businesses in your industry are positioning themselves, the channels they’re prioritising and the kind of messaging they’re using to reach their audiences.

Look at their website content, search visibility, social media activity and paid advertising. Are there areas where competitors are performing particularly well? Equally, are there gaps in their approach that your business could capitalise on?

The purpose isn’t to replicate what other businesses are doing. Instead, it’s about recognising where your own marketing can stand out, identifying potential opportunities and understanding how your business compares within its market.

Fleshing out a plan across all areas of marketing

With your objectives established and opportunities identified, the next step is to start putting your strategy into practice. This means bringing each area of your marketing together and outlining the activities that will help you work towards your goals.

Consider what needs to happen across PPC, paid media, SEO and content creation. This could mean planning campaigns around key dates, identifying opportunities to improve existing website content or allocating more budget to channels that have delivered stronger results.

You’ll also need to think about the practicalities of putting your strategy into action. Establishing budgets, assigning responsibilities and setting realistic deadlines will help make sure your plans are achievable, rather than simply a list of things you’d like to do.

Breaking your strategy down into quarterly plans can make it easier to manage and review. It gives you the opportunity to assess what’s working throughout the year, make adjustments where needed and keep your marketing activities aligned with your wider objectives.

Taking the time to prepare now means you’re not starting from scratch in January. Instead, you’ll have a clearer idea of what needs to be prioritised, where your resources should be focused and how each area of marketing will contribute to your goals for 2027.

What is content pruning?

Content pruning is a process used to remove content that no longer serves a purpose. This could be because it’s become outdated, is no longer relevant to a business’s offering, or simply isn’t of a quality that reflects business standards.

When content is removed from a site, redirects may need to be put in place to send users and search engines to a relevant, existing piece of content. This could be:

• A newer version of the content
• A relevant alternative resource
• A category page providing a range of related resources
• A relevant service or product page

If there’s no suitable replacement, the page may be removed without a redirect.

How to decide what content needs to be pruned?

Pruning isn’t just done on a whim; it’s a tactical decision made through content analysis. Often the result of a content audit, which collects data on content performance to give insight into what works and what doesn’t and can often help rationalise decisions to delete content.

Considering factors as mentioned above, it essentially boils down to relevance and quality; a simple read-through often indicates whether something needs to be removed or revived. A content audit, which looks at metrics like click-through rate, views, average engagement times, and revenue earned, can reveal what isn’t performing by metrics.

In this process, there’s usually a benchmark for good, needs work, and bad. It’s content that either needs work but isn’t worth the time and resources, or that is bad and will be best suited for pruning. If content has consistently lost traffic and fallen in ranking, then it likely demonstrates the need to delete or at least review it for elimination.

An equal opportunity for removal is when the content is not attracting the right audience, often not relevant to your business’s offering.

An added benefit of removing content is removing index bloat. That essentially takes up space as Google’s indexing crawlers scan content that is no longer relevant, instead of content which would potentially build authority, send trust signals and help with rankings.

How often should content be pruned?

There’s no set frequency for how often you should prune content. As long as content remains useful, relevant and informative to your audience, there’s no basis for removal. Once content no longer has a lasting purpose, that’s an indicator that you may need to remove it.

A good frequency to check content relevance and performance is roughly every six months. Tracking it every time you check it helps you spot an overall trend in its performance; those with declining metrics indicate a need for renewal or elimination. 

A good pattern to establish is to do monthly monitoring, checking for significant traffic fluctuations or ranking drops. Every six months, you can then review the wider content library, allowing you to identify pages that need merging, updating or removing. Annually, reassess whether content still aligns with business services, the audience and your wider marketing strategy.

Keep your content relevant

Content pruning is an important part of maintaining a healthy website, ensuring your content continues to serve a purpose for both your business and your audience. By regularly reviewing performance, relevance and quality, you can identify opportunities to update, consolidate or remove content that no longer adds value.

Ultimately, content pruning isn’t about reducing the number of pages on your website, but making sure the content you have is working as effectively as possible.

What is Tone of Voice (TOV)?

TOV is the type of vocabulary used to communicate a brand’s message, which is often attributed an adjective like professional, friendly, or empowering. It essentially encapsulates the communication style of a brand.

