A DIY Guide to Writing Comparison Pages for Your SaaS

You know that your SaaS product is great. Even when compared to other options on the market, your product stands out. But have you told this to your target audience?

That is exactly what a competitor comparison landing page does. It tells people how your product fares against the competition.

If you have created a comparison page, Kudos! Maybe I can help you make it more effective. If you don’t have one yet, even better. This blog will help you create a comparison page — a killer one at that.

We analyzed over 40 SaaS comparison pages and poured all the lessons into this article. You will learn about:

• The benefits of comparison pages
• Important components of the comparison page & how to use them (with examples)
• How different SaaS companies have created their comparison pages (with examples)
• How to create a competitor comparison page for your SaaS product (with examples)
• How to design your comparison page (with examples)
• Copywriting for comparison page (with examples)
• Mistakes to avoid when making a comparison page

At the end of the article you will find:

• A Comprehensive Checklist for creating comparison pages
• A Complete Template to create an effective comparison page for your SaaS 

Let’s start with the why! Why even bother making a comparison landing page? Is it worth the effort?

Why Create a Competitor Comparison Page for SaaS Brand?

A comparison landing page is more useful than ten random blogs about your industry or achievements. It is a form of evergreen content and helps bring in bottom-of-the-funnel audiences with strong purchase intent. 

The traffic of comparison pages will be less in volume compared to any top-of-funnel or middle-funnel-content. But, it gives a better conversion rate if done right.

High Conversion Rate

Comparative searches usually come from relevant audiences with high purchase intent.

Some of the common SaaS comparison searches include “brand A vs brand B”, “brand A alternatives”, and “Brand A or Brand B”. These are the searches of people on the verge of a decision or purchase.

An effective comparison page will help drive their decision in your favor. Take the case study of Teamwork for instance. This SaaS company used competitor comparison pages to get 54% more organic traffic conversions for its project management software.

If you do not have a comparison page for your SaaS brand, you are losing high-quality customers to your competitors.

Competitive Analysis

Genuine competitive analysis will help you understand where you stand in the market. You will identify your strengths against your SaaS competitors. You will also learn how you differ from other brands in the market.

Most importantly, you can identify the ideal customers for your brand. It is these customers that you will be targeting with your comparison page. The best comparison pages focus on their USPs and differentiating factors instead of downplaying the competitor.

Competitive analysis will also help you identify the USPs of your competitors as well as their target audience. You can accordingly upgrade your product or prices to attract your competitors’ audience and convert them into your customers.

SEO Benefits

Comparison pages have long-term SEO value. As your product becomes more popular, more people will search for it and compare it with other products. These searches will generate a good volume of traffic.

Furthermore, audiences from these searches tend to stay on the page for longer. You will get better scroll depth and time-on-page than other pieces of content. As SaaS products continue to change and grow, you will also have ample opportunities to update this page and keep it relevant. 

A single comparison page can target a wide range of relevant keywords. You can rank for searches concerning your brand, your competitor’s brand, and a comparison between the two. We will detail all the keywords you can target for comparison pages in the next section of this article.

Keywords of comparison searches are ironically not that competitive to rank for. You only have to outrank review websites and your competitor’s comparison page. It is easier to rank comparison pages compared to blogs on popular topics.

But, if you do not have a comparison page for your SaaS brand, you are allowing other people to control your story and potentially steal customers.

Reputation Management

If you lack a comparison page, potential customers will learn about you from other blogs, review sites, or your competitor’s landing page. To control how the customer perceives your brand, you must control the narrative.

You want people to learn about your SaaS product from you and not some biased source. A comparative page will help you tell your story, present your USPs and tell people how you are different from the stock.

Customer Retention

Comparison landing pages can also help prevent migration. You can convince the customers that they already have the best product available in the market. Any customer looking to migrate to another product will compare it with your product.

Here a comparison page can highlight the problems they will face after migration. You can also show the drawbacks of other products on the market and compare them with the solutions your product offers. This will help you retain valuable customers.

Targeted Marketing & Advertisement

A good comparison landing page is not just SEO gold, but also a marketing goldmine. You can build a variety of marketing campaigns around such landing pages.

SaaS comparison pages can be used for targeted search ads, social media ads, content marketing, influencer marketing, and more. These pages contain a very powerful message about the brand and its product.

Marketing with competitor comparison landing pages will bring quality prospects and convert more customers. In the below image, you can see how Outplay HQ is using its comparison page for search ads.

OutplayHQ is targeting people searching for “Yesware”, its competitor. Instead of advertising its name directly, Outplay HQ is proposing that they are the “Best Yesware Alternative”. Through this campaign, they are taking away a significant chunk of Yesware’s customers.

If you do not have a comparison page, your competitors will most likely gain an advantage. In the marketing jungle, you are either targeting or you are the target.

What do you need to Create a Comparison Page?

To create an effective comparison landing page you need to understand your product, competitors’ products, and the target market. You can simply create a feature-to-feature or price comparison page, but that will not convey a strong message.

If you want to convert visitors into customers, you have to convince them of differences in the products and user experience.

Here are a few important questions you should answer for each competitor comparison page:

• Who is my ideal customer?
• How is my product perfect for that ideal customer?
• What unique features does my SaaS product have?
• What are the differences between my features & competitor’s features?
• What solutions does my product offer?
• What are the differences between my solution & competitor’s solution?
• What are the pain points of my competitor’s customers?
• How does my product resolve those pain points?
• How do my competitors resolve those pain points?
• What kind of user experience do competitor’s customers have?
• What kind of user experience do my customers have?

Once you answer these questions, you will have all the information you need to create your comparison landing page. Then you focus on targeting the right people.

Keywords to Target for Comparison Landing Pages

Competitor comparison pages are not general interest content. They are meant to target specific search intents and hence should focus only on a select few keywords.

10 most Important keywords to target for SaaS comparison pages:

1. [Your Product] vs [Competitor Product] (& vice versa)
2. [Competitor Product] alternatives
3. [Competitor Product] reviews
4. [Competitor Product] [Review Website] (eg. G2 Crowd, Capterra, TrustRadius, etc.)
5. Best / Top [Product Category]
6. [Competitor Product]
7. [Your Product]
8. [Your Product] reviews
9. [Your Product] [Review Website] (eg. G2 Crowd, Capterra, TrustRadius, etc.)
10. [Your Product] alternatives

With the above keywords, you will target a variety of people with different search queries. These keywords help you target:

• People searching for a product similar to yours.
• People searching for the competitor’s product.
• People who are dissatisfied with the competitor’s product.
• People researching your product.
• People researching your competitor’s product.

Your comparison page should cater to all these search intents. If a person is putting your targeted keywords in a search engine, they should be happy that they found your comparison landing page.

How to Create Killer Comparison Landing Pages for your SaaS

You have to make the comparison page persuasive to ensure conversion. This requires careful drafting of different components on the page. Each component should independently persuade the visitors and complement the larger narrative of the comparison page.

In this article, we will discuss how SaaS comparison pages have used different components. We will also recommend the best way to use each of these to create your comparison page.

We will discuss:

• Importance of each component
• Purpose of each component
• How different SaaS comparison pages have used them (with examples)
• How to design each component (with examples)
• Copywriting for each component (with examples)

At the end of every discussion, we will give our verdict on how you can use different components for maximum impact. But, before we can understand the building blocks, we need to understand the different types of comparison pages and how they are used.

Types of SaaS Competitor Comparison Landing Pages

After studying 35 SaaS comparison pages, we found that they essentially fall into 3 types:

1. One vs All
2. One vs Many 
3. One vs One 

“One vs All” comparison pages start with a headline that promises a comparison of one product against all the products on the market. But, the comparison is abandoned immediately after the headline. Instead, this kind of comparison page only talks about how their product is the best in the market. Such pages offer little to no information about the competitor’s products.

