Competitor Manager

Summary#

Competitor Manager — titled Competitor Vault on screen — is the saved list of domains you compete with. You tag each one by relationship, see the roster at a glance, and launch a Domain Overview, a Competitor Battle or a Bulk Analysis straight from a row.

Purpose#

Everyone who does competitive work keeps this list somewhere: a spreadsheet, a note, or in their head. It goes stale, it lives on one person's laptop, and every analysis starts by retyping the same six domains.

The vault exists so the list has a home inside the product, one click from the tools that use it. It is a workspace, not a report — it does not analyze anything by itself.

Overview#

You add domains one at a time, each with a relationship tag: Direct, Indirect, Aspirational or Emerging. The screen shows a summary of the roster, and once you have two or more saved it unlocks two charts — the mix of relationship types, and an authority comparison.

Each row carries actions that hand the domain to another tool. The vault itself never runs an analysis and never charges a credit; the tools it hands off to do both.

Your list is stored in the browser you are using, not on your account. It does not follow you to another device or appear for a teammate, and it holds up to 50 domains.

Benefits#

• One place for the competitive set, instead of a spreadsheet nobody updates.
• Relationship tags, so a direct rival and an aspirational benchmark are not treated as the same thing.
• One-click hand-off into Domain Overview, Competitor Battle and Bulk Analysis.
• CSV export, so the roster can leave the app for a client deck.
• Costs nothing to keep. The vault itself never charges credits.

Use Cases#

• Standing up a competitive set. New client, new market: capture the eight domains that matter and tag them once.
• Separating rivals from benchmarks. Direct competitors get monitored; aspirational ones get studied.
• Speeding up a monthly review. Bulk Analyze loads the whole roster into Bulk Analysis in one action.
• Priming a head-to-head. Run Battle fills Competitor Battle with your top two saved domains.
• Handing over an account. Export the roster to CSV and send it with the rest of the account documentation.

Requirements#

• A signed-in Metric Vault account on any plan, including Free.
• Nothing else to use the vault itself.
• Credits are needed only for the tools it launches: Domain Overview costs 6, Competitor Battle costs 3, and Bulk Analysis charges per tool it runs.

Permissions#

Any signed-in user can add, tag, remove and export competitors. There is no plan gate and no role restriction.

Because the roster lives in your browser rather than on your account, it is personal by default: a teammate opening the same workspace sees their own list, not yours. Share it by exporting the CSV.

Cost#

0 credits. Adding, tagging, filtering, exporting and clearing the vault are all free.

The row actions are not free, because they run real tools:

See How credits work and Tool catalog and credit cost.

Navigation Path#

Dashboard → Competitors & Backlinks → Competitor Manager

Inputs#

Pressing Enter in the domain field adds the competitor, the same as pressing Add Competitor.

Step-by-Step Guide#

1. Open Dashboard → Competitors & Backlinks → Competitor Manager.
2. Type a domain into the field marked competitor domain (e.g., shopify.com).
3. Pick a type from the dropdown beside it.
4. Press Add Competitor, or press Enter. A toast confirms the domain was saved to Competitor Manager. Adding a domain you already have returns "<domain>" is already in your vault.
5. Repeat until the roster is complete. At two or more the charts unlock.
6. Change a type at any time from the dropdown on its row.
7. Use the filter pills to narrow the list by type.
8. Press Export CSV to save the roster, or Clear All to empty the vault.

To see the screen populated before building your own list, press Start with sample competitors in the empty state. It seeds five well-known domains with authority, traffic and notes already filled in.

Reading the Results#

The header carries VERIFIED · LIVE DATAFORSEO and a verdict pill that describes the roster rather than any single domain. With nothing saved it reads ADD COMPETITORS. Once at least one saved domain has an authority of 70 or more it reads N STRONG RIVALS. Otherwise it reads MID-TIER, meaning your saved set is all mid-weight — worth noticing, because a competitive set with no strong rival in it is often the wrong set.

The four summary tiles:

• Saved, tracked rivals. The size of your roster. Six to ten is a working set; thirty is a list nobody reads.
• Avg Authority, with the median beneath it. It reads — and no authority data until entries with authority figures exist. Compare the average and the median: an average well above the median means one giant is distorting the picture.
• Total Traffic, monthly organic across all. The combined organic traffic of everything you track — a rough measure of the market you are competing in.
• Direct Rivals, head-to-head competitors. How many you tagged Direct. If this is zero, nothing in the vault is a real competitor.

Last save shows when the roster last changed, or never.