It’s particularly important as it influences how audiences perceive and engage with the brands they support. We see clear examples of the kind of emotional or subconscious responses that brands are able to evoke, just through the way they communicate.

A key example is Nike, with their “Just do it” slogan. It’s to the point, motivational, but also slightly blunt. It works to empower and enthuse, whilst treading the line between being slightly bossy and commanding. But it works. It prompts customers to feel empowered and capable, and it’s clever how Nike communicates such a strong message in just three words.

Similarly, Lidl champions its “More to Value” messaging, which is again simple but a really strong communicator. It’s direct, and separating emotion from fact works. It reinforces Lidl’s position as a straightforward, affordable option, helping to build trust with customers. After all, there is often nothing more frustrating than a brand being all talk, with no real follow-through on its promises.

So, Does TOV Really Matter in Marketing?

Yes, TOV absolutely matters when it comes to marketing strategies. A disjointed TOV sends audiences mixed signals; it doesn’t capture the thoughts, position or values of a brand, which makes connecting with and investing in them much harder to do.

A study by NN Group found that the tone of voice used by a brand can influence how trustworthy and desirable it appears to users. In the study, trustworthiness accounted for 52% of the variation in users’ brand desirability ratings. This is a clear indicator of the relationship between how a brand communicates and how audiences perceive it. It also reinforces the importance of TOV as part of a marketer’s communication strategy.

Picking the right tone of voice for a brand’s messaging, goals, values, and identity is just as crucial as keeping a consistent TOV.

How does TOV help convert audience members into customers?

As we’ve touched upon, TOV is an incredibly effective tool for building trust. As trust is built, audiences feel safer and see a brand as more reliable, increasing the likelihood of them converting into customers.

Communication is the bridge between a brand and its audience. Being able to convey a message in a way that resonates with or engages them encourages engagement overall.

What often sets brands apart from others is their way of conveying style and voice. It’s an opportunity to be unique and stand out. TOV is often part of creating a recognisable brand identity, and a recognisable personality helps your brand differentiate itself from others, giving customers another reason to choose you.

How should a business develop its TOV?

The basis for developing a TOV is understanding who your brand is, what kind of message you want to communicate, and who it is that will receive the message (the audience). Knowing who you’re speaking to will help you tailor the tone to cater to them.

Defining your brand personality is also an essential step in creating a tone of voice. Identify a few adjectives that reflect how you want your business to come across, such as knowledgeable, relatable or factual.

Then apply it consistently. Make sure your tone is recognisable across different channels, even when adapting your messaging to suit the platform. Inconsistency is where customers can start to feel like they don’t recognise or understand the difference across platforms.

Ultimately, TOV is more than just the words a brand uses. It’s about how those words make your audience feel and the impression they leave behind. Getting it right can help build trust, strengthen brand recognition and give customers a reason to choose you over the competition. When it comes to conversions, how you communicate your message can be just as important as the message itself.

AI has its applications, but recently, more and more AI-generated menus, posters, and marketing materials have been cropping up. This has led to many online and offline comments about a lack of creativity, inaccurate representation, and a generally lazy approach to asset creation.

The core issues with AI-generated content

Beyond customers disengaging from AI-generated assets, there are several issues that are apparent with this approach. The key one is creative opportunities being taken from skilled designers, photographers and copywriters. Outsourcing content creation to AI snubs very capable content creators out of work.

So why is this an issue? Well, aside from the lack of work, it also raises issues around quality, styling, and effort. All of which creatives provide when designing marketing materials.

Other issues that present with AI-generated designs are the inconsistent quality. We observe a lack of textural accuracy with things like food items, with burger buns looking ultra shiny, burger patties looking bumpy, poorly coloured, and just generally not like food. Proportions are off, the colour palettes are often entirely different from the products, and “creative” liberties are taken with the overall styling.

What it highlights is the need for accurate media materials, especially when marketing materials like food menus are being distributed. There’s an art to food photography, which is excellent for inducing cravings and highlighting the nature of food. Think splashing drinks, dripping sauces, bites from food, which actually look like they’ve come from a person. These particular stylings help to sell a product, and AI rarely gets it right.

A key issue around AI-generated content, which we are yet to see the fallout for, is the fact that these engines will utilise training assets to develop designs. This could result in copy being plagiarised, designs verging on copyright infringement, and IP being stolen and repurposed for a cheap and quick solution.

