The Must-Have Tools For SEO Professionals

Whether working for a digital marketing agency or doing your own search engine optimization (SEO), using tools is indispensable. If you have a budget for your disposal, you will be able to purchase some of the best tools there is. If not, there are free and freemium SEO tools, which albeit the limited features, are highly utilizable as well. Here are the must-have SEO tools.

1.) Google Keyword Planner:

An SEO campaign starts with a keyword research; the process is foundational. Specifically designed for Google AdWords, Keyword Planner displays keyword ideas on a particular search phrase. It also shows search volume data (via monthly searches) and trends (through competitiveness level). The best thing about this tool is you can filter its targeting, which is undoubtedly beneficial for local SEO.

2.) SEO Book:

Another great tool for keyword research is SEO Book. However, the free tools that this site provides are diverse. Great examples are linked suggestion tool, robots.txt tool, meta tag generator, page comparison tool, ad group generator, and typo generator among others. Thus, if you are tackling a distinct task, these tools will help. SEO Book also includes free Firefox extensions such as a toolbar and rank checker.

3.) SEO Site Tools:

A Google Chrome extension, SEO Site Tools is perfect for quick stats about a particular site or page. It displays external page data, page elements, social media and suggestions among others. Under the page elements, you’d be able to determine the strength of your on-page SEO from meta description and anchor tags to H tags. You can work upon the suggestions to clean your website of bad links, improper tags, and other elements that are not SEO-friendly. If you are using Firefox, an alternative is SEOQuake which is available for both Chrome and Firefox.

4.) Open Site Explorer:

Link building is fundamental to SEO. One tool to support this initiative is Open Site Explorer by Moz. This is particularly useful when doing a competitor backlink analysis—you’d be able to know what links they are getting and work on how to obtain them as well. You simply have to enter the domain at the field so you may view its backlinks. The analysis shows metrics for authority and page link, although the page social metrics are only available for the premium users.

5.) SEMRush:

Throughout the years, SEMRush proved to be a dependable SEO tool for both digital agencies and firms with in-house SEO. Nevertheless, the tool is best utilized for keyword research and competitor analysis; its competitor research is way too advanced compared to other tools on the list except for Moz’s Open Site Explorer. For one, it can outline insights on how your competitors are performing organically. SEMRush is from the same maker of SEOQuake, another great SEO tool.

6.) Advanced Web Ranking:

Advanced Web Ranking, or simply AWR, can be used for various SEO initiatives. AWR, however, has a powerful analyzer that makes it perfect for creating custom ranking and traffic reports. What’s great about the tool its frequent updates, and the customer service is willing to offer premium users a walkthrough. AWR is mostly applicable for small digital firms and in-house SEO.

7.) Market Samurai:

For keyword research and more, Market Samurai is one tool that you can use. The tool allows focusing on keyword niche while building a link profile. Just be careful with using the tool, though, since creating too many backlinks in the least possible time may alert Google and other search engines that you are using black hat techniques.

8.) Cognitive SEO:

Another tool that digs in relevant data is Cognitive SEO. This tool is very helpful for firms that are penalized by Google due to unnatural links. Cognitive SEO sorts all the backlinks and generates a disavow file automatically.

Paid or not, these tools meant to make the life of any SEO easier and more convenient. They aim to help the users become effective on what they do. You can use these tools at the same time, but your goal should be finding the tools that make sense to your process and goals. With this, you may conclude that a particular tool is more helpful than the others. The best route to take is using the tool with a free trial and choosing which ones best deliver the intended results.