“One vs Many” pages compare several products against each other. Such pages open with an elaborate comparison table. This table compares the features and prices of multiple products on the market. The creator’s column in this table is frozen while columns of other products can be horizontally scrolled. Each of the columns has a link to their respective “One vs One” comparison page.

Some brands also combine “One vs All” and “One vs Many” formats to create a comparison page. This page first focuses on the USPs of their product and their standing in the market. After that, they either feature a comparison table or link to several “One vs One” comparison pages.

“One vs One” pages focus on comparing only 2 products. The comparison is quite detailed and focuses on differences in features, solutions, product use, customer experience, etc. Such pages best match comparison search intent. This type of page contains several elements that persuade a customer to choose one product over the other.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Create a “One vs Many” comparison page with a table
• Connect each column with a “One vs One” comparison page.
• Use different components to make the case for your product.

Components of a Killer Comparison Page for SaaS

Depending on which message you wish to convey, you will have to choose the components that build your comparison page.

Components to create the perfect comparison landing page:

1. Call to Action Buttons
2. 1. Free Trials
   2. Contact Us
   3. Live Chat
   4. Request a Demo

1. Comparison Table
   1. Price Comparison Table
   2. Features Comparison Table
2. Unique Features
3. Key Solutions
4. Differentiating Factors
5. Trust Building Elements
   1. Major Customers
   2. Customer Reviews
   3. Testimonials
   4. Rating
   5. Awards
   6. Customer Success Case Studies
   7. Media Coverage
6. Migration Support
7. FAQs
8. Supporting Blogs

Let’s see how you can use each of these components to create the perfect comparison page for your SaaS products.

1. Call to Action Buttons

The ultimate goal of a comparison landing page is to gain new customers. That’s what call-to-action (CTA) buttons do.

We found that 91% of SaaS comparison pages use call-to-action buttons. The majority of them have deployed CTAs at the very beginning of the page. 

But, you should not stop there. 77% of comparison landing pages have used multiple CTAs distributed throughout the page.

We found the following CTA buttons on SaaS comparison pages:

1. Free Trial (77%)
2. Contact Us (43%)
3. Request a Demo (34%)
4. Live Chat (23%)
5. Buy Now (11%)

“Free Trial” and “Request Demo” are the perfect CTAs for a comparison landing page. The visitor does not have to make any hard commitments and is more likely to click on it. 

Visitors to a comparison page are usually looking for alternatives. They have not made a decision yet. So a “Buy Now” button will seem off putting. Pushing for purchase on a comparison page might repel the visitors.

On the other hand, the “Contact Us” button seems like an overly soft approach. This button can be used as a secondary CTA, but the primary focus should be on getting visitors to try your SaaS product. 

You can also add “Live Chat” to the page instead of Contact Us. Instant responses can help you become a part of your visitor’s decision-making process. You can use it to guide visitors to try your product.

Copywriting for CTA Message

CTA buttons in comparison to landing pages are accompanied by persuasive text copies. These copies convey messages such as

Note: Product names marked in bold are the competitors.

• [Our Brand] compared to [Competitor Brand]
  • Examples:
    • Pipedrive vs Salesforce
    • How does Zoho CRM stack up to Microsoft 365
  • When to use:
    • If you are only offering a comparison

• The best alternative to [Competitor Brand]
  • Examples:
    • Looking for an alternative to Google Docs?
    • A Smart Mailchimp alternative
  • When to use:
    • If your landing page focuses on features comparison

• Tired of [Competitor Brand], try [Our Brand]
  • Examples:
    • Tired of Evernote? Say hi to Notion
    • Why choose Teamwork over Basecamp?
  • When to use:
    • If you are offering better solutions than the competitor

• [Our Brand] is best for [Customer Type] / [Key Solution]
  • Examples:
    • The only Slack alternative built for async teamwork.
    • The DocuSign alternative for people who want to keep it simple.
  • When to use:
    • If you are targeting a specific type of customer looking for specific solutions

Your copy is the supporting pillar of your CTA button. It will heavily influence your click-through rate. For the competitor comparison page, you should include the following elements in your CTA message copy:

• Highlight Key Solutions or Customer Pain Points
• Use Persuasive Phrases (try for free, create a free account, sign up now, etc.)
• Mention Ideal Customer
• Mention your Product Name
• Mention your Competitor’s Product Name

The copy for the CTA message should also serve as an introduction for your comparison landing page. If you lead with a headline offering solutions, you should explain how your product creates these solutions. 

Designing CTA Header

The design elements of a CTA header should visually represent your CTA message. The comparison pages we reviewed for this article have used stock images, custom graphics, and software previews. 

You can use visuals to communicate subliminal messages.

Mailerlite has used brand logos in the header. Its logo is shown as bigger than the competitor’s logo and is positioned higher. Other comparison pages have graphically shown key solutions they offer such as speed, simplicity, efficiency, and so on. 

But the majority of comparison pages stick to text-only headers with minimalist designs.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• CTA Button
  • Put the Free Trial button at the Beginning
  • Put the Request a Demo button next to it
  • Add Live Chat to the Page
• CTA Message
  • Your CTA message should look something like this:
    • [Your Product] is the best [Competitor Product] alternative for [Ideal Customer Type] / [Key Solution]
• CTA Header Design
  • Keep it simple. Make the text visually appealing.
  • You don’t need to use any graphics.

2. Comparison Table

Anyone visiting a comparison landing page will expect to see a comparison table. It’s obvious, isn’t it? 

But, we discovered that only 57% of the comparison landing pages have given side-by-side comparisons of features and prices. The other 43% of comparison pages have either compared features without a table i.e. descriptively or not given any comparison at all.

You have 4 types of tables to choose from

1. Short & Concise
   1. When to Use
      1. If you have a few important features to compare 

1. Long & Detailed
   1. When to Use:
      1. If there are several important features to compare

1. Explanatory
   1. When to Use:
      1. If your and your competitor’s features are similar but function differently. 

1. Price Only
   1. When to Use:
      1. If you are comparing features in a different section.

The comparison table should give an honest and transparent overview of both products. If you give a biased comparison or exclude key features of the competitor, you will lose the trust of the visitors.

You should only compare important features between both products. Long tables with a list of secondary features create an unsavory reading experience.

When comparing prices, you should highlight additional features that are chargeable. You should mention their charges for both products. A price comparison table should give a clear idea of each priced plan. You can also add a link to your pricing page at the end of the table.

Copywriting for Comparison Table

For a comparison table, you need copywriting for the header, features, and descriptive comparison. If you are doing a “yes” and “no” comparison, you only need copywriting for the former two.

The header text is the most important piece of text in a comparison table. The right headline will set the tone for the comparison. It will also give the reader a perspective on the information in the table.

The header of the comparison table can implant ideas. Before visitors read the table, the header tells them the conclusion they should derive. For example, a header text saying “[Our Product] is cheaper than [Competitor Product]” will implant the idea that the visitor is getting a great deal on price.

You should use the header text of the table to highlight differences in prices, features, or solutions.

Comparison table headlines follow one of the 4 following formats:

• [Your Product] vs [Competitor Product]
  • Examples:
    • Pipedrive vs Salesforce at a glance
    • Shopify vs BigCommerce
• [Your Product] is designed for [Ideal Customer Type] / [Key Solution]
  • Examples:
    • It’s not about adding features but removing complexity
    • Features designed for You, the business owner

When writing the rest of the comparison table you have to be brief. You do not need to describe each feature in detail. Assign a 3-word limit for feature titles. Most comparison tables don’t use feature descriptions. However, if you need to describe a feature, keep it under 7 words.

Instead of simple yes or no, you can also use quirky phrases to compare features and prices. But, flowery language should not dilute your message.

Signature’s comparison table is a great example. They have used conversational phrases and satirical language to highlight differences in features. The table headline also clearly sums up their message.

