11 free SEO tools for creators
SEO is a confusing process and time-consuming, however it's not required to be. Here are 11 reliable SEO tools to help optimize your website and bring in increased traffic.
SEO is often difficult and complicated, especially if you're new to it. Keywords, both short and long-tail, anchor text and txt files, backlinking and link-building . . . This is enough to make your mind spin.
The best part? There are a lot of easy-to-use, affordable -- often even free -- tools out there which can take care of a great deal of SEO-related heavy lifting (and algorithm analyzing) for you.
Here are 11 easy SEO tools to help improve your site's performance and draw more eyes on your digital merchandise. As an additional bonus all the tools on this list is free.
But first, what exactly are SEO tools?
What is SEO? (And why should you make use of them?)
SEO tools make it easier to anyone who has a website to make their website content more optimized for search engines.
Content that is optimized will show up better in search results for pertinent words and phrases. If you can optimize your content, the more easy for people who are new to discover it on search.
With organic search accounting of the majority of all online traffic , grabbing the first spot on the results page matters -- especially considering that the first five results from any Google search make up 67.6 percent of all clicks .
What does SEO take on in real life?
If I'm a parent with lots of responsibilities with a difficult time keeping my family's budget, I might Google the phrase "budgeting for busy moms".
If I visit your site, I'll find your content, see you have the expertise I'm looking for or perhaps take your class.
The snippet of text that is featured for the term "budgeting with busy parents" is this post taken from Simplified Motherhood, which is a site dedicated to providing educational contentwhich includes online classes and digital downloads that helps busy moms stay organized.
SEO tools can assist you to reach that highly sought-after top spot in the search results -- even if you don't have a dedicated digital marketing team (or even a team). These tools can even give solopreneurs and small businesses to be able to compete against big corporations that have larger budgets.
The reason is that SEO is considerably less expensive than cost-per-click (CPC) marketing and more effective. An Databox survey found the fact that 70% of advertisers agree that SEO can be superior to PPC advertisements for driving sales.
Just a couple of SEO modifications can create a big improvement in natural traffic and sales. That's why nearly 64 percent of marketing professionals are actively investing time into SEO.
(If you don't have an optimized website it, you can make one with . Sign up for a free 14-day trial to begin selling your digital products through your website.)
Before we dive into our selection of the most effective SEO tools for entrepreneurs, let's look over the top types of SEO tools.
Types of SEO instruments
Some SEO tools are akin to Swiss knifes They come with a variety of options and can help in a variety of SEO tasks -- while certain tools are concentrated on one particular piece in the SEO puzzle.
Below are a few of the most commonly used kinds of SEO tools.
Keyword search Tools: These tools help to identify the most popular keywords and phrases people enter into the search engines.
They will also inform you of keyword difficulty -- how hard it is to get your content to be ranked for a specific keywords -- as well as month-long keyword volume -- the many times a keyword is used in a monthfor you to identify your most suitable keyword .
Tools for tracking rank: Rank-tracking tools tell the user how your site is ranked for the keywords you want to rank and allow you to adjust your content accordingly.
Tools for building links: Link-building is the process of gaining backlinks -- hyperlinks to your website on different websites, to boost your site's reputation on search engines. is a vital element of a well-constructed SEO strategy.
Tools for building links can assist you to discover opportunities for backlinks and figure the websites that link to your site.
Technical SEO tools: Technical SEO tools go into the nitty-gritty of SEO. The front end of your website Technical SEO makes sure that your website pages are designed for users as well as crawlers, the crawlers that are responsible for indexing updated and new material.
Tools for Analytics: SEO reporting and analytics tools will show you how your website is performing across a variety of metrics, including visitors, conversions and the visits to the website, and more.
Now, without further ado, let's get to our best SEO tools for information entrepreneurs.
The top 11 free SEO tools for infopreneurs
1. Ahrefs' free SEO tools
Although the priced plans start at $99/month , Ahrefs offers a variety of free SEO tools. These are their most popular tools:
Webmaster tools : Ahrefs Webmaster Tools are completely free for all websites owners and are technically just "free access" for Ahrefs' Site Explorer & Site Audit " However, they provide a number of very helpful features, including:
A backlink audit and SEO audit evaluation of your website
Analyzing the competitiveness of sites" SEO
Actionable SEO metrics, including organic traffic and keyword ranking
Keyword generator : You can enter up to 10 words or phrases and Ahrefs will give you 100 relevant keywords for the word you're looking for as well as the level of the initial 10.