Each compounded issue can very quickly erode the trust of customers, especially without explicit labelling that AI has been used. A core value of a great business is transparency, and without that, customers can be left wondering and assuming what else is disingenuous about the business.

Why do AI-generated assets bother customers?

As we touched on, distrust is a core problem raised with AI use. In addition to distrust, AI-slop can make customers feel:

• Like the materials don’t align with their experience, with the expectation versus reality causing a strong response and dislike.
• Feeling misled in their decision, whether that’s from inaccurate copy or added ingredients in generated food images.
• The erosion of the human experience; it’s like a chain reaction of distrust. If the menu is AI-generated, then what will be next? People want human experiences to be at the forefront of their experience, not being led by AI, which feels cold and lazy.

An insight into the audience’s response

We see a number of users across channels showing the same disdain for AI-generated content.

Keeping the Human Element in Marketing

AI can offer businesses useful ways to streamline content creation, but the quality and authenticity of the final result still matter. When marketing assets feel disconnected from the real product or experience, they can affect how customers perceive a brand.

Human creativity, expertise and attention to detail remain valuable in creating content that accurately represents what a business offers. By using technology alongside these skills, rather than allowing it to replace them entirely, businesses can benefit from greater efficiency without losing the human element that customers connect with.

The way social media and websites perform is evolving, and customer journeys are no longer linear. This shift requires businesses to adapt, whether that means reallocating marketing budgets or adjusting their visual approach to better align with customer expectations.

What is the marketing funnel?

The marketing funnel describes the varying levels of commitment an audience has to your product or service. Often described as a funnel, as the top lets in lots of people, whilst the process naturally eliminates uninterested or ill-fitting prospects, eventually with a smaller output of people who convert.

How does the marketing funnel inform marketing strategies?

A solid marketing strategy will account for the customers at the various stages of the funnel, producing content and campaigns that cater to each stage of the funnel. Understanding the different stages of engagement better allows the messaging and imagery to be tailored, with the aim of converting them.

The type of content produced for the top of the funnel, for instance, would differ significantly from that created for the bottom of the funnel. Depending on the stage of the funnel the customers are at, the goal will change, and therefore the strategy to achieve the conversion will need to be differentiated.

Measuring engagement for each stage of the marketing funnel

At the top of the funnel, the kind of metrics you’ll need to pay attention to are the reach and click-through rate. These metrics alone will help give you a sense of the interest generated, with the reach being the overall figure, and the click-through rate indicating interest.

As customers advance to the middle of the funnel, metrics that will begin to play a key role in your strategising, these include:

• Average duration
• Drop-off points
• Data captured information (the volume compared to reach)
• Cost per lead
• Engagement rate

The middle of the funnel is where the “make it or break it” moment happens; it shows the clear strengths and challenges. It’s perhaps the most insightful because it allows businesses to distinguish exactly what customers do and do not respond to.

At the bottom of the funnel is where all the work you have done in terms of strategy is either validated or highlights greater pain points. Metrics you’ll need to track for this stage of the funnel range from conversion rates and retention to the customer’s lifetime value.

To calculate your customer lifetime value, you’ll need to multiply the average purchase value by the purchase frequency and the predicted customer lifespan.

Retention is just as crucial as acquisition, as it indicates just how much of the audience wants to engage, an indicator of strong growth. Personalisation is a non-negotiable; in fact, it’s a determining feature in why some customers stay. A better understanding of the interplay of these will allow brands to connect with customers on a profound level.

What is a brand ambassador?

A brand ambassador is usually a long-term partnership between a brand and a celebrity/influencer, where they act as a representative of the company. Some of the responsibilities of a brand ambassador extend beyond representation; they may also need to:

• Promote the brand
• Create content for it
• Attend events hosted by said brand
• Develop a rapport with customers
• Often, ambassadors will wear the products or use services year-round as part of their contract

Brand ambassadors can be paid, though the approach will depend on the business. Some may pay per post, some brands may offer a fixed salary, while others may provide products or services at a reduced price or remove costs altogether.

What is a brand affiliate?

