Our Top Ten Favorite SEO Tools
As an ever-expanding Atlanta SEO company, EverSpark Interactive encounters new, innovative SEO tools on a daily basis. There are a few we stick with because we find they provide the best results (though picking just ten was difficult – there are a lot of useful tools out there!). We have chosen these tools because they provide SEOs with the ability to do proper research, reverse engineer, track our work and more, and we have created a line-up of just a few of the favorites often used here at our SEO agency. Please note that these tools are not organized in any particular order of importance.
1. SEOBook’s SEO Toolbar
We dissected and explained this comprehensive tool in two earlier posts on our blog, but cannot ignore it here. It is an extremely useful tool we use often to reverse engineer for SEO. The Toolbar essentially gives you a birds-eye view of the ranking factors any website you look at (using Mozilla Firefox).
2. SEMRush
2. SEMRush is a keyword research tool that allows for the person who is trying to optimize his or her site to analyze the keywords for which competitors are ranking (both organically and via AdWords).
Known for its accuracy, SEMRush is useful to a webmaster looking to manage a site of any size. If you are looking to analyze a competitor’s site and the rankings of key phrases, SEMRush can be a huge time saver.
3.Yahoo Site Explorer
Surprised to see this particular tool here? Well, don’t be. The Yahoo Site Explorer can be useful for finding the most accurate data for links pointing to a website. A large portion of SEO is about off-page factors, so links are very important.
This tool can provide you with information about in-links (the links pointing back to your website) and pages indexed (this is important because Google loves big sites). The more inbound links you have, chances increase that your site will enjoy higher rankings. The Yahoo Site Explorer is helpful, therefore, because it reflects exact number of links indexed in the algorithm.
So, this tool can help you find out:
- The number of backlinks coming into a site.
- The number of pages being indexed by the search engines.
4. Google Analytics
Web traffic reports show where your site traffic is coming from so that you can see which pages bring in the most traffic (which allows you to decide what needs to be tweaked and made better) make up one of the many helpful features Google Analytics provides. You can also use Analytics to track any email or keyword campaigns you are using to promote your site, and how they may be helping you. Additionally, social metrics are becoming integrated so that you can track your Facebook likes, Tweets, and how many people Google +1 your site.
5. Google Webmaster Tools
Google’s Webmaster Tools are extremely important for any SEO. First of all, it’s a free way to diagnose any problems your site might be having and analyze the links coming into your site.
This tool is also useful for communicating with Google with regard to the search engine’s indexing functions. Additionally, Webmaster tools allow you to understand how Google views your site. You can check your page speed and other extremely important factors that may contribute to lower rankings. Additionally, one of its most important functions is the feature that allows you to see what search queries are pulling your site up in the SERPs. Further, you can file “Reconsideration Requests” with Google through Webmaster tools if you feel you have been punished by Google.
6. Open Site Explorer
Today, SEOMoz announced the launch of a new version of this useful tool, which is extremely helpful for SEOs and link-builders looking to assess a site’s authority and links. It now provides link data as well as social metrics for the site being assessed. According to the SEOMoz blog, “social metrics are also included in the Top Pages reports, so you can see how the most-linked-to content has performed on the social web. This is particularly cool for popular blogs.”
There are also features that allow you compare site metrics side by side for domains, pages, and sub-domains. Tools for link-builders looking to assess other sites’ link profiles are also a large part of this tool’s allure.
7. Raven Tools
Raven Tools maximizes the efficiency of an internet marketing campaign; there are multiple features that an SEO agency would find helpful. We aren’t going to cover all of them here, but I would like to touch on a few useful functions that, for a smaller SEO company like EverSpark, can be helpful and help us to stay ahead of our competition in Atlanta and the rest of the nation. This tool makes it easier to compile detailed, organized and comprehensive reports for clients and for the purposes of tracking as well. For instance, Raven Tools provides a way to track links coming into the site being analyzed as well as sites going into other sites (like those of your competitors). Also, Raven Tools provides a way to find people to mutually build links with by scanning keywords.
In addition to tracking functions, Raven Tools also provides ways to manage your presence on the social platforms. Not only can you send out social media updates through Raven Tools, but you can also monitor what others are saying about your site/company on these platforms.
8. Google Keyword tool
The Google Keyword tool allows you to search for the exact terms people search for when interested in your niche. For instance, if you are a personal injury attorney, you can type this into the keyword tool, click the “Exact Match” box, and immediately see what terms having to do with “personal injury attorney” are being searched by Google users.
This tool is extremely useful to any SEO company – and is especially popular in our Atlanta office.
9. Majestic SEO
Majestic SEO Site Explorer is a backlink analysis tool.
This link checker is a fast tool whose function is very similar to Yahoo Site Explorer’s but with a few more cool perks. Who better to describe this tool than its creator? On the Majestic SEO site, the blog about the introduction of the tool describes it like this: “Site Explorer starts with a one page summary of any root domain, subdomain or URL. This page contains all the top level backlink information you need to make a quick assessment of the site. It includes both the domain and page information, backlink and referring domains discovery charts for the last 12 months, the top backlinks linking to the domain/URL, the referring domains linking to the root domain and the top pages on the domain/page.”
10. EverSpark’s New Link Analysis Tool (Scheduled to be released in September 2011)
EverSpark’s own new tool will be released soon, and will be revolutionary in its information gathering ability. The tool will gather a list of the top 30 links on Google and score them after 1) reverse engineering the links 2) gathering information about the domain age of each 3) analyzing the number of links per page and 4) analyzing the number of outgoing links per page.
This is a temporary mock-up of what the new tool will look like. Keep checking back on our blog for updates on this new tool!
Where Else Can You Find Useful Information from EverSpark Interactive?
EverSpark Interactive is a full service SEO agency based in Atlanta. For more information and current SEO news, continue reading our blog and visit EverSpark’s website or Facebook page. Or, follow us on Twitter where we microblog – @EverSparkSEO. For SEO questions specific to your business and website, give us a call at 770-481-1766. Also, look out for our upcoming E-Book, which goes in-depth with these tools and others.
Related Information
What Is A Good, Free Tool for SEO Research?
What Is A Great Free Tool for SEO Research? Part Two
Will Social Networking Really Change How Site Rankings Are Calculated
How Do I Ensure A Good User Experience On My Website?
How Should I Optimize My Site’s “About” Page for SEO?
What To Do After You Have Corrected Your Webmaster Violations
What Makes A Great Domain Name?