Designing Comparison Table

People are expecting to see a table, so give them a table. The text should be readable and the design should be easy on the eyes. You can use tick marks and cross marks to show which features are available. And you can use colors to highlight your product better.

Other than that, you don’t have to add any other design elements.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Comparison Table
  • Create a Short Comparison Table
  • If needed, create a separate page for the Long Table or Explanatory Table and add a link to it at the end of the Short Table
• Comparison Table CTA
  • Add a CTA at the end of the table.
  • Connect the CTA copy to the table’s headline.
• Comparison Table Headline
  • Your Table Headline should look something like this:
    • [Your Product] is designed for [Ideal Customer Type] / [Key Solution]
• Comparison Table Content
  • Keep the text short & concise
  • Use conversational phrases to emphasize your message
• Comparison Table Design
  • Create a minimalist table that is easy to understand
• Positioning
  • Position the comparison table at the end of the web page.
  • It should serve as a summary for the rest of the competitor comparison page.

3. Unique Features

Every product has a few features that set it apart from others. We found that 77% of the comparison pages highlight the Unique Features of their product. Among them, 67% use custom graphics or software previews to showcase these features.

It might be tempting to highlight every major feature of your software. But, doing so will make your page exhaustive to read. Do not include obvious features that are common to your industry. You should only highlight features that distinguish your product in the market.

Types of Features to Highlight:

1. Features that solve major customer pain points
2. Features that are unique to your software
3. Features that work differently in your software compared to competitors
4. Features that create a better user experience

The Unique Features section usually contains a set of 3 to 6 features. Each set is linked to a key solution. The features in each set show how the software makes a solution possible.

Each set of Unique Features should have each of the following elements:

1. Unique Features Headline (usually a Key Solution)
2. Feature Title
3. Feature Description
4. Visuals

We also discovered that comparison pages have more than one set of Unique Features sections. Each section is linked to one key solution. For example, the first section focuses on features that help increase speed, the second section on ease of use, and the third section on collaboration.

These sets of Unique Features are distributed throughout the comparison page. Brands use Trust Building Elements to complement each set of Unique Features. 

Copywriting for Top Feature Section

Most comparison pages feature similar headlines and feature titles. But, they use different lengths of descriptions for their features.

The copy for titles is usually to the point. It is never more than 3 words. On the other hand, copy headlines and feature descriptions change from brand to brand.

The section’s headline tells how Unique Features make the software unique and better than the competitor. The feature title is usually only the name of the feature. It is sometimes accompanied by an adjective such as faster, intuitive, easy-to-use, etc.

Comparison pages have one of the following messages for Unique Features headlines:

Note: Product names marked in bold are competitors.

• Reasons to choose [Your Product] over [Competitor Product]
  • Examples:
    • Reasons to choose Reply.io over Yesware
    • Top Reasons why companies use Teamwork vs Basecamp

• [Your Product] has [Key Solution/s] for [Customer Type]
  • Examples:
    • Intercom bots do more than just book meetings.
    • The notion is made with Teams in mind.

In our research of comparison landing pages, we have seen brands use both short and long copy formats to describe their Unique Features. The long descriptions have instructional language while short descriptions are explanatory.

This section does offer much scope for creative language. You can make descriptions more lively and conversational. But, do not take liberties with its length.

Types of Descriptions for Unique Features Section:

1. Short Description (< 30 words) + Graphics
   1. When to use:
      1. If you need to explain how the feature works, how it is unique, how it helps the customer, or how it solves a problem.

1. Long Description (> 30 words) + Graphics
   1. When to use:
      1. If you need to explain different aspects of the feature. Long descriptions include how the feature works, how it solves a problem, why it was included, how it is unique, how to use it and how it integrates with other features.

You can create detailed description pages for software features and link those pages to the Unique Features section. This will help you cut down the content in this section. On a comparison landing page, you only need to highlight the most persuasive aspects of your product.

Designing for Unique Features Section

In our research, we discovered that 54% of the comparison pages used graphics in the Unique Features section. This section needs visuals to communicate the functions or advantages of a feature. Comparison pages use icons, custom graphics, or software previews to highlight Unique Features.

1. Icons

Some brands have designed their version of generic icons to describe features. These include an envelope for email, graphs for reports, location market for milestones, and so on.

2. Custom Graphics

Custom Graphics is the most common type of visual used in the Unique Features section. These visuals either depict customers using a feature (with a smile on their face) or a graphical version of the software.

3. Software Preview

Software previews are usually GIF videos of a feature. This shows how a customer can use a feature. Software preview GIF usually jumps between windows to show interconnected features.

Growfusely Verdict:

• Unique Features Headline
  • Your Unique Features headline should look something like this:
    • [Your Product] has [Key Solution/s] for [Customer Type]
• Unique Features Description
  • Use Feature Title + Short Description format
  • Use conversational language to describe your features. Add humor if you can.
• Unique Features Design
  • Use software preview to support feature descriptions
  • Create GIF videos from the software to show how the feature works 
• Sets of Unique Features
  • Create 3 sets of Unique Features. Each group should focus on a single solution.
• Positioning
  • Distribute sets of Unique Features throughout the page.
  • You should support each set with Trust Building elements like testimonials or customer reviews.

4. Key Solutions

Key Solutions have a cause-and-effect relationship with Unique Features. Solutions are a consequence of the features. In our research, we found that 74% of SaaS comparison pages highlight their key solutions.

Some of the most common solutions offered by SaaS brands include simplicity, ease of use, flexibility, performance enhancement, customization, team collaboration, and customer support.

Comparison pages either highlight all solutions in one section or use separate sections to highlight each solution. If you are using the latter format, you will also need to complement each Key Solution with a set of Unique Features.

For comparison landing pages, brands usually focus on 3 to 5 Key Solutions. But, some brands have also designed their entire page to highlight one Key Solution. In such cases, the Key Solution is also the main differentiating factor between the brand and its competitor.

Signaturely’s comparison page against DocuSign is a great example of this. The entire page talks about the simplicity of Signaturely’s software. 

The key solutions section is also used to address customer pain points. You can talk about the general pain points of the customers or the problems faced by competitor’s customers. But, alongside you should tell visitors how your SaaS product solves these problems.

The format of a Key Solutions section goes as follows:

1. Key Solutions Headline
2. Solution Title
3. Solution Description
4. Visuals
5. CTA Message
6. CTA

The headline of the Key Solutions section needs to communicate your USP or appeal to your Ideal Customer. You can also communicate how your solution works better for the customer in the headline

For example, “[Product Name]  grows with your team” “[Product Name] is designed for creative minds” or “[Product Name] improves sales by 72%”.

You can also create one set dedicated to one Key Solution. If so, you should adopt this 3-pointer format:

1. Solution Title
2. Solution Description
3. Visuals

In such cases, the solution title serves as the headline. You only need to add a description and visuals to complete the set.

The Key Solutions section should culminate with a CTA. Most comparison pages use the “Free Trial” CTA with this section. 

You can also use Trust Building Elements immediately after the Key Solutions section to emphasize your point. Testimonials, Customer Reviews, and even Competitor’s Customer Reviews lend weight to your message.

Copywriting for Key Solutions Section

As with Unique Features, most comparison pages have similar headlines and titles for the Key Solutions section as well. Though, the format and length of descriptions are different for each brand. Some of the SaaS comparison pages have used different formats for different solutions as well.

In contrast to Unique Features, brands have used vivid language in the Key Solutions section. Both section headlines and titles are descriptive and conversational. The word count ranges between 2 to 15 words.

With the headline and solution title, you need to tell people why they should choose your product. You can talk about customer experience, solving problems, helping their performance, making life better, and what customers can achieve with your SaaS product.

Several SaaS comparison pages also heavily emphasize their customer support services in their Key Solutions section. 