Brand affiliates are a short-term relationship between a brand and an influencer/celebrity, often collaborating for a campaign or the release of affiliate codes through partnerships. Some of the key tasks they may undertake during this period include:

• Sharing products on social media
• Creating promotional content
• Delivering measurable assets (on which they will measure performance)

Brand affiliates are often paid partnerships, where the engagement and sales made through their code earn them a percentage of the revenue.

What are the key differences between a brand ambassador and an affiliate?

The two roles can look very similar on the surface, but they’re quite different in their structure, motivation and relationship with a company.

The nature of the relationship is often quite different. A brand ambassador has a long-term, closer relationship with the brand. Reflecting values and identities aligned with branding. By contrast, an affiliate relationship is more transactional. They help promote products when it benefits them, without needing to be aligned with brand values.

A key difference between an affiliate and an ambassador is the payment structure. Affiliates are only paid by performance, usually earning a commission on each sale made with their tracked link or code. While ambassadors are often paid or are gifted free products and are also given exclusive access.

Expectations in terms of brand representation often differ quite drastically. Ambassadors take on a role as a face for a brand, often working on events, product launches and campaigns. They establish a relationship with both the brand and its customers.

The style and type of content created for a brand. There’s an overlap in terms of the content expectations placed on an affiliate or ambassador.  Ambassadors usually produced consent that is designed to feel authentic, with lifestyle-based content of the product being used. Affiliates are often associated with more sales-based types of content, whether that an ad, or softer types of content like their top 5 products.

Commitment levels vary for affiliates and ambassadors, but generally speaking, ambassadors are loyal to the brand, avoiding promoting any competitors. Whereas an affiliate doesn’t need to concern themselves with what brands they associate with.

Which is better for my brand: A brand ambassador or a brand affiliate?

Either role is inherently “better”; it depends on the goal. For brands, ambassadors are better for long-term brand building and trust, while affiliates are better for driving immediate sales and measurable results. For creators, ambassadorships offer stability and stronger partnerships, while affiliate roles offer flexibility and performance-based earning potential.

Each serves a different purpose depending on the goals of the brand or creator. Ultimately, the choice between a brand ambassador and an affiliate comes down to whether the priority is building long-term relationships and trust or driving short-term, measurable results.

Content chunking is one of the latest terms attributed to the way we structure content, particularly so that it is optimised for AI responses.

Content chunking breaks long-form content down into digestible logical chunks, so it’s easy for the AI to dissect the relevant information. This means shorter pieces of text, listicles, and clearly defined content hierarchies, along with methodical wording in both text and sub-headings to identify the key topics being discussed.

Does my business need to start content chunking?

Content chunking isn’t necessarily a new approach to creating content; in fact, it’s more common than not to accommodate readers with shorter, scannable and ultimately digestible pieces of copy.

However, utilising this approach as a framework for content can be useful if businesses feel it’s in their interest to push their content in AI responses.  In some cases, content chunking isn’t suitable for the type of content being produced. For instance, a research paper’s most appropriate format is, as it has always been, a long-form investigation. If it requires context to understand it, then chunking it can remove the necessary detail required to understand the discussion.

Equally, some content can’t be chunked because it’s already short, i.e. FAQs. It can unnecessarily bulk content which does not need it, detracting from its value and reducing its contextual relevance.

The benefits of content chunking include:

• Increased visibility on search engines and AI engines
• Increased chance of click-through rates when people want to explore sources
• Authority is developed with audiences and engines as you’re being ranked higher
• Content becomes more scannable to readers, which can help with engagement
• Content chunking can help make retrospective content updates quicker and easier

What are some examples of content chunking?

Clear Topic Boundaries

Each section should have a specific topical focus, keeping each paragraph to one specific idea. This works in content chunking because it defines different areas of a discussion, making it easier for AI to make the distinction between what is and isn’t contextually relevant.

This ensures each chunk works independently, making it easier for AI and other engines to directly pull into the results

Structural clarity

Utilising formatting to signal different segments, whether that’s through headings and subheadings, bullet points, labelling, and grouping by theme. It creates content that is easier to digest, and makes it clear what it’s trying to achieve.

Consistency in content length

Each chunk should fall between 100 and 300 words each time. Keeping this consistent ensures your content is effectively broken down, splitting it between 1-3 paragraphs.

Each section should ideally be uniform in length, making it easier for the AI to understand what content needs to be retrieved.

