Ideas on competitors website jumping so quickly?

[Trey3]

Aloha Moz community!

I've been chipping away on my site and have been happy to see progress on getting to the first page for some searches I'd like to rank for.

That being said and during my time doing this I noticed a fellow photographer jump to the first page out of what seems like nowhere!

http://emilyhelen.com/

It left me scratching my head trying to figure out where and how they're site jumped up to the front so fast and has been holding strong since then. Do you guys have any ideas or ways I could replicate that?

Much appreciated as always guys!

Warmest aloha,

Jon Gibb

[Trey3]

Awesome breakdown and many thanks for your insight!

After checking out what you suggested it became very clear what the 411 was! Lots of good links in comparison to my 1 good link vs 23!

[Hurf]

You haven't given us too much to go on (what searches are you performing and what results are being delivered - are they local results etc.) However...

The first step to replicating (and surpassing) a site's success is to understand it.

To get you started, take a look at Moz's Open Site Explorer, searching around this website and you'll see that this site has only a small number of established links from a handful root domains,  though the ones present almost all relate to Wedding Photography, none of them are spammy and most have a respectable Domain Authority. If you look Linking Domains and change Target to Root Domain (https://moz.com/researchtools/ose/domains?site=emilyhelen.com&target=domain&sort=domain_authority&page=1) you'll see a list of these, the linking pages and their DA.

You can also Compare Link Metrics for your site against this, here: https://moz.com/researchtools/ose/comparisons?site=emilyhelen.com

Quality, inbound links which pass on link equity from related sites are a big factor as they serve as endorsements, so you'll certainly want to develop as many of these as you can and the best way to do this is through building relationships with the humans behind the sites and getting them to engage with your content - if they like it there's a good chance they'd be happy to share it with their audience.

Also, be sure to check that your assumptions are correct. To do so, take advantage of the Rank Checker, here: https://moz.com/researchtools/rank-tracker which you can use to confirm your (and your competitor's ranking) for a variety of keywords, to check that what your seeing in your browser is a true reflection of what the rest of the world are seeing.

Beyond that, this site has nothing much in the way of text content (that I can discern at a glance).

I hope that helps give you a clearer understanding.

Good luck!

[I.AM.Strategist]

Hi Jon,

I'd happily take a look at this for you. What search term are you trying to rank for?

What is your own page optimisation score for that term?

What is your PA and DA of your competition (relative to your own) in the rankings?

[advertisingcloud]

I would try to check their back link profile, either with moz or majestic. What type of links they have what you do not. How do they rank in this category in regards to their back link profile?

I would also make sure your own internal linking is correct as double content issues sometimes spread quite a bit of your link juice. (if you have index.php the directs have been done  also that your www has a redirect to your domain or the other way around depending  on your configuration)