Some of the most common headlines & titles messages for the Key Solutions section are:

• [Your Product] offers [Key Solution]
  • Examples:
    • Our project management scales with your team
    • Personalize, don’t pounce. Meet customers on their terms.

• Why choose [Your Product]
  • Examples:
    • Why you should trust Signaturely?
    • Why you’ll love Swell?

The descriptions of Key Solutions are quite similar to those of Unique Features. They can be short copies or long copies. Regardless of its length, the description should focus on how the software achieves the solution, how the solution helps the customer, or why the solution is important for customers.

Types of Descriptions for Key Solutions Section:

1. Short Description (< 30 words)
   1. When to use:
      1. If the solution is widely known and the title is self-explanatory.
2. Long Description
   1. When to use:
      1. If the solution is also a USP and you can explain how its functions uniquely with your software.

Most comparison pages use a blend of instructional and conversational language to describe their solutions. 

The CTA message in the Key Solutions section should complement the headline or the solution title. For example, if your Key Solution is “Simplicity”, your CTA message can be “Let’s try a simpler way”.

Designing for Key Solutions Section

60% of the comparison pages that have a Key Solutions section have used visuals to better communicate their message. The rest 40% rely on text alone. Just like Unique Features, Key Solutions also need a visual aid to drive a point home.

You can use icons, custom graphics, or stock images to emphasize the message of your solutions.

1. Icons

You can use commonly known icons to visually describe your key solutions. Some of the common icons used in comparison pages include headphones for customer support, gears for functionality, graph for growth, and so on.

2. Custom Graphics

Graphics for Key Solutions are an extension of the icons. They usually feature happy customers using a graphical version of the software and experience the solution. 

3. Stock Images

Stock images are not very common on comparison pages. Only 9% of the comparison landing pages use stock images to describe a solution. Brands have used different stock images for different solutions.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Key Solutions Format
  • Headline
  • Solution Title
  • Long Description
  • Visuals
  • CTA
• Key Solutions Headline
  • Your headline for Key Solutions should look something like this:
    • [Ideal Customer] loves [Your Product] for its [Key Solution]
• Solution Title
  • Your title should look something like this:
    • [Key Solution] results in [Customer Experience]
• Solution Description
  • Use a long description to describe how your solution is unique and how it solves customers’ problems.
• Key Solutions CTA
  • Offer Free Trial CTA
  • Support it with a CTA message that compliments the headline.
• Key Solutions Design
  • Use custom graphics to communicate the customer experience
• Positioning
  • Create 2 separate sets of Key Solutions containing 3 solutions each
  • Use each set to compliment the Unique Features section & Trust Building Elements Section.
  • Use the 2nd set of Key Solutions at the end of the comparison page followed by a final CTA.

5. Trust Building Elements

Trust Building elements are the feedback on your SaaS product by 3rd parties. The feedback can be in form of reviews, testimonials, ratings, or awards. You can use these elements to show what other people are saying about your product.

These elements assure the visitors that your product is well recognized in the market. It is always better to be praised by others than to blow your own trumpet.

We found that 91% of SaaS comparison pages have used at least one trust-building element. But, it is common for competitor comparison pages to feature more than one. Some of the most common trust-building elements include:

1. Customer Testimonials (71%)
2. Major Customers (37%)
3. Awards & Recognitions (31%)
4. Customer Reviews (23%)
5. Customer Success Stories (23%)
6. Market Ratings (20%)
7. Media Coverage (3%)

Most SaaS comparison pages have positioned these elements towards the end of the page, almost as a conclusion. Though a few comparison landing pages creatively employ these elements to highlight Unique Features and support Key Solutions.

SaaS brands also use these elements to highlight differences between them and their competitors. 

Customer Testimonials

Testimonials are the customer reviews you collected. In comparison pages, testimonials can be used to communicate your USPs, brand identity, Unique Features, Key Solutions, user experience, customer success stories, or customer loyalty.

Most brands use only text for testimonials. However, a few brands use video testimonials to show authenticity. Even with video testimonials, the central message is highlighted in the text.

Essential Elements of a Testimonial:

• Quote of the Customer
• Name of the Customer
• Customer’s Designation
• Customer’s Company Name
• Picture / Video of the Customer

Some comparison pages have linked testimonials with customer success stories and case studies. This way, they get to flaunt how their product is instrumental in achieving success in an industry.

Many comparison pages shove their testimonials together in one section. These sections feature 3 testimonials from different customers. In doing so, individual testimonials lose their significance.

Highlighting each testimonial separately lends weight to their message. Testimonials from different customers can be used to support different elements. For example, Processkit has used 3 testimonials on its competitor comparison page, each testimonial supports a difference between its product and Trello, its competitor.

Major Customers

If you have big brands in your clientele, flaunt them. This element works on the same principle as influencer marketing. When people see successful companies using a product, they associate that product with success.

Comparison pages are the right place to show off your celebrity customers.

The format is quite simple. All you need is a good headline and logos of your customers. That’s it.

Most SaaS competitor comparison pages mention a ballpark figure of their total customers along with major customer logos.

Awards & Recognition

Awards & recognitions are rare, hence only a few brands get to feature them on their comparison pages. They are a recognition of industry excellence and lend credibility to your claim.

You can feature awards and recognitions from media, customer review sites, research agencies, critic sites, and so on. The most common awards featured on SaaS comparison pages come from G2 Crowd awards and recognitions. Only a few brands feature awards and recognition by media, critic reviews, or research brands.

Most comparison pages exhibit their awards toward the end of the page. This section is used as a final mark of credibility. The positioning of this section can alter the message it communicates.

How you use these elements depends on the type of award or recognition. If you have won something for the brand, it is best to showcase it at the beginning of a page. If the award concerns particular features or solutions, you can use them alongside their respective sections.

Customer Reviews

Customer reviews are feedback given by customers on third-party websites. These can be review sites, community forums, google reviews, or social media sites. They serve the same purpose as testimonials but have more credibility because they come from independent sources.

Most comparison pages extract screenshots of customer reviews and present them as they are. The most common sources for customer reviews for SaaS brands are G2 Crowd, Capterra, and Twitter.

You should look for customer reviews that tell a personal story rather than ones that make a general statement. In the above image, you can see Notion has used reviews that have a personal and narrative element.

You can use customer reviews just as you use testimonials. They can help you emphasize your Unique Features and Key Solutions.

Like testimonials, customer reviews can also be scattered throughout the comparison page. Each set of reviews can emphasize the importance of different features or solutions.

Customer Success Stories

Customer success stories tell the visitors that someone has already achieved their goals with your SaaS product. This section says that “If they can do it, you can do it too.” 

Comparison pages usually do not feature the entire story. The central message is featured on the page with a link to the detailed case study. This message is usually a quote from the customer either directly recommending the SaaS product or praising its features.

Customer Success Stories are an extension of testimonials. They build trust by showing that other people have already trusted the brand and are happy about it.

These success stories are usually positioned at the bottom of the comparison page. Most of the time they look like testimonials. Only they are linked to detailed case studies.

Case studies of different customers can be distributed throughout the page to show that a success story is not a one-off thing. By showing the success stories of multiple customers, you communicate that success from using your product is the norm, not an exception.

User Ratings

Ratings on product review sites are considered more impartial than individual reviews or testimonials. They are the collective voice of numerous customers. SaaS comparison landing pages show ratings from either G2 Crowd or Capterra.

There is a reason why only 20% of the comparison pages have exhibited their ratings. Most brands might not have a great score. This is understood by the customers as well. So if you have good ratings on any major review website, showcase it on your competitor comparison page.

SaaS comparison pages showcase their overall rating as well as individual aspect rating such as ease of use, customer service quality, ease of setup, etc.

Like many trust-building elements, ratings are usually featured at the end of the comparison page. It is followed by a final call to action.

