7 Lesser-Known Strategies to Find Competitor Keywords [2025]

While finding less competitive keywords to secure organic rankings is a common keyword strategy, it may not be the most effective. Then what is? Leveraging your competitors’ keywords.

Let me tell you why.

By publishing helpful content around competitors’ keywords, you compete against their existing customer base and market share. This helps you position yourself as an alternative option and drive more traffic and signups, giving you a competitive edge.

So yes, a content strategy filled with competitors’ keywords is more effective in attracting ideal customers. But how to find competitor keywords that they are already ranking for?

In this post, I’ll share seven strategies to find competition keywords, both using free and paid tools.

But first…

What are competitors’ keywords, and why are they important?

Competitors’ keywords are search terms for which your competitors are already ranking and driving traffic. These keywords are perfect to include in your content strategy because they allow you to create better content and outrank your competitors to capture a portion of their traffic and conversions.

Suppose you sell an online course hosting platform and want to rank for the keyword “how to sell online courses.”

Then, LearnWorlds and Hostinger are your competitors, and “how to sell online courses” is a competitor keyword. It’s perfect for targeting because if you outrank both sites, you could get a portion of their audience.  

But being able to steal your competitors’ traffic isn’t the only benefit. There are many other reasons why competitors’ keywords are essential:

1. Build an effective content strategy

Researching competitors’ keywords is a stepping stone for businesses starting their content efforts. When you don’t know where to begin, find keywords or ideas that are successful for your competitors to define your content strategy. Thorough competitor analysis also reveals content gaps and untapped markets to drive more traffic.

2. Identify market trends

Keeping track of competitors’ keywords allows you to identify SEO trends and interests in your market. You can also review their content performance to fine-tune your marketing messages and get maximum visibility for these trends.

3. Optimize PPC campaigns

By finding the keywords your competitors are bidding on in their pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, you can make informed decisions about your own ad spending to reduce costs and increase ROI. Of course, you bid on their high-value keywords and optimize your ad campaigns to get a share of their audience.

Now that you know why you should research competitors’ keywords, I will show you the seven strategies that I personally use to find competitor keywords.

7 Strategies to Find Competitor Keywords in 2025

Before searching competitors’ keywords, you need to identify your top competitors. Chances are, you would already know who they are. If not, a quick Google search or customer survey is also an excellent way to find your competitors.

Once you have 3 to 4 competitors, you’re ready for the next steps.

Here are seven ways to find competitor keywords in 2025:

• Use Google Search
• Check Competitor Website Content & Blogs
• Check Social Media and YouTube for Keyword Insights
• Use Google Search Operators
• Use a Keyword Research Tool
• Use a Content Gap Analysis Tool
• Let AI Find The Competitor Keywords

Use Google Search to Find Competitor Keywords

One of the easiest ways to find competitor keywords is to use Google itself. A simple search can reveal valuable insights about the keywords your competitors are targeting and ranking for.

Start by searching for a topic related to your industry. Say you run a fitness blog. You’ll search for “best home workouts.”

Look at the top-ranking pages — these are your biggest competitors for that keyword.

Pay attention to their titles, meta descriptions, and URLs. These often include primary keywords that help them rank. Take note of any recurring terms or phrases that appear across multiple competitors.

Scroll down to the People Also Ask section in search results. Click on the questions and expand to see which competitor pages are mentioned as answers. 

Finally, check the Related Searches at the bottom of the search results page. These are terms closely associated with your original keyword, often revealing additional keyword opportunities that your competitors are ranking for.

Google search is a quick and free way to gather competitor keyword insights. However, it lacks data on search volume, difficulty, and competition level. Once you have a list of keywords, gather these insights using our Keyword Researcher.

Simply plug in your keyword…

…and you can see the search volume, difficulty, and other metrics that’ll help you determine if a keyword is worth targeting.

Check Competitor Website Content & Blogs

One of the best ways to find competitor keywords is by analyzing their website content. Blog posts, landing pages, product descriptions, and even FAQ sections often reveal the keywords they’re targeting.

Say you run a home decor blog and your competitor is Elle Decor.

Visit their website and skim through their blog. Look at article titles, headings, and subheadings — these often contain primary keywords. If you notice certain terms appearing repeatedly across multiple articles, note these down as primary keywords.

If they have a category or tag system, explore those as well. These often group related content, revealing keyword themes they’re targeting.

