Klassifizierung und Verwaltung
Organisieren Sie Wettbewerber nach Typ und verwalten Sie Ihr Wettbewerbsumfeld.
Classification Types
Every competitor in your landscape is assigned a classification type that determines how it is treated in analysis, reporting, and competitive tracking. You can classify competitors at any time from the Competitors settings page.
| Classification | Description | Use Case |
|---|---|---|
| Direct Competitor | Operates in the same market and targets the same audience as your brand. | Primary competitive benchmarking and head-to-head analysis. |
| Indirect Competitor | Operates in an adjacent market with an overlapping audience. | Monitoring emerging threats and cross-market positioning. |
| My Brand | Your own domain, used for multi-domain setups. | Tracking how your other domains perform relative to your primary project domain. |
| Ignored | Hidden from all analysis and reporting. | Excluding irrelevant domains that were auto-discovered but are not actual competitors. |
How to Classify Competitors
When competitors are first discovered (either via Smart Discovery or added manually), they default to the Direct Competitor classification. To change a competitor's classification:
- Navigate to Project Settings > Competitors.
- Locate the competitor you want to reclassify.
- Click the classification dropdown next to the competitor's name.
- Select the new classification type from the list.
The change takes effect immediately. Any ongoing or future analyses will use the updated classification. Historical data is preserved and remains associated with the competitor regardless of classification changes.
Reclassification
You can reclassify a competitor at any time without losing data. Reclassifying a competitor from Direct to Indirect adjusts how prominently they appear in competitive reports but retains all tracked metrics. Reclassifying to Ignored hides the competitor from dashboards, reports, and active analysis, but the underlying data is not deleted. If you reclassify an ignored competitor back to Direct or Indirect, all historical tracking data becomes visible again.
Managing Competitors
Beyond classification, you can manage your competitive landscape with the following actions:
- Add manually - Enter a competitor domain directly to add it to your landscape. Manually added competitors are preserved during Smart Discovery refreshes.
- Remove - Permanently delete a competitor and all associated tracking data. This action cannot be undone.
- Refresh - Trigger a new Smart Discovery cycle. Auto-discovered competitors are replaced with fresh results, while manually added competitors remain untouched.
Tracking Dimensions
Rankfender tracks each classified competitor across two distinct dimensions, providing a comprehensive view of competitive performance:
Traditional SEO Tracking
Traditional SEO metrics provide a foundation for understanding each competitor's organic search presence:
- Domain Authority - A composite score reflecting the overall strength of the competitor's domain in search engines.
- Backlinks - The total number of inbound links, indicating link-building strength and domain trust.
- Common Keywords - Keywords where both your domain and the competitor rank in search results.
- Organic Traffic - Estimated monthly organic traffic to the competitor's domain.
AI Visibility Tracking
AI visibility metrics capture how competitors perform in AI-generated responses, which increasingly influence user decisions:
- Mention Frequency - How often the competitor is referenced in AI responses across your tracked prompts.
- Share of Voice - The proportion of AI mentions this competitor receives relative to all competitors in your landscape.
- Head-to-Head Comparison - Direct win/loss metrics when your brand and the competitor appear in the same AI response.
Together, these two tracking dimensions give you a complete picture of where each competitor stands in both traditional search and the emerging AI-driven discovery landscape.