Media Coverage

Media coverage among SaaS brands is even more sparse than excellent ratings. Hence we found only 3% of SaaS comparison pages highlight some kind of media coverage.

You have to do something newsworthy or pay a media agency to feature your brand. The bigger the media agency, the greater the impact. Freshbooks, for instance, shows that it has been featured by renowned media brands like Forbes, the New York Times, and Bloomberg.

If your brand has been covered by media, you should showcase it on your comparison page. It will lend additional weight to your credibility and industry recognition. People know that it is not easy to get your name on the news. Getting featured by a major media brand is considered a great achievement in itself.

On the other hand, you should not feature small media brands that are recognized by the general audience. Use this section only if your brand or SaaS product has been featured by a renowned newspaper, magazine, or media website.

Unlike other trust-building elements, Media coverage is featured at the top of the page, right after the initial CTA. Such is the prestige associated with being on the news.

Copywriting for Trust Building Elements

This section requires very little copywriting. You only need to worry about the headline and let the words of the people do the rest.

Some of the common headlines for trust-building elements include:

1. Customer Testimonials
   1. What our Customers Say About Us
   2. [Your Product] solves [Customer Pain Point]
   3. [Your Product] offers [Key Solution]
2. Major Customers
   1. You are in Good Company
   2. Out Esteemed Customers
   3. [Your Product] is trusted by [Number of Customers] Worldwide
3. Awards & Recognition
   1. [Award Title]
   2. Recognized by Critics
   3. Award Winning [Product Type]
4. Customer Reviews
   1. What our customers say about us
   2. Here’s what users have to say about [Your Product]
5. Customer Success Stories
   1. [Customer Name] achieved [Customer Achievement] with [Your Product]
   2. [Your Product] provides [Key Solution] that helped [Customer Name] with [Customer Achievement]
6. User Ratings
   1. Top Rated [Product Type]
   2. Highest Rated [Key Solution]
7. Media Coverage
   1. [Your Product] has been featured in [Media Brand]
   2. [Quotes from Media Coverage] by [Media Brand]

Many of the trust-building elements are self-explanatory. So you do not even need a headline for them. These include customer reviews, awards, media coverage, and market ratings. But, you need to assure people of their authenticity.

You can convey the authenticity of trust-building elements by adding a link to the source. This can be done for any of the elements except testimonials. The other way you can convey authenticity is through design & presentation.

Designing for Trust-Building Elements

The elements of this section do not need to be dressed up with the design. The purpose of visuals for this section is to convey authenticity. Trust-building elements should not look “Designed”.

Much of the visuals for this section come directly from the source. You can extract customer reviews, ratings, media coverage, and awards as they are on the source website. All you need are good screenshots.

It may be tempting to redesign them to match the theme of the page. But, matching the visual branding of the source conveys more authenticity. In the images below you can see how trust-building elements reflect their sources.

You just need to arrange the elements to look visually appealing. You can build designs and patterns around them as long as their authenticity remains intact.

Liberty in design is possible with Testimonials, Customer Case Studies, and Major Customers. For each of these, the customer’s brand logo is the most important visual element. Even if your customer’s logos do not match the theme of your comparison page, you should display them as it is. Here again, communicating authenticity is paramount.

For testimonials and Customer Case Studies, you can also add a picture of the customer alongside their company’s logo.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Use at least 3 different trust-building elements
• Use them to support Key Solutions & Unique Features
• Use them to highlight differentiating factors
• Trust-Building Elements Headlines
  • For Testimonials, Customer Reviews & Customer Success Stories
    • Why Customers Love [Your Product]
  • For Ratings, Awards & Recognition
    • Highest Rated [Product Category]
  • For Major Customers
    • You are in Good Company
  • For Media Coverage
    • [Quotes from Media Coverage] by [Media Brand]
• Trust-Building Elements Design
  • Stay true to the source
    • Highlight Logos
    • Incorporate the Design of the Source Website
• Positioning
  • Distribute trust-building elements throughout the page
    • Top of the Page: Media Coverage, Awards & Recognitions
    • Middle of the Page: Testimonials, Customer Reviews, Market Ratings
    • End of the Page: Customer Success Stories & Major Customers
• You can also use some Trust-Building elements in combination with others
  • Trust-Building Elements Combinations:
    • Testimonials & Customer Success Stories
    • Customer Reviews & Ratings
    • Customer Reviews & Major Customers

6. Differentiating Factors

These are the factors that separate your product from the competition. Differentiating factors are an extension of a brand’s identity and philosophy. They help highlight a brand’s USP and how their product provides a unique customer experience.

This section is all the more important for SaaS brands that focus on a niche audience. Using differences, you can communicate how your product is custom-built for an ideal type of customer or a specific purpose.

This section is used in competitor comparison landing pages to show:

1. differences in features
2. differences in product use
3. differences in customer experience
4. different approaches to similar solutions
5. how each product has a different purpose
6. drawbacks of competitor’s products

In our research, we found that 66% of the comparison pages highlight important differences between them and their competitors. If you are comparing against a single competitor, this section is the second most important element on the page after the comparison table.

Comparison pages highlight differences in features, solutions, product purpose, customer reviews, ratings, and brand philosophy. 63% of brands use differentiating factors to highlight their product’s USP. And 49% of the comparison pages highlight differences in features and solutions.

A few brands have themed their entire competitor comparison landing pages around differentiating factors. For Example, Signature’s comparison page entirely focuses on how their product is simpler when compared to DocuSign, their competitor.

Signaturely has compared features, solutions, brand identity, product purpose, and customer reviews. They have used each of these factors to show that Signaturely is a better choice owing to its ease of use and simplicity.

Comparing customer reviews and ratings serve as the punctuation mark for the differentiating factors. Trust-building elements are used to show that differences in features & solutions create different user experiences.

SaaS brands evenly distribute differentiating factors throughout their comparison pages. Differences in brand identity, product purpose, USPs, or user experience are generally put at the top of the page. They are either placed alongside the opening CTA or immediately after it.

Differences in features and solutions are distributed throughout the page. Usually, a difference in feature is linked with the difference in solution as well. These differences are supported by customer reviews of both the SaaS brand and its competitors.

SaaS comparison pages also call attention to their competitor’s drawbacks in the guise of differences. This too is done at the beginning of the page and continues through the length of it.

Differentiating Features & Solutions

When your product has the same features and offers the same solutions as your competitors, you need to show how they are different. 

Is your product more efficient? Is it easier to use? Does it work better for a specific type of customer? Are there things your product can do and the competitor’s cannot?

These are the questions you need to answer by comparing features and solutions. A great example of features & solutions differences is Slite’s comparison page against Google Docs. 

By comparing its features against those of Google Docs, Slite shows how its product is easier to organize and better for collaboration.

You can use such differences to show what it would be like to use your product against the competitor’s product. Differences in features & solutions also subtly hint at the ideal customers and purpose of the products.

In the above examples, Signaturely says that it is built for simple & straightforward processes and Slite says that it is great for teamwork. 

Differentiating USPs, Brand Philosophy & Product Purpose

Several comparison pages open by defining the differences in the purpose of the products, USPs, and brand philosophy. Such opening statements are revisited throughout the comparison landing page. 

More than highlighting the differences, these statements are meant to communicate why someone should choose their product instead of the competitor’s product.

A few brands have used this section to praise their competitors as well. In doing so, they show that they are not being petty when highlighting the competitor’s drawbacks. It is also a great show of confidence. Statements of praise convey a sense of humility and transparency. This influences the reader’s perception of the rest of the content.

Drift & Missive both praise their competitors for something. Though Missive’s content feels more genuine. They recognize the popularity of Slack and the role it played in changing the market. Only then does it talk about differences in their products.

Some SaaS comparison pages even recommend their competitors for a certain type of user. 

Such recommendations are only seen on comparison pages that have clearly identified their niche audience.

