Choose competitors by the buyer problem
Start with products your customers would reasonably compare with yours. A large company sharing one feature may have a very different audience, budget, or product category.
Compare relevant pages as well as entire domains. A guide linking to a competitor's educational resource may have no reason to link to your pricing page.
Inspect the source, not just the export
A backlink tool can help identify referring pages and attributes. Indexes differ, and a "new" link in a report may simply be newly discovered by that provider.
Open each useful candidate. Record what the article is about, why the competitor appears, and whether your product offers a genuinely relevant alternative or additional option.
Build a gap you can explain
Imagine a comparison of project management tools for architecture firms. If your product lacks the document and approval workflows that shaped the selection, the competitor's presence is not a good reason to request inclusion. If you serve that exact workflow, prepare current facts and access for evaluation.
We would prioritize pages where the reason for inclusion is obvious. Copying every referring domain can duplicate years of irrelevant sponsorships, old partnerships, and one-off coverage.
Use consistent measurements
If you compare referring domains or authority metrics, use the same provider and date. Keep those numbers separate from the editorial assessment. A larger backlink total does not automatically mean a more useful profile for your target customer.
Keep the final prospect list small enough to research properly. Each contact should be able to understand your suggested contribution without opening a spreadsheet of SEO metrics.