Competitors

How competitor tracking works

A competitor is a hostname you add to a domain. They are measured on your keywords, in your scans — they have no keywords of their own. Whenever we fetch a results page for one of your keywords, we record where each competitor appeared on that same page.

This is why adding a competitor costs no slots: the page was already being fetched. The only limit is how many competitors your plan allows per domain.

History from day one

When you add a competitor, PicoRank back-fills their history from search results already stored — so they appear with weeks or months of context immediately, rather than starting flat and filling in over time.

The app tells you how many observations were recovered. It is derived from the same stored pages a live scan would read, so the numbers match.

Choosing competitors

Track who actually appears on your results pages, which is often not who you think of as a competitor. A trade magazine, a marketplace or a directory outranking you is more actionable than a rival whose site never shows up.

Look at the SERP panel on a keyword's drill-down to see who is really there.

Path-scoped competitors

Competitors can be path-scoped too: marketplace.com/sellers/you-rival. Useful when your competitor is a storefront on a larger platform rather than a site of their own.