Missive says that their competitor is great for certain types of people. At the same time, this line of recommendation also highlights their drawback. Also, note how Missive has recommended SparkMail for a limited audience type while recommending itself for a wider audience.

The missive has done this quite smartly. Though a few SaaS brands have also used sarcastic tones when recommending their competitors. Such statements are used to demean the competitors as well as the competitor’s customers.

Differentiating Customer Response

In our research, we found that 26% of the SaaS comparison pages use reviews of competitors to show how their product is better for the users. 9% of the comparison pages have also shown user ratings from review sites like G2 Crowd.

A great example of a comparison with customer reviews is ProcessKit’s comparison page against Trello.

Processkit shows how its product works well for larger teams with complex workflows. At the same time, they present Trello as a basic and insufficient task management tool. They have put customer reviews of Trello against their own to showcase this. 

By showing such reviews, SaaS comparison pages tell the reader that people who have chosen their competitor are unhappy. This comparison is presented as yet another reason for the reader to migrate.

A few SaaS comparison pages also compare ratings to show better satisfaction among their users compared to those of the competitor.

Copywriting for Differentiating Factors

SaaS comparison pages use vivid language to describe the differences between their product and their competitor’s product. The tone is conversational rather than instructional.

For this section, comparison pages use the inverted pyramid format. A headline describes the difference followed by two paragraphs to explain further. One paragraph is used to describe the competitor and the other to describe the home product.

The headlines for this section usually focus on a particular solution for a specific type of people. This solution en described by highlighting differences in features, product purpose, customer reviews, ratings, or brand philosophy.

Headlines for Differentiating Factors:

1. Differentiating USPs, Brand Philosophy, or Product Purpose
   1. Difference between [Your Product] and [Competitor Product]
   2. [Your Product] is built for [Ideal Customer]
   3. [Your Product] focuses on [Key Solution]
   4. [Your Product] is built for [Product Purpose]
   5. [Competitor Product] has [Competitor Drawback]
   6. [Competitor Product] lacks [Key Solution]
   7. [Competitor Product] has [Competitor Drawback] while [Your Product] offers [Key Solution]
   8. [Competitor Product] is built for [Customer Type] while [Your Product] is built for [Ideal Customer]
   9. [Competitor Product] is built for [Product Purpose] while [Your Product] is built for [Product Purpose]
2. Differentiating Features & Solutions
   1. [Your Product] has [Key Solution]
   2. [Your Product] is great for [Product Purpose]
   3. Better [Key Solution]
   4. Users face [Competitor Drawback] with [Competitor Product]
   5. [Competitor Product] does not have [Unique Features]
   6. [Competitor Product] does not have [Key Solution]
   7. [Competitor Product] is not built for [Product Purpose]
   8. [Competitor Product] is not suited for [Customer Type]
3. Differentiating Customer Response
   1. What customers say about [Your Product] vs [Competitor Product]
   2. What customers say about [Competitor Product]
   3. Users face [Competitor Drawback] with [Competitor Product]
   4. Why users choose [Your Product] over [Competitor Product]
   5. People using [Competitor Product] complain about [Competitor Drawback]

The description paragraphs follow the lead of the headline. You can describe your product first and the competitor’s product in the second paragraph or vice-versa. The section is not bound by an order. Many comparison pages have changed the order within the same page.

This format works for all differentiating factors. One paragraph is used to highlight the benefits of your product and the other to highlight the drawbacks of the competitor.

The descriptive paragraphs usually communicate one of the following messages:

• How your product is better for the ideal customers
• How your product functions differently
• How your features are more useful
• How your features will solve a problem that the competitor’s product creates
• How your solutions are helpful for the users
• Drawbacks of competitor’s features
• Complaints of competitor’s customers

In descriptive paragraphs, it is important to give more weightage to your product. A few SaaS comparison pages have rambled on about competitors’ drawbacks without showing how their product works. 

The majority of SaaS comparison pages use 2 lines or less to describe the competitor in each section.

In the above example, Drift highlights that their product is designed for sales & marketing people while Intercom was built for developers and designers.

Drift then shows how its features are designed to function better for sales & marketing people as compared to Intercom. The headline highlights the difference in a solution and two paragraphs explain it further.

Designing for Differentiating Factors Section

Most Saas Comparison pages use alternating blocks designed for differentiating factors. The first section has text on the left and a design element on the right. The second section makes a switch by putting design elements on the left and text on the right.

This format is used for differentiating features and solutions.

Most SaaS comparison pages give a preview of their software in this section. Some pages use screenshots of the software while others showcase features with GIFs or short videos. 

As for brand statements or differences in product purpose, comparison pages use only text with little to no graphics.

Comparison of customer reviews is done in many different ways. Some comparison pages create separate sections for their reviews and competitor’s reviews.

Each set of reviews is used to highlight one drawback of the competitor. On the other hand, some comparison pages exhibit their reviews and competitor’s reviews side by side.

This format highlights differences in user experience. At the same time, it showcases differences in features and solutions.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Open with a difference in Product’s Purpose or Ideal Customer
• Headline for Product Purpose Section:
  • [Your Product] is designed for [Ideal Customers] / [Product Purpose]
• Compare differences in features and solutions in sets.
• Each set should contain:
  • Headline focusing on a solution or competitor drawback
  • Differences in a feature
  • Your customer review
  • Competitor’s customer review
  • Preview of Your Software
• Highlight the difference in solution in the headline:
  • [Your Product] offers [Key Solution] while [Competitor Product] has [Competitor Drawback]
• Compare the features in 2 paragraphs format.
• Describe your product in the first paragraph & competitor’s drawbacks in the second paragraph.
• Differences in features should highlight:
  • Your Product’s Purpose
  • Your Product’s Usefulness
• Use GIFs or Short Videos of your software to support the description.
• Support this comparison with customer reviews.
• Use customer reviews that are relevant to the headline.
• Link customer reviews to the source
• Positioning:
  • You can position this section immediately after the opening CTA.
  • You can also put a CTA immediately after this section.

7. Migration Support

Many of the customers visit comparison pages to look for an alternative to their existing software. This could be because they are facing an issue with the current software or they want a more cost-effective solution.

Regardless of the reason, offering easy migration from your competitor’s software to your software can make a huge impact. If a customer is using your competitor’s product, they will have existing projects and saved data on it.

You need to help them overcome status quo bias. If you can assure them that they don’t have to start from scratch again, they are more likely to choose your product.

Despite its obvious advantages, only 26% of the SaaS comparison pages offer easy migration. This section is very well highlighted on the page. SaaS brands offer migration support in 3 ways:

1. Automated Data Import
2. Manual Migration Features with Customer Support
3. Done-for-You Migration by the Company

The migration support section also works as a conversion CTA. It is positioned as the final or second-last CTA on the competitor comparison landing page.

The migration Support section contains a headline, description, graphical elements, and a CTA button.

Copywriting for Migration Support Section

This section only needs to convey that the customer will not lose their data and continue their work with the new software.

The headline for this section says: Import data from [Competitor Product] to [Your Product]

The description outlines how this migration is done. It also assures the visitor that the migration will be easy, they will get all their data on the new software and the company will help them complete it.  The description is usually linked to a detailed blog about the migration process.

A few SaaS comparison pages have also provided video guides in the Migration Support section.

Designing for Migration Support Section

This section does not require many design elements. SaaS comparison pages have used software previews and video guides as graphical elements. Some comparison pages only show logos of two companies with an arrow to symbolize migration.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Automated migration is the best option.
• If that is not available with your product, you can offer done-for-you migration or customer support for migration.
• Your headline should look something like this:
  • Import all your data from [Competitor Product] to [Your Product]
• Support the headline with visuals of company logos.
• Add a video guide to show how migration would work.
• Add a brief description of the migration process.
• Link the description to a detailed blog of the migration.
• This blog should also show how various features work in your software after the migration.

