[1] Although many of these changes are minor, they can create shifts in search results in many ways. To maintain optimization progress, SEO professionals use a variety of tools to evaluate their work and start campaigns. Here are our 5 favorite tools, each with free and paid versions, that make SEO easier:

• Screaming Frog’s SEO Spider Tool

Every SEO professional should have a crawling tool to help evaluate their onsite optimization. Screaming Frog’s SEO Spider Tool is a favorite because it’s fast, configurable, and user-friendly. There are other tools that perform many of the same tasks like Xenu’s Link Sleuth, but they’re clunky and weren’t developed with the needs of an SEO in mind.

With SEO Spider Tool, users can track crawl levels, internal and outbound links, metadata, HTTP status codes, and much more. Where SEO Spider Tool excels are its customizable filters and the ability to search HTML source codes.

• Moz’s Open Site Explorer

Depending on your product and service, finding valuable opportunities can feel like fishing in the desert. Luckily, the brilliant minds at Moz developed the Open Site Explorer to find backlinks on a page or entire site for link-building opportunities.

Open Site Explorer offers some of the most comprehensive link metrics available, including page authority, information about anchor texts, link opportunity scores, and top pages in a domain. Pair the Open Site Explorer with the MozBar and you can extend your link searches into Google’s SERP for fast link building.

• SE Ranking

Understanding how well your pages rank in relevant keywords is an essential to the success of SEO. SE Ranking allows SEO professionals to track and monitor their daily ranking status in a list of keywords that they find relevant. The results of the tool are highly accurate and the tool allows you to recheck your results multiple times throughout the day.

Another feature that makes SE Ranking tool shine above the rest is its ability to generate reports for up to three search engines like Google, Yahoo, Yandex, and Bing. Other tools tend to be limited in scope, limiting your results to a single search engine. With search engines constantly evolving, understanding how your site ranks across the web has become increasingly instrumental to being competitive.

• BuzzSumo’s Content Research Tool

Developing high quality is as much as science as it is an art. Not only must the content be appealing, it should also add value to your site by hitting essential keywords. Tools like BuzzSumo’s Content Research Tool can help bridge the gap by evaluating the type of content that ranks well around a specific topic, including information on influencers in that topic.

When you combine data from the Content Research tool with other backend ranking tools, you get a complete end-to-end analysis of where to go next with your content.

• Google Tools

At nearly 2 trillion search queries per-year, Google Search is one of the busiest search engines available today. The company also has some of the most widely used tools in SEO for their comprehensive data and user-friendly design. There are at least three tools every SEO should have in their toolbox:

• Google Analytics: Not only does Google Analytics measure your search traffic, it also offers highly granular information on how visitors interact with your site. Few tools come close to the power of Google Analytics.  
• Google Search Console: Formerly known as Webmaster Tools, it’s a suite of tools that can help evaluate how your site interacts with the Google Search Engine. From crawl errors to query reports, the search console is a must-have for webmasters and SEO professionals.
• Google Trends: Visitor search behaviors and trends are always changing, especially in highly competitive and season dependent industries like clothing and technology. Monitoring the latest search behaviors for your market is key to competing in niche and volatile markets.

These tools help SEO professionals make quicker and smarter decisions. Each tool performs a specific job in the highly diverse practice of SEO to earn a stronger search ranking and maintain a competitive edge.  

With 10-years of experience in developing successful digital strategies, Strongpages has generated significant results for clients in a variety of competitive industries. Learn more about how our Search Engine Optimization (SEO) services can help you reach your digital marketing goals, fill out our form and a digital marketing expert will reach you soon!

We’ve also created many tools like a Marketing Channel ROI Analysis sheet and a Hashtag Counter Tool to better manage our efforts. They are downloadable on our site under resources. Don’t forget to follow our Twitter: @Strongpages & LinkedIn: Strongpages for more insight on successful SEO and PPC strategies!

 

[1]“Google Algorithm Change History”. Moz. https://moz.com/google-algorithm-change