Once you’ve found a bunch of keywords, you can again review them using Keyword Researcher.

Check Social Media and YouTube for Keyword Insights

Social media platforms and YouTube are often overlooked when it comes to keyword research, but they can provide valuable insights into what your competitors are targeting.

Start by looking at your competitor’s social media posts, captions, and hashtags. Platforms like Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn can give you an idea of the topics they’re focusing on. If you see certain terms or phrases being used frequently, they may be important keywords for your niche.

YouTube is another powerful source of competitor keywords. Search for a topic in your industry and check the titles, descriptions, and tags of top-ranking videos. These often contain relevant keywords that drive traffic.

For example, looking for “home decor ideas” on YouTube shows us that competitors are ranking for the keyword “aesthetic room decor.”

A quick search using the Keyword Researcher reveals that it’s a keyword with 4400 search volume and 18 difficulty, which means it’s a keyword you should target too.

Also, pay attention to the comment sections on social media and YouTube videos. People often ask questions or discuss topics related to the content, which can reveal new keyword opportunities. If you see repeated questions, consider creating content around them.

Social media and YouTube won’t give you detailed keyword metrics like search volume or difficulty, but they can help you identify trending topics and high-engagement keywords that your competitors are already using. You can always use keyword research tools for additional metrics and insights.

Use a Keyword Research Tool to Find Competitor Keywords

Manually searching for competitor keywords can be effective, but it’s time-consuming. A tool like Keyword Researcher speeds up the process by giving you a detailed breakdown of the keywords your competitors rank for, along with important metrics like search volume, keyword difficulty, and competition level.

If you haven’t already, sign up for a free Writesonic account. Then, just insert your seed keyword in the Keyword Researcher and click on Identify Keywords.

It gives you the overview of the keyword along with a bunch of lists of other keywords. At the bottom, click on the Competitor Terms list.

You get a list of all the keywords your competitors rank for that are related to the seed keyword, along with their search volume, intent, and competition.

You can further insert these keywords back in the Keyword Researcher to get more metrics or find a new list of competitor keywords.

Use a Content Gap Analysis Tool

If you’ve signed up for the Keyword Researcher, you’ll get full access to Writesonic’s suite of tools, which includes the Content Gap Analysis tool. This tool can also be used as a method to find competitor keywords — if you already have a blog or an article published. But it can be a little tricky.

To start, open the Content Gap Analysis tool and insert the article link that you want to optimize with competitor keywords, and click on Next.

Choose a seed keyword to rank the article for:

Select the required competitors and start the analysis:

You can see a list of secondary keywords competitors have targeted for the given topic.

If you click on View Suggestions, you can also see suggestions on how exactly to incorporate these competitor keywords into your article.

Let AI Find Competitor Keywords

Manually researching competitor keywords can take hours, even with advanced SEO tools. If you find the whole process tedious or want to find competitor keywords, simply switch to AI tools that are equipped to find competitor keywords, such as the SEO AI Agent.

The SEO AI Agent is connected to all the necessary SEO tools, such as Ahrefs and Semrush, and can also analyze Google SERPs. Just use the below prompt:

Prompt: Find competitor keywords for the topic “[topic/seed keyword]” for “[website].”

And the SEO AI Agent will connect with the right tools, run a thorough analysis of competitor pages, and give a detailed report on the competitor keywords. Apart from a list of competitor keywords, you can also see exactly how competitors have placed those keywords and find actionable insights on using the keywords in your own content.

Final Thoughts: How to Find Competitor Keywords for Your Website

Finding competitor keywords is a smart way to look for ranking opportunities and incorporate them in your content. However, finding what keywords your competitors are ranking for isn’t always easy. We’ve discussed multiple ways to find such keywords in the guide above.

However, manual methods have their own limitations. They take time and are too tedious, especially if you want to find competition keywords in bulk.

Instead, we recommend using the SEO AI Agent — an AI-powered tool that’s designed for keyword research. It can go through competitor pages, extract commonly used keywords, and give suggestions on how you can incorporate them in your content.

With a single prompt, you can have a list of competition keywords in minutes — what would usually take you hours to build using manual methods and traditional tools.

Ready to outrank your competitors? Sign up for SEO AI Agent for free!

Niyati Mahale

Niyati Mahale is a Content Writer @Writesonic. She specializes in artificial intelligence and B2B, with a flair for combining effective storytelling and SEO best practices to create impactful content.