8. FAQs Section

FAQs on competitor comparison pages are used to summarize points of comparison in form of answers. They also feature common questions about the software, its uses, and pricing plans. 

Types of Questions in Comparison Page FAQs:

• Questions about Features
• Questions about Features Comparison
• Questions about Migration
• Questions about Pricing
• Questions about Differentiating Factors

The answers to FAQs are short and to the point. The answers are linked with other pages on the website related to the topic. 

Copywriting for FAQs Section

FAQs are usually headlined as FAQs. Both the questions and the answers in this section use first-person language and have a conversational tone. The questions are framed from the customer’s first-person perspective and the answers are written from the SaaS company’s first-person perspective.

Designing for FAQs Section

Most SaaS comparison pages with FAQs use expanding and collapsing sections. Each question gets a button that shows the answer when expanded.

Other than that, this section does not feature any design elements.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Build a robust FAQs section with a variety of questions about your product and the competitors’ product
• Frame the questions to include long-tail keywords and search terms for your product, competitor’s product, and product category.
• Reinforce your USP, differentiating factors, Unique Features, and key solutions in the answers
• Use first-person language and a conversational tone
• Link the answers to other relevant pages on your website.

9. Supporting Resources

Though not an essential part of comparison pages, supporting resources can help keep the visitor on your website for a longer period. Supporting resources can also be used to create further intrigue about your product.

Only 17% of the SaaS comparison pages use supporting resources like blogs, customer case studies, eBooks, use cases, or product demonstrations. This section also allows you to build internal links to relevant content on your website.

The blogs featured in this section focus on product comparison, product features, relevant tips, strategies for the product, competitor drawbacks, user guides, or case studies.

Growfusely’s Verdict:

• Create a supporting resources section with blogs and case studies.
• Feature 4 of each at the end of the page.
• Include blogs about product uses, strategies based on the product, and the product’s important features.
• Position this section after the last CTA of the page.

Things you should not do on a Comparison Page

For all the wonderful things you can do on a comparison page, there are a few things that you absolutely should not do. Unless you like the trouble of the legal kind.

Do not Violate the Legal Rights of the Competitor

You can’t have a comparison page without mentioning your competitor. You should be mindful of how you represent the competitors or their products on your comparison page. Company name, product name, company logo, product icon, and company trademark are very important elements.

Here are a few things you should keep in mind when you mention your competitors:

• You should not cut, distort or edit the competitor’s logo.
• You should not change the color or design of the competitor’s logo.
• Use the ® symbol if you are using any trademark elements like logo or name.
• Add disclaimers regarding the ownership of the trademarked elements.
• Provide contact details to register complaints regarding the comparison page.
• Mention the date of comparison or the last update.
• Use third-party sources to support claims about the competitor.
• Do not make any claims about the competitors without third-party sources.
• Add a disclaimer about third-party sources and links. Refute all responsibility for examining Third-Party sources or their claims. 

Do Not Disrespect your Competitor

You cannot outright claim that your competitors have a bad product. Disrespect towards a competitor will make your brand look petty. You should stick to facts and objective comparisons. Any subjective claims you make should be supported by facts or third-party sources. 

For example, if you claim that your competitor’s software is not easy to use, you should show customer reviews from third-party websites to support this claim.

Most SaaS comparison pages use respectful language when talking about their competitors. 34% of the comparison landing pages we analyzed praised their competitors. While 23% of the SaaS comparison pages also recommended their competitors for a few features or solutions.

You do not have to praise or recommend the competitor, but you should be very careful not to disrespect them either.

Do Not Create Thin Content Comparison Pages

Thin content comparison pages are made just to target certain keywords. But such content will soon lose its SERP. Such content does not fulfill the visitor’s desire and hence has high bounce rates.

This would only damage your website’s SEO and your overall brand reputation. If a visitor comes to your website and finds thin content, they are likely to discount your brand as unreliable.

Do Not be Self-Centered

Visitors searching for comparison pages are seeking true and objective information about both products. If you focus only on your product, they are likely to go elsewhere to learn about the competitor.

In this case, you lose the opportunity to control the narrative and convert such visitors into customers.

You must offer an objective comparison between two products, their similarities, and differences. This will require you to mention your competitors quite a few times. But, don’t unwittingly promote their product as the superior alternative.

At the same time, do not falsely discount your competitors. If you make false claims about competitors’ products, the visitors will find out about it from elsewhere. Furthermore, your website will be penalized for spreading false information and your competitors may also take legal action.

Do Not Include Unnecessary Comparisons

Do not add insignificant features, tools, or solutions in your comparison just to lend weight to your product. The comparison should focus only on things that would matter to a customer.

You should only include aspects of the products that affect the cost, customer experience, or product utility. You can create detailed pages about your features and link to them. But, minor details have no place on a competitor comparison page.

Even for important aspects, you should keep the descriptions short and precise. Most comparison pages feature concise text and sharp language. Long descriptions will make your comparison page tiresome to read.

Competitor Comparison Landing Page Checklist

This comprehensive checklist will help you create the perfect competitor comparison landing page. This checklist focuses on the SEO, marketing, and sales goals of a comparison page. Each point will help improve your chances of converting a visitor into a customer.

1. Create one comparison page for each competitor.
2. Target all keywords concerning your product, competitor’s product, customer reviews, and product comparison.
3. Draft the comparison page to target your ideal customers.
4. Establish the main differentiating factor between your and the competitor’s product at the beginning of your comparison landing page.
5. Provide a summary of the differences in features, solutions, product purpose, and customer experience.
6. Follow it up with a sincere brand statement that outlines your USP,  purpose for creating the product, and the ideal customers for the product.
7. Advertise your awards, recognitions, and media coverage with the brand statement.
8. Focus on comparison rather than advertising your product.
9. Create an impactful opening and a persuasive closing. Use CTA at both places.
10. Offer a free trial of your software and place the “Start Free Trial” CTA.
11. Write a different copy for each CTA. The copy should persuade the reader with a solution.
12. Use a conversational tone for headlines & descriptions.
13. Write in short sentences & brief paragraphs throughout the page.
14. You can use humor, but do not make a joke at the competitor’s expense.
15. Make your headlines descriptive. Each headline should talk about a solution or a customer pain point.
16. Connect each solution with your product’s features.
17. Show how the features function and create a better user experience.
18. When comparing solutions focus on the differences in customer experience, performance, and results.
19. Support your claims with trust-building elements.
20. Use at least 3 different types of trust-building elements on the comparison page.
21. Show your competitor’s drawbacks only in comparison to your product.
22. Use reviews of competitor customers from third-party websites to support claims about their drawbacks.
23. Offer easy migration from a competitor’s product to your product. Assure the reader that the migration will be easy & their data will remain intact.
24. Use testimonials and reviews of customers who have made the switch to support your claim.
25. Create unique graphics to compliment your text instead of using stock images.
26. Provide a preview of your software when explaining features & solutions.
27. Create a comprehensive comparison table containing important features and pricing plans.
28. Highlight Unique Features & key solutions of your product independently.
29. Address all possible objections through the FAQs section.
30. Link the comparison page to other pages on your website such as features, pricing plan, blog, customer support, etc.
31. Create a set of 5-6 supporting blogs that work as follow-up material to the comparison page.
32. Write a proper disclaimer for use of competitors’ copyrights and trademarks.
33. Write a disclaimer for terms of use of third-party information.
34. Provide date of comparison and contact details to register complaints for inaccurate information.
35. Persuade the visitors with an exciting offer. But make it time-bound.

Also, check out a concise version of the checklist with an infographic.

How Growfusely creates a Comparison Landing Page

To make the most out of a comparison page you need SEO, Content Creation, Content Marketing, and Digital PR. Growfusely does all four and more. We are a content marketing agency for SaaS companies.