Logical entry and exit points

Each section should have a logical beginning and end. Natural conclusions in content chunks are essential for properly breaking down content. It’s important that it doesn’t cut off mid-idea or instruction.

This is how content chunking looks on our blog on colour schemes in branding, before and after.

In summary, content chunking is less about changing what you say and more about improving how you structure it. By organising ideas into focused, clearly labelled sections, you make your content easier for both people and AI systems to understand, retrieve, and reference. Not every piece of content needs to be chunked, but where it fits, this approach can improve visibility, usability, and long-term value. As search and AI-driven discovery continue to grow, clear structure and logical flow will play an increasingly important role in how your content performs.

Growing a small YouTube channel can often be a frustrating experience for up-and-coming channels. The platform is extremely competitive, and the algorithm can often feel almost random, sometimes pushing your videos to achieve a healthy number of views, while other videos underperform, leaving you to wonder where you went wrong. YouTube Shorts can be a great way to help boost channel performance, both in the early stages of content creation and for already established channels.

Why YouTube Shorts are Important

On traditional YouTube videos, it is very difficult to be able to gain traction on YouTube search pages due to the highly competitive nature of most content. Outside of getting your video to appear on Google’s SERP, most people’s views will typically come from a combination of subscribers already following their channel and some new viewers from Google or YouTube. This is what makes YouTube Shorts so important; shorts are much more viral in nature, and don’t require subscribers to get views. YouTube will show your shorts to new users early on if they like similar content, and if your shorts perform well, a snowball effect will take place, which can see your views rise rapidly in a short amount of time.

How to make a Short Perform

There are a couple of key elements to making sure a short performs optimally, and most importantly, the hook. In the opening 2 seconds, your script needs to be able to explain what your video is about and be engaging enough for audiences to want to learn more, making it the most crucial part of your video. Nailing this and keeping people intrigued is probably the most important part of any short, but the pacing is also something that needs to be taken into consideration. If people are watching your shorts in full or on repeat your much more likely to get a viewership boost from YouTube. Pacing your short so it doesn’t lose people’s interest is important, keeping it engaging all the way through.

Turning Shorts into Subscribers

While shorts are great for attracting new viewers, one way in which they are not as reliable as long-form videos is in turning viewers into subscribers. Due to the short-form nature of YouTube shorts, people often flick through from one to the next and don’t have much incentive to stop and look around your channel, which people typically do more often with longer-form content. Therefore, finding ways to use your shorts to attract users to your channel is important. A good way to improve subscriber count with shorts is by including a call to action, such as breaking the short up into 2 parts and explaining you have a part 2 on your channel or linking your shorts to full-length channel videos, thus eliminating the limitations of shorts.

Understanding how YouTube shorts work allows you to accelerate the growth of your channel to new heights, wether your just starting or you’re already an experienced YouTuber.

The objective for B2C and B2B marketing is quite similar in the sense that it looks to engage and evoke a response. It’s the approach and strategy that tend to diverge from each other, as the audiences differ drastically.

Business-to-Business Content Marketing

Business-to-business content marketing looks at how it can push a product or service for an entire business/ team of employees, rather than a singular audience member. This requires an entirely different strategy than B2C content marketing, as it’s looking at long-term objectives like building trust, a reputation, and ultimately working towards a return on investment.

• Build rapport, trust and a reputation with content for this audience
• Context-driven content that appeals to a broader audience
• Data-led decision-making means it’s a longer sales funnel, and as such, content should serve to support but not be the driving factor in converting

Business to Client Content Marketing

Business-to-client content marketing is the typical style of marketing we encounter, from newsletters from your favourite brands to the ads we see as we scroll aimlessly on social channels.

• Customers are emotionally driven by products; it’s much more about the individual experience than anything else
• Behaviour and interest-driven
• A shorter sales cycle, which looks to inspire momentary responses like impulse buying
• An overall softer and simpler way to approach the audience, as it looks to create a sense of relatability or intrigue, which then encourages engagement

The Key Differences between B2C and B2B Content Marketing

There are some major differences in how content marketing is done when comparing B2B and B2C practices. The main things content marketing boils down to:

The Audience – The audiences differ so much, and the ways they discover and explore content to reach the end goal (a service or item). Content marketing tends to drive conversions much faster for B2C than its B2B counterpart, which often requires a slower, more thought-out approach to investing in a product or service.

