Competitor Keyword Research: How to Pull Keywords the Right Way
Competitor keyword research done right: pull category menus and sitemaps from rivals, then filter by business scope so you keep real keywords and drop brands, labels, and out-of-scope products.
Competitor keyword research is one of the fastest ways to find category gaps — and one of the easiest to do badly. Most people export a rival’s keyword list and treat every term as a target, which drags in brand names, navigation labels, and products they do not even sell. Done right, it is a two-part move: pull broadly, then filter hard against what your business actually offers.
Pulled broadly and filtered hard, a rival’s site becomes a usable seed list. This guide shows how, with the real numbers from an antenna cluster — following how to find seed keywords and feeding the B2B keyword research workflow.
The quick answer
- Pick 4–6 close competitors that sell roughly what you sell.
- Pull their product/category menus, collection pages, and XML sitemaps.
- Add the terms they clearly rank for if you use a keyword tool.
- Sort every term into keep, combine, or drop against your business scope.
- Keep only in-scope category nouns; expand those later.
The output is not “their keywords.” It is a filtered seed list you can actually build pages from.
Step 1 — Pick the right competitors
Choose competitors by overlap with your catalog, not by size. A giant rival that sells ten product lines you do not touch is mostly noise. In the antenna build, the most useful reference was a competitor whose coverage — 4G LTE, 5G Sub-6, GPS/GNSS — almost exactly matched the business scope. That overlap made its menu a near-direct map of in-scope categories.
Four to six well-chosen competitors give you enough coverage without drowning you in terms.
Step 2 — Pull menus, collections, and sitemaps
Three sources cover most of it:
- Navigation and category menus — the cleanest list of how a competitor groups products.
- Collection / category pages — often reveal sub-categories and modifiers (by frequency, by mount, by application).
- XML sitemaps (
/sitemap.xml) — the full URL inventory, including pages not linked in the menu.
Add B2B directories where your competitors list — everythingRF, ThomasNet, Metoree — because their filters and category trees are themselves keyword sources.
In this build, pulling the full category lists from six competitor sites produced about 250 terms. That is the raw material, not the answer.
Step 3 — Sort every term: keep, combine, or drop
The whole value is in the filter. Run each of the ~250 terms against your one-line business scope and sort it:
| Action | What it is | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Keep | A real in-scope product/category noun | gps patch antenna, ceramic patch antenna |
| Combine | A modifier that needs a product noun | 5g → 5g patch antenna |
| Drop | Brand/series names, nav labels, out-of-scope, cross-line products | Thunder, Products – All, wifi patch antenna, speakers |
After this pass, ~250 raw competitor terms became about 50 real seed keywords. Everything that survived was in scope; everything that drifted — WiFi/Bluetooth terms, brand series, navigation cruft — was gone before any expansion.
Step 4 — Watch for the brand-name trap
The most common error is keeping competitor brand and series names because they have search volume. They convert poorly and signal the wrong topical focus — you are not the brand people are searching for. Drop them. Keep only the generic category terms underneath the brand.
A free side benefit of this research: the competitors who keep showing up in your category SERPs are also your directory and link targets. If everyone in your space lists on everythingRF or ThomasNet, that is where you list too.
Common mistakes
- Treating the whole export as keywords. Most of a competitor’s menu is brands, labels, and products you do not sell.
- Copying their site structure. Their URL layout fits their catalog, not yours. Take the terms, not the architecture.
- Skipping the scope filter. Without it, competitor research is the fastest way to drift out of your lane.
- Ignoring smaller, closer rivals. A tightly matched small competitor is more useful than a sprawling large one.
FAQ
How do I find a competitor’s keywords for free?
Pull their navigation menus, category/collection pages, and XML sitemap, and read the B2B directories they list on. A keyword tool adds volume context, but the free structural sources give you the category list itself.
Should I target the same keywords as my competitors?
Only the in-scope ones. Match the category terms you both genuinely sell, and skip their brand names and any products outside your scope.
How many competitors should I analyze?
Four to six closely matched competitors is usually enough. Beyond that you get diminishing returns and more out-of-scope noise to filter.
Is competitor keyword research the same as copying their content?
No. You are collecting category terms and gaps, then validating intent and writing original pages. Copying structure or content hurts more than it helps.
Conclusion
Competitor keyword research works when you pull broadly and filter ruthlessly: gather menus, collections, and sitemaps from a few well-matched rivals, then sort every term into keep, combine, or drop against your business scope. That is how ~250 competitor terms become ~50 real seeds instead of a list that pulls you off topic.
Next, validate those seeds with search intent on the SERP, or see the full filter run in the B2B topic cluster example.
Written by Taylor Yang. More on the method and the author on the about page.
Free template: the keep/combine/drop filter above, plus the keyword map and content brief templates.
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