Instead of working just on the comparison page, we develop a marketing campaign around competitor comparison. Here’s how we do it:

Brand Research

The first order of business is learning about your brand and its product. We want to know the story of both from origins to the status quo. Your story has as big an impact on the conversion rate as features in your product. This will also help us define your brand’s identity and purpose. In turn, this helps creates an origin story for the product. 

Product Research

The next step is understanding your product through and through. Like test driving a race car, we want to see what potential and possibilities your product holds. Then we will learn about things that make it tick: features, mechanics, user interface, and so on. This will help Growfusely prepare a list of solutions that your product can offer. From this, we identify the ideal customers for your product.

Competitor Research

Growfusely studies your competitors as closely as it studies your product. We find out the purpose their product serves, the features that make it special, the company that created it, and the solutions it offers. We first take an objective approach toward the product. Our goal is to understand it from a user’s perspective. Only then do we start picking out the differences between the two products. Growfusely puts equal emphasis on comparing user experience as it does on features and solutions.

Target Audience Research

After understanding both products, we listen to their customers. Growfusely clients are gracious enough to connect us with their customers. We are especially interested in the people who switched from competitor’s product to your product. These folks can help us identify key differences between the two products.

We also go through testimonials, social media, and review sites to learn what people are saying about both products. We want to know what they like about the product, how they use the product, the problems they face, and things they wish to have in a product like that. 

SEO

Once we understand the audience, we target their search patterns. We focus on generating relevant traffic and ranking the comparison page for targetted keywords. Our SEO strategy targets a variety of audiences including, but not limited to, people searching for

• Comparison between your product and competitor’s product
• Alternative to competitor’s product
• Reviews of competitor’s product
• Contact details for competitor’s company
• Comparison between your competitors
• Product alternatives in the market

This wide targeting will bring relevant traffic to your comparison pages. Our SEO strategy also helps with brand awareness. We target people looking for a product in the market as well as people searching for competitors’ brands.

Even if your brand is not the biggest name in the market, Growfusely can help you put your name in big conversations. 

Content Creation

We create comparison pages in “One vs Many” and “One vs One” formats. Each of these targets a different set of keywords and brings in different types of audiences. Though the ultimate goal for both of them is to get conversions.

The “One vs Many” comparison page aims to highlight your product’s USP and attract ideal customers. This landing page serves people searching for options and helps your product stand against bigger fish in the market.

On the other hand, the “One vs One” comparison landing page focuses on people searching for a particular competitor, customers unhappy with that competitor’s product, and people trying to decide between your and competitor’s product.

Growfusely creates a different “One vs One” comparison page for each of your competitors. Each page highlights differences between two products, the competitor’s drawbacks, the best features of your product, solutions your product offers, and the difference in user experience.

The content creation is based on points of persuasion. These are identified during product and audience research. Each of the customer’s pain points is addressed and we show how your product solves that problem. We also focus on your product’s unique factors to create a sense of fascination in the customer’s eye.

The entire competitor comparison landing page flows like a story that culminates in conversion.

Marketing

Once the comparison pages are ready, we focus on marketing them through internal and external resources. Growfusely creates supporting content like blogs, how-to guides, listicles, customer case studies, success stories, and so on. This helps attract top and middle funnel audiences.

We build up the authority of the comparison page as well as your brand with digital PR. This activity helps drive quality traffic to the comparison page and increase its SERP. Digital PR also gives third-party credibility to your product and your brand.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg, we aim to create a long-lasting marketing campaign around comparison pages. 

Growfusely’s strategy incorporates the present as well as the future. Some of your competitors may shut down and new competitors may emerge. That’s why our strategy changes with time.

There will also be changes in your product, your competitor’s product, audience needs, market trends, and more. We will upgrade the content and the marketing strategy to stay ahead of the ever-evolving variables.

The Ideal Competitor Comparison Landing Page Template

Based on our research, we have created a template for an ideal comparison landing page. The template is for the “One vs One” comparison format. It is designed to highlight your product’s USP, show differences between the two products, and guide the visitor toward conversion.

Section 1

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Section 3

Section 4

Section 5

Section 6

Section 7

Section 8

Section 9

Section 10

Optimize the Comparison Page for Conversion

Once your comparison page is up and running, you should track its performance for SERP, traffic, visitor behavior, and conversion. It is necessary to update the landing page based on these insights.

Higher SERP will bring in more traffic. You should work on the comparison page’s SEO to get better rankings. It is also important for controlling the narrative about your brand. If your competitors rank higher than you for comparison searches, they get to speak first about your brand.

After SERP is sorted, you should study the behavior of the visitors on your page. Here conversion is the most important metric to track. If the conversion rate remains low despite high traffic, you will need to make changes to the comparison page.

You can use metrics like scroll depth and heat map to see where the visitor stops reading the page. This way you can identify problem areas to increase conversion through the comparison page.

Most importantly, you should keep updating the comparison page at regular intervals. Sooner or later your competitor will update their product and so will you. The comparison page must provide accurate information about both products

Thank you for reading this far. We hope that this guide helps you in making a killer competitor page that brings in quality customers to your brand. Speaking of which, here are a few bonus tips to help you market your comparison landing page.

You have come this far, you deserve more.

Bonus Tips: How to Use Comparison Page for Marketing

You can market your comparison page in a variety of ways. It is a very useful piece of content to target middle and bottom funnel audiences. Aside from direct search engine traffic, you can also incorporate comparison pages in content marketing and paid ads campaigns.

Content Marketing

We have already talked about writing supporting blogs for your comparison page to expand its reach. It is a form of content marketing. You can also create listicles of different options in a product category and link them to your comparison page. 

For example, if your product is a CRM software, you can create listicles like top 10 CRM software, 10 best CRM alternatives to Salesforce, 5 ways to use CRM software to get more customers, etc.

You can also write guest posts for customer guidance and review websites and link them to your comparison pages. These guest posts can be on similar topics as supporting blogs and listicles.

Video blogs are a quite popular form of content, but only a few brands have used them for product comparison. Only 9% of the comparison pages have a video version of the page. You can get an edge over your competitors by creating one.

Youtube videos face less competition and rank faster than web pages. This tactic can help you outrank review websites and your competitors for a variety of search queries.

Content marketing can help create a lot of different channels to drive traffic to your comparison pages. Although, you should be mindful of avoiding common content marketing mistakes.

Paid Ads Campaign

It might take time for your comparison page to reach the top 3 ranks in SERP. In the meantime, you can use search ads to target relevant keywords and bring traffic to your landing page. As we mentioned before, SaaS brands target comparison search queries to place ads.

You can target all the keywords you used for creating the comparison page. Check the “Keywords for Comparison Page” section at the beginning of this article to get the list.

You can also target people who have visited your competitor’s website, review websites, product guidance websites, and so on. For comparison landing pages, you should target all people looking for a product or are on the verge of making a decision. 

If you drive such traffic, your comparison page will not only help them make a decision but also guide them toward purchasing your product.

Just like content marketing, comparison videos are also a great tool for paid ads. You can target the same audience as your comparison page with video comparisons.

You can use social media paid ads to target people who have mentioned your competitors in their posts. You should especially target those people who have posted complaints about the competitor’s products.

A Gift that Keeps Giving

A comparison page opens up a world of possibilities and a good one can act as a dedicated salesman for your product. Combine your comparison page with marketing automation and you have a gift that keeps on giving.

Image Sources – Salesforce, Mailerlite, Shopify, Azure, Air, Pipedrive, Slite, Notion, Twist, FreshBooks, Shortcut, Swell, Signaturely, Outplay, Reply, Intercom, Teamwork, Drift, Zoho CRM, Hiver, Outreach, Missive, Processkit, PandaDoc

Pratik Dholakiya

Pratik Dholakiya is the Founder of Growfusely, a SaaS content marketing agency specializing in content and data-driven SEO.