Type Mix and Authority Comparison appear once you have two or more saved domains. Until then they are replaced by a note explaining that the type breakdown and the authority comparison unlock when you save competitors. Type Mix is a donut of your relationship tags; a vault that is entirely Direct usually means the tags are not being used. Authority Comparison is a horizontal bar per domain, sorted strongest first, which is the fastest way to see where you sit against the field.

Your Competitors is the roster table, headed by a count such as 6 COMPETITORS. Each row shows:

• The domain, linked so it opens in a new tab, with your notes underneath, or — when there are none.
• The type dropdown, color-coded per tag and editable in place.
• DA — domain authority.
• Est. Traffic — estimated monthly organic traffic.
• Added — today, 1 day ago or N days ago.
• Three actions: Overview, which opens Domain Overview on that domain and runs it; VS, which opens Competitor Battle with that domain in the competitor field; and a remove button.

One thing to understand about DA and Est. Traffic: the vault stores what it is given. A domain you type in yourself is saved without figures, so it shows — for DA and 0 for traffic, and nothing fills those in later. The sample roster arrives with real figures because they are saved with it. To see a saved competitor's true numbers, use the Overview action, which runs Domain Overview for 6 credits.

Empty states. With nothing saved the table shows Build your competitor vault, explaining that you can track authority, traffic and keyword overlap side by side, with buttons for Add a Competitor, Find Competitors via Domain Overview and Start with sample competitors. If a filter matches nothing you get No competitors match this tag and a prompt to switch back to All or save more competitors with that tag.

The header actions move the roster into other tools. Bulk Analyze loads every saved domain into Bulk Analysis and confirms with a toast; with an empty vault it returns No competitors saved yet. Run Battle opens Competitor Battle with your two most recent domains filled in and confirms Battle primed: <a> vs <b>; with fewer than two saved it returns Need at least two saved competitors to run a battle. Export CSV downloads a file named for today's date with the columns Domain, Type, DA, Traffic, Notes and Added. Add Competitor simply scrolls to the add field.

Clear All asks Clear all saved competitors? This cannot be undone. before emptying the vault, and confirms with Vault cleared.

Examples#

Screenshots#

Tips#

• Tag as you add. Retagging thirty domains later never happens.
• Keep the roster small. The competitors you actually act on are usually five to eight.
• Export the CSV after any significant change. It is the only copy that survives a cleared browser.
• Use Run Battle rather than the row VS button when you want to choose both sides — it primes the fields without spending anything.
• Keep the Direct rivals in step with the pages you watch in Competitor Monitor.

Best Practices#

• Reserve Direct for domains that take revenue from you, and Aspirational for the ones you study. The tags are only useful if they mean something.
• Review the roster quarterly. Competitive sets go stale faster than people expect.
• Find competitors from data rather than memory: Main Organic Competitors in Domain Overview is built from shared rankings.
• Because the list lives in one browser, export and re-import through the CSV when you change machines or hand over an account.

Common Mistakes#

• Expecting the vault to fetch authority and traffic. It stores what you save. Domains you type in show — and 0 until you look them up with Domain Overview.
• Pressing Overview to browse. It runs Domain Overview immediately and charges 6 credits.
• Pressing VS with the first field already filled. The battle starts and charges 3 credits.
• Assuming teammates see your roster. It is stored in your browser only.
• Using Clear All to remove one domain. It empties the vault, and there is no undo. Use the remove button on the row.

Limitations#

• Stored in your browser, so it does not sync across devices, browsers or teammates, and clearing site data deletes it.
• Capped at 50 saved domains.
• No analysis of its own: every number that means anything comes from another tool.
• DA and estimated traffic are not refreshed automatically for entries you add.
• Notes can be exported but are not editable from the roster row.
• Four fixed relationship tags. Custom tags are not supported.

Troubleshooting#

FAQs#

Does the Competitor Manager cost credits? No. The vault is free on every plan. Only the tools it launches — Domain Overview at 6 credits and Competitor Battle at 3 — charge anything.

Where is my list stored? In the browser you are using. It does not sync to your account or to teammates, and clearing your browser's site data removes it. Export the CSV to keep a copy.

What do the four types mean? They are yours to define, but the intent is: Direct competes for the same customers, Indirect solves the same problem differently, Aspirational is where you want to be, and Emerging is a newcomer worth watching.

Why does my competitor show no authority score? Because it was added by hand. The vault records the domain, the tag and the date; it does not look up metrics. Press Overview on the row to run Domain Overview and see the real figures.

How many competitors can I save? Up to 50. Well before that the list stops being useful — keep it to the domains you act on.

Can I get the roster out of Metric Vault? Yes. Export CSV downloads Domain, Type, DA, Traffic, Notes and Added as a dated file. See Exporting results for exports elsewhere in the product.