?A workman is only as good as his tools?; much how an internet marketer is limited by the SEO tools at his disposal.
The problem is though; SEO has changed a lot in the last 12 months, and in 2013 you need a new internet marketing strategy to make your links as natural as possible. This has made a marketers? job more difficult, but there is help out there.
There are a still some SEO tools ? both free and paid for ? that you can use to improve the visibility of your website. So whether you?re just starting out or have been playing the SEO game for a long time, you could always use a helping hand. Here then, are our top 5 free SEO tools:
1. Google Analytics
Used on 10 million websites and counting, Google Analytics is the undoubtedly the King of free SEO tools. The user-friendly dashboard provides marketers with details statistics about their websites? overall performance; aiding your SEO efforts.
For example; you can see how much traffic is coming to your website and from what sources; visitor behaviour around your site; and those all important conversions. Armed with this information, you can make informed decisions as to the next step in your SEO campaign.
2. Google and Bing Webmaster Tools
Google and Bing Webmaster Tools are essential for making sure that search engine spiders have crawled and indexed your pages. These two tools are basically the same ? but for different search engines ? and offer tools that:
- Submit your sitemap and check this for errors
- Monitor how frequently your website is crawled
- Provide link reports and highlight any broken or suspicious links pointing to your site
Many marketers focus their efforts on ranking in Google, but Bing shouldn?t be forgotten. Search Engine Watch recently reported that Bing has a 16% market share making it a very lucrative market for webmasters.
3. SEOQuake
SEOQuake is a comprehensive browser extension for Chrome and Firefox, that should be an important tool in your SEO efforts. When activated, SEOQuake will display important information about a webpage including Google PageRank, AlexaRank, Domain Age and more.
This is hugely beneficial for your link building, as it can help you place your links on authority websites; in turn, boosting your website?s visibility and authority. You can get all this information from a number of other SEO tools; but SEOQuake provides it all in one go making it a must-use for marketers.
4. Open Site Explorer
Competitor backlink research should be an important part of your internet marketing strategy. And with Open Site Explorer from SEOMoz, it is easier and quicker than ever to access this kind of information.
This free SEO tool boasts a really user-friendly interface and is pop-up free (unlike some free tools on the web). By entering a website URL, the tool will provide you with a comprehensive list of the pages on the net linking to that domain.
5. YoastSEO for WordPress
Our final pick and a firm favourite amongst web markers is the Yoast SEO plugin for WordPress. If your website is built using this CMS, you really should install Yoast as it makes optimising each page simple.
Never again will you forget to add your ALT text; Yoast walks you through the whole process of on-page optimisation. This is a great tool for beginners or multi-admin websites, as it ensures that all the important information is present and correct.
By including these tools in your online marketing strategy, SEO doesn?t have to be a challenge. In fact, you can give your 2013 SEO strategy a real boost by putting these ? and other ? tools to the test. What are your favourite SEO tools?
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