Search engine optimization test : Check how well your site ranks with respect to a specific keyword.
Backlink checker : Enter any domain and see its rank on the domain (the importance of a site's backlink profile) and the amount of backlinks are there, as well as the number of websites which connect to the site.
If you like Ahrefs free tools, and want to get even more specific with your data, you can try for a seven-day free trial of their entire platform for $7.
If you decide to sign up for the paid subscription I would suggest checking out their SEO Toolbar that is a cost-free Firefox and Chrome extension that displays instant SEO metrics for any webpage you visit.
2. Moz's SEO tools for free
Similar to Ahrefs, Moz has a robust paid platform but also provides various free tools . These are the most effective:
The Domain SEO Analysis Tool : Enter an URL and look up SEO-related metrics like:
Domain Authority, Moz's version of "Domain Ranking"
The top pages are ranked based on "Page Authority" Moz's algorithm of link metrics
Estimated clicks for most popular keywords
New links have been added to the domain
MozBar : A Chrome extension that provides immediate SEO metrics when you visit any webpage or search results page (SERP).
Keyword Explorer : Enter an appropriate keyword to gain access to:
Monthly search volume
Data for keyword research that is exportable as CSV as well as Excel spreadsheets
Long-tail keywords -- keywords with higher relevance and less search volume
Keyword difficulty scores
SERP analysis, with data for each result appearing on the first page of search results.
Keyword suggestions by country
When you sign up for an unpaid Moz login, users are limited to 10 queries for keyword analysis each month. To have full access to all Moz's tools, including the Keyword as well as Site Explorers, Moz Pro plans cost $149/month -- but you can try a 30-day free trial before starting a paid subscription.
3. Google Keyword Planner
Google Keyword Planner Google Keyword Planner is Google's search engine for keywords.
This tool will help you figure the keywords that people are searching in your niche. The tool lets you view the monthly volume of searches and predicted search volume. It can also help you identify keyword concepts to help you reach the right audience.
It's completely free for all users with an Google account. (That is said, it could occasionally be difficult to get access -- if you run into trouble, this guide from Ahrefs offers some excellent solutions to troubleshooting.)
4. Google Search Console (GSC)
GSC is another free tool by the search experts at Google. GSC provides reports and tools to help you evaluate the performance and traffic of your site particularly with regard to how and where it shows prominently in Google search results.
The principal characteristics of GSC comprise:
Confirming that Google can find and crawl your website.
Resolving issues with indexing and the re-indexing of any new or modified material.
Viewing Google search traffic data for your site, which includes how frequently your site is featured in Google searches, which queries show your site, and how often searchers visit your website in response to those searches.
Notifying you when Google encounters indexing, spam and other problems with your site.
Displaying which websites connect to your site (a.k.a. backlinks).
GSC can have a steep learning curve, but there are various resources available for you to navigate this platform. For instance, these training videos that are free by Google.
P.S. In case your audience uses Bing to browse, Bing Webmaster Tools is the (free) Bing equivalent of GSC.
5. Google Analytics (GA)
Google Analytics gives you all of the information you require to understand how customers engage with your site. For SEO purposes you need to add Google Analytics tracking code to your website and connect it to GSC.
GA offers free reporting on SEO metrics like:
Organic traffic (on desktop and mobile)
Organic conversions
Top page of landing pages
Pages that are the top exits (the last page that people are able to visit prior to leaving your website)
Rate of bounce
Time on site
Pages per visit
Plus a lot of . . .
A drawback to GA has to do with the fact that as with GSC, its robustness leads to a more steep learning curve. But, as mentioned that there are a lot of amazing training tools available such as Google Analytics Academy as well as this guide by Ahrefs on making use of GA for SEO.
6. Google's mobile-friendly tester
Google's mobile-friendly tester is the final free software from Google on our list. While it's technically part of GSC but it's so important -- and easy enough to utilize that it merits its own spot.
Enter the URL of your site, and Google tells you whether your website has been optimized for mobile. The site also displays an example of how your site looks like when viewed on mobile devices.
What is the reason this tool is so important?
Mobile optimization is a crucial aspect of your site's user experience as well as SEO.
The mobile-friendly traffic accounts approximately half the web traffic in the world , and visitors who are mobile-friendly visitors 5 times more likely to quit your website in the event that your website is not mobile-friendly.
Plus, Google announced in 2018 that they're boosting the positions of mobile-optimized websites on their mobile-friendly search results Optimizing your website's mobile-friendlyness can benefit in the optimization of your site's search engines, too.
