Google SEO Tools

Using Google SEO Tools to monitor your search engine optimization progress is a necessity for any webmaster or business engaging in SEO practices. There are many free online reporting tools that you can easily utilize to display important statistics. That being said, there are some definiate drawbacks with free tools, certain features can only be found with subscription based tools.

SEO Optimization Tools

These tools allows you to see if your current link building strategies are helping to promote your website or if your current plan is relatively unsuccessful. No one single tool can completely get the job done, there are a variety of SEO Optimization Tools, here are a few categories:

• Backlink Checking Tools
• Competitor Research Tools
• Link Tracking Software
• SEO Reporting Tools
• General Optimization Tools
• Client Management Software
• Keyword Research Tools

6 SEO Tools to Check Backlinks

Checking backlinks is an integral factor in track your link building SEO efforts. Without these tools, it is virtually impossible to understand the effectiveness of any online campaign. Even if you do not build links or do SEO yourself, you can track the results of the SEO company that you invested in to see if their service is effective or not.

Alexa – Alexa Internet is a subcompany of Amazon.com. The Alexa Backlink tool collects statistics on browsing data via a toolbar that over 3 million people have installed. The toolbar then sends it to their mainsite. The backlinks shown typically represent a large preportion of a sites actual backlinks. While it is nearly impossible to discover every single link pointing to a website, the Alexa tools is one of the best free backlink checking tools.

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While Alexa often shows a good amount of the websites actual backlinks, it does now crawl the web in the same fashion that Google does. Alexa often fails to show accurate data on small sites, new sites, or sites without much natural traffic. That being said, it is one of the best tools for checking free backlinks.

Open Site Explorer – SEOMoz offers a paid tool for $99 month to analyze intricate details about a website backlink portfolio. With the ability to sort by anchor text, link strength, trust and page location, Open Site Explorer sets the bar at usability and quality of data. That being said, the price is quite steep. For many new webmasters, a cheaper or free alternative may still get the job done. This site is also perfect for SEO companies that need specific statistics and seo tracking data. The service is free for 30 days, then it is $99 a month.

MajesticSEO – This service may be free for your site if you match their specific criteria. If you are able to upload a file to verify that you are the owner of the website, you can use the full feature set of Majestic SEO to check your own backlinks. Their backlink tool is able to check the legitmacy of the backlinks to your website by displaying the strength of the links with their trust and citation factors.

Other great tools to use are: Ahrefs, Google’s “link:” operator, and the Blekko Search Engine.

Competitor Research & SEO Reporting Tools

• SearchMetrics
• SEMRush
• SEOMoz

When it comes to SEO, if you’re not first, you’re last. Sites like SearchMetrics, SEMRush and SEOMoz give you important reporting statistics to see how you stack up against competing sites. If you are low ranked on a specific keyword, then this should motivate you to work to improve your rank for that word. Likewise, if you are high for a keyword, they will estimate the amount of work necessary to maintain that high position. Google SEO tools, especially competitor reporting tools, are extremely important in high volume niches. Link building is never an easy task, but taking a look at your competitors progress can help jumpstart your SEO efforts.

4 Tools For Keyword Research

• Traffic Travis
• Market Samurai
• SEMRush
• Google Adsense Tool

As many of you know “Keywords” are the words that people will search for to find your product. Ranking high for good keywords will ideally help direct to your website. Keyword volume and competitiveness is vitally important. Make sure that you research heavily into keywords before investing time and money in SEO services. While SEO companies offer this service as part of their managed SEO campaigns, it is possible to do yourself.  For example, if you are a car repair shop in central Florida, a keyword for you could be “Orlando car repair.”

Make the keywords relevant for your location and services. The four Google SEO tools above, Traffic Travis, Market Samurai, SEMRush, and Google AdSense are all great free online tools to seeing the popularity of your potential keywords. It is recommended to avoid very basic one word keywords because these are very hard to rank for. Doing keyword research makes the whole SEO process easier for you and the SEO company you are hiring.