This means the journey taken and the way they interact during that journey will be entirely different. While a B2C customer may become invested, feel a connection to a brand, a business (B2B) would make decisions that are informed by their existing strategy, budget and so on, which is what makes it a lengthier process to convert.

The Type and Tone of Content –

Business-to-business content often adopts a no frills, factual, professional format, cutting through any fluff and getting straight to the important details. Whilst this doesn’t always apply to B2B, it’s fairly typical to still see this matter-of-fact way of producing content.

B2C businesses can take more creative liberties with the styles of content, the message used for content, and the tone that it’s communicating. The tone is often much softer, relatable and approachable for a customer. It’s meant to connect with the audience on a deeper level than that of a B2B piece of content.

Content Formats and Destinations

Another difference in how content is marketed to these different audiences is via the format of content and the destination at which it is posted. You’ll find B2B companies posting in places that are widely seen as professional, including LinkedIn and paywalled websites.

Final Thoughts

While B2B and B2C content marketing share the same core goal—to engage audiences and inspire action—the paths they take to get there are worlds apart. B2B thrives on logic, trust, and long-term relationship building, while B2C speaks to emotion, immediacy, and personal connection. Understanding these nuances allows brands to tailor their content strategy with precision—meeting their audience exactly where they are and driving meaningful results that last.

What is a competitor content audit?

A competitor content audit analyses the various competitors of a business to measure their performance and output to create a better-informed content marketing strategy.

A competitor content audit will analyse all the content of a competitor’s website, whether that’s service or product pages, the home page, or their blog. It evaluates the quality of the content by assessing its relevance, usefulness, and uniqueness. This is then compiled into tangible optimisations and recommendations.

Why do we do competitor audits?

Competitor content audits allow us to create a data-informed content strategy by identifying areas for opportunity and growth. This ensured that your business keeps up with and eventually propels past competitors by learning from their failures and accomplishments.

We look for:

• The topics covered
• The length and structure of the content
• The formats used
• The quality of assets/ if assets have been used
• Content performance
• What type of search intent does the content cater to

How to do a competitor content audit

1.     Finding competitors

Establishing your competitors is ground zero, then you build up. You can figure out who your competition is in a couple of different ways. The first is through search. For instance, if you’re a furniture shop, you’d look at established brands selling the same products, as well as more local competitors.

The second route is to survey the public to get a consensus about preferred brands for your specific industry. If you’re already established and have found you’ve lost a customer, follow up and find out with whom they’ve opted with.

Using review platforms to identify the audience perception of brands, i.e Trustpilot, Yelp, and Tripadvisor.

2.     Competitor analysis tools

Utilising competitive analysis software is what elevates your evaluation, utilising data to accurately depict the successes and pitfalls of competitors’ content. We utilise tools like SE Ranking, Crunchbase, and Ahrefs. These tools quantify success through metrics like traffic volumes, keyword tracking, automating the tracking process and making identifying trends simpler.

SE Ranking

An all-in-one SEO platform that streamlines features like tracking keyword ranking against competitors, assessing page performance, performing backlink analysis, and monitoring any changes like new page launches.

Ahrefs

Ahrefs is another leading SEO intelligence platform, allowing marketers to undertake backlink analysis, rank tracking, site audits, content exploration, along competitor analysis.

Crunchbase

Crunchbase is essentially a database of businesses with predictive intelligence capabilities by compiling numerous sources to paint a picture of a company’s performance. Its interface contains a growth score, insight signals and growth predictions, which can be great for identifying competitors gaining momentum.

3.     Comparative analysis to identify opportunities

Once you’re set up on your competitor analysis tools, it’s time to begin analysing the data, tracking against their keywords, and assessing the quality and volume of their backlinks.

Data is super telling, so if competitors are ranking poorly for shared keywords, there’s an opportunity for you to surpass them by optimising for that particular keyword. Unfurl your competitors’ strategies through the data. Once you identify their successes, look at the content on their site and make a note of why it is performing.

4.     Outlining the next steps

Once you’ve painted a picture of what is and isn’t working for your competitors, you can apply those findings to your content performance. Establishing areas where you can improve your content, increase your output and achieve the goals your business has set out to reach.