Similar to all tools available in GSC The mobile-friendly tester is free.
7. Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Screaming Frog's SEO Spider is a web crawler. This means it analyzes and audits both on-page and technical SEO problems. SEO Spider is "trusted by hundreds of SEOs as well as agencies around the world for technical SEO audits of websites".
Web crawlers such as SEO Spider can help you identify broken links, find duplicate content on your site and also analyze your website's titles and metadata to ensure that your SEO performs exactly the way it should be at the front end and the on the back.
The trial version of SEO Spider lets you crawl up to 500 URLs, which, unless your website contains over 500 pages is plenty. If you're a plethora of content , or have more than one website, the premium version will set you back PS149.00 for a year.
8. GTmetrix
GTmetrix evaluates the load speed of your web pages. If it determines your site's loading time is lower than what it should, GTmetrix tells you what's slowing your site down and gives you actionable tips for making your site load more quickly.
Like mobile optimization, load time and speed of your website play a big role in your visitors' user experience.
26.9 percent of online website visitors have to wait for less than four seconds for the page to loadas well as 45.4% of visitors stated that they are less likely to buy items if page loading speeds were slower than expected.
It is a factor in the SEO part, too. According to the SEO experts from Moz , "Google has confirmed that site speed (and as a result the speed of pages) is among the signals used by its algorithm in order to rank websites."
GTmetrix's free version lets users monitor one URL per day, and upgrading to GTmetrix PRO starts at $10/month. If you'd prefer to stick with an unpaid tool, Google's PageSpeed Insights tool is a similar, but not as robust alternative.
9. Yoast SEO
If you have your own WordPress blog and you're looking for an SEO software for you. Yoast is a WordPress plugin that helps to optimize the content you publish in the WordPress page editor.
Input the phrase or keyword you'd like your site or blog post to be ranked for, then Yoast examines your blog or website content and informs you if you're using keywords in the right amount (or excessively) as well as in the right spots, such as the headers.
Yoast also lets you see how your website or blog post appears in the Google results page.
On the backend, Yoast generates and applies schema.org structures as well as organized data that "helps search engines determine what each part of your website means and who it is for and what the connections between everything".
The free version of Yoast offers nearly every feature that is available in the premium version. It costs $89 per year for one WordPress site.
10. SimilarWeb
SimilarWeb can be a competitive analysis tool. You can search for the websites of your competition and check their stats on traffic which include:
Top of the page
Total number of visits
Traffic sources
The top referring websites
Pages per visit
Average visit duration
Rate of bounce
SimilarWeb provides a no-cost option, which limits you to five outcomes per measurement. If you love the free software, it is possible to change to "Enterprise" down the way, however the free version provides plenty of data that you can use.
11. SERPsim
Billing itself as "the most exact SERP design tool," SERPsim is a search results preview tool that has mobile and desktop views.
This tool for free allows you to examine your title and meta description -- the HTML attribute that provides an uncomplicated description of your site's content to see how it'll look in the Google SERP.
You can import your existing metadata or paste in text. It's a great method to ensure that your metadata doesn't get deleted from results because it's too long.
Increase the visibility of your information products using these simple SEO tools
SEO can be a fantastic method to increase visitors to your website and also bring your product information front of more potential customers. However, it isn't an easy and time-consuming process to handle by yourself.
There are tools to assist in almost all aspects of SEO (and all are free. version.
In case you're wondering, here's 11 of the best SEO tools available for Infopreneurs for free:
Ahrefs Webmaster Tools for Free include keyword generator, keywords, rank checker, as well as a backlink checker.
Moz's completely free SEO tools include their Domain SEO Analysis Tool, Mozbar Chrome extension, and Keyword Planner.
Google's tools for free, such as Keyword Planner for keyword research, Google Search Console and Google Analytics to provide in-depth information and reporting, and the Mobile-friendly test.
The Screaming Frog SEO Spider to audit your site for technical and on-page SEO problems.
GTmetrix is a great tool to make sure that the load speed is the fastest it can be.
Yoast SEO is a WordPress plugin that lets you improve your content every time you post it.
SimilarWeb provides competitive analysis that shows you how your site stacks up against your competitors'.
SERPsim for a simple preview of your title and meta description within search results.
All in all, whether you choose to use any of these SEO tools or a combination of these, including them in your marketing toolbox is a step toward reaching greater numbers of people and selling more goods.