Search competitor research report

Discover who repeatedly appears across a keyword set before choosing competitors for deeper research. A recurring domain is a search competitor for this sample, not automatically a business competitor.

Install and run the report

Install the CLI once, then run seo start to connect your site and Google data. After setup you can run this report yourself or ask your agent to run it.

Runafter install

Install the SEO CLI globally.

npm i -g seo

Run setup after installation.

seo start

Run search competitors through the report catalog.

seo reports run serp-competitors --params '{"keywords":["blue widget","red widget","widget prices"],"targetDomain":"example.com","countryCode":"GB","languageCode":"en","limit":25}' --json

What you get from this report

Find domains that repeatedly appear for an explicit keyword set, preserve declared site types, and leave unknown search competitors safely unclassified.

Best for: You want to discover search competitors before choosing a small set for deeper research.
Needs: Explicit keyword set and country market
You get: Find domains that repeatedly appear for an explicit keyword set, preserve declared site types, and leave unknown search competitors safely unclassified.
Use next: Ranking pages and patterns

Every report follows the same rules for missing data and outside estimates.See how report data works.

What you need before you run it

The report uses the information below. Optional sources are only used when you ask for them.

Explicit keyword set and country market

Define the limited query set used to find domains that repeatedly appear in the same search market.

Target domain and optional site classifications

Separate the target and user-declared business competitors from publishers, directories, communities, marketplaces, and unknown sites.

Optional multi-domain ranked-keyword exports

Find recurring domains in one to four local provider files without claiming they reproduce a live result page.

Use a different report for these jobs

These jobs need a different report or a manual review.

You need a current view of one query or a city-level and device-specific result.

Run SERP results. This report compares recurring domains across a country-level query set rather than capturing one live result page.

Live SERP results report

You have not reviewed and classified the returned domains.

Inspect representative pages and classify the relevant sites before running a keyword gap. Recurring search visibility alone does not make a domain a business competitor.

Needs more evidence

Use the report with an agent or in code

The command above is enough for most work. These options let an agent, script or application run the same report with explicit input and structured output.

Use the report catalog when an agent, script or CI job needs predictable JSON instead of the normal terminal output. Check the current input first, then run the report with the validated parameters.

Check the current input before the agent or script runs the report.

seo reports describe serp-competitors --json

Once the input is valid, run the report through the report catalog.

seo reports run serp-competitors --params '{"keywords":["blue widget","red widget","widget prices"],"targetDomain":"example.com","countryCode":"GB","languageCode":"en","limit":25}' --json

An MCP agent follows the same two-step flow. It inspects the current schema, fills the required fields and only then runs the report.

Ask the MCP server for the current report input.

{
  "id": "serp-competitors"
}

Run the report after the agent has checked and filled the input.

{
  "id": "serp-competitors",
  "params": {
    "keywords": [
      "blue widget",
      "red widget",
      "widget prices"
    ],
    "targetDomain": "example.com",
    "countryCode": "GB",
    "languageCode": "en",
    "limit": 25
  }
}

Install the package in a Node 22 project when your application needs to run the report directly. The result includes the same evidence, warnings and limits returned through the CLI and MCP server.

Add the SEO package to your project.

npm install seo

Run the report from your TypeScript application.

import { executeReport } from 'seo/mcp'

const result = await executeReport(
  'serp-competitors',
  {
  "keywords": [
    "blue widget",
    "red widget",
    "widget prices"
  ],
  "targetDomain": "example.com",
  "countryCode": "GB",
  "languageCode": "en",
  "limit": 25
},
)

console.log(result)

What to do next

Review every unknown site type before choosing competitors for deeper research. Keep publishers, directories, communities and marketplaces distinct, then compare a small relevant set instead of treating result overlap as business equivalence.

01Classify unknown domains as business, publisher, directory, community, or marketplace.
02Run ranking pages for relevant domains.
03Run competitor keyword gap only after excluding irrelevant site types.

See which pages carry a domain's estimated search footprint, which URL patterns repeat and how matching pages on your own site perform in Search Console.

Organic ranking pages report

Compare competitor keywords with Search Console themes, current rankings and repeated page patterns. Exclude irrelevant terms and evidence of existing coverage.

Competitor keyword gap report

Inspect exact organic ranks, domains, URLs, titles, snippets and result features for one keyword, location, language and device-specific search snapshot.