These online benchmarking tools can give you insight into how your industry peers are performing on social media, in keyword searches, and more.

Senior Director of Strategy Kate Lee recently wrote about the importance of benchmarking your marketing performance against your competitors. To define success within your market and industry, you need to look outside what’s going on internally and compare yourself to your peers. This will also help your company identify threats and strategic opportunities.

Benchmarking gives you a context to understand how your marketing efforts are paying off. But running another set of reports and keeping track of all those metrics could be a full-time job within itself — and ain’t nobody got time for that.

The good news is there are some really effective tools available for marketers to quickly, even automatically benchmark their performance against the competition. Let’s take a look at three of these platforms below.

3 tools to benchmark your performance

1) BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo’s slogan, “Add value, be uncommon,” exemplifies its mission: to assist companies in creating the most relevant content for their individual audiences. The comprehensive content tool offers insight on what topics are trending, which influencers have the most reach, and more.

The competitor research feature will be of particular interest to those hoping to do some competitive benchmarking. It offers competitive intelligence, such as:

• What content is getting traction for my competitors?
• On what networks are they having success?
• Who is sharing their content?
• How does our content compare?

Overall this site will save you time that you would have spent compiling and analyzing data about you and your competitors.

Pricing: BuzzSumo’s pricing varies from $79-$599 per month, but there’s a free trial option to help you decide if Buzz Sumo is right for your company.

Ease of use: There’s a lot of information to digest, but the compelling data displays make it as easy as possible.

Clients: Rolling Stone, Expedia, National Geographic, IBM, Capital One

2) Serpstat

Serpstat identifies itself as the “growth-hacking tool of marketing” and the “all-in-one SEO platform for professionals.” It offers an abundance of insightful features to view your data in comparison with your competition. You can find answers to the following questions:

• What keywords are placing your competitors in the top search results?
• What does your competitors’ AdWords and paid search look like?
• What does your competitors’ strategy look like in regard to their budget, ad positions in search results, and cost-per-click for AdWords?

Pricing: Serpstat ranges anywhere from $0-$299.

Ease of use: While Serpstat provides an overwhelming amount of information, their 24/7 user-friendly chat feature makes things a little easier. They also offer a completely free demo via Skype or Google Hangouts in as little as 20 minutes.

Clients: Yves Rocher, Gift Baskets Overseas, GL Marketing

3) Rival IQ

Rival IQ offers “digital marketing analytics with a competitive edge.” Essentially, it allows you to compare your performance in social media, keyword ranking, and content against other companies. You also learn when growth in those categories happens for your company, as well as what is driving it. It answers:

• What do your social media metrics (followers, likes, etc.) look like versus your competitors?
• What do your competitors’ social biographies look like, and what are they changing?
• What do the “best” social media posts look like across your competitive landscape?

Pricing: anywhere from $299-$799. They’ll even work with you to create a customized package. A free trial is also available.

Ease of use: While the information presented is extensive, it is displayed in a way that makes it easy to digest. According to New York Times best-selling author Jay Baer, “Rival IQ is a game-changer. Incredibly useful intelligence about the digital activities and successes of your competitors, delivered quick, easy and smart.”

Clients: Studio Science, the Media Flow, Convince & Convert

These three benchmarking tools can help your business gauge how you’re fairing against the competition. The right one for your company could give you a competitive edge, helping you surpass your goals — and your competition.

Related posts:

• Social Benchmarking: How You Know You’re Killing It on Social Media
• Why You Need to Benchmark Your Marketing Performance Against Your Competitors
• 4 Tools for Determining the Best Time to Post on Social Media