Competitor: How can I get a piece of the bread?

Hi guys,

I’ve been doing web design for a few years now and am about to launch a new web design services targeting a very specific niche - until now I wasn’t targeting any specific industry, that’s why I decided to make this move, to be able to scale more.

Furthermore, the niche I’m planning to target is one of my passions, so I’ll definitely be able to do great things and help my future customers.

I do have one concern though.

I’m working on my business plan and I found out there’s a guy that’s been targeting this niche since 2007, with lots of reviews, 26K backlinks and many useful blog posts that rank first (I checked that on SemRush and by googling a few things myself).

I know the very basics of SEO optimization but I’m not a SEO genius (and I’m bad with backlinks). So based on your point of view and experience, I am wondering if I have any changes to get well ranked or potentially outrank some of his content in the SERP?

To get more clients, my plan is to use social media as well. But I’d definitely like to have my place in the search engines.

Thanks guys.