When it comes to SEO, there are a lot of things to consider. How well do your pages rank? Which keywords work best? How much time should you dedicate to research and implementation?
To help guide you in making the right decisions, reduce the amount of time spent analyzing both on-page and off-page SEO, and prevent you from becoming overwhelmed with data, there are helpful SEO tools and software platforms available on the market.
Especially if you are doing both off-page and on-page SEO, you will need to rely on some of these tools to become more efficient and gain a competitive advantage. You will need tools for keyword research and technical SEO. You will also need SEO tools to help you track how keywords and pages are performing.
The best SEO tools give you the data and capabilities to consistently produce high-quality content. Fortunately, there are tons of useful SEO tools available.
Types of SEO Tools
Keyword Research Tools
One of the crucial elements of SEO is relevant keywords. You want to find the right keywords that assist you rank higher in search engines, so you will need a tool that can enable you to:
- Find keywords with high search volume and low competition
- Select primary and secondary keywords wisely
- Identify keywords competitors are using successfully
- Get traffic forecasts for target keywords
- Generate a list of latent semantic indexing (LSI) keywords
Technical SEO Tools
Technical SEO tools let you gain insight into how your website is performing. You will see what could aid or prohibit your website from ranking, which is virtually impossible to do without the right SEO tools and software. With them, you can find, fix, and optimize:
- Internal redirects and duplicate pages
- Canonical page references
- Meta tag errors
- Broken links and page crawl issues
You can also see what bots see. This includes your website’s speed, any 404 errors or issues with server-side rendering, and server response times. You can also see whether bots are crawling on your website or a sitemap.
Backlink Monitoring and Analysis Tools
Backlinks, which are links from other relevant websites that point to yours, are a crucial part of off-page SEO. It is a great idea to keep an eye on whether these backlinks are spam or relevant to your website.
Backlink monitoring and analysis tools let you:
- Monitor website backlinks
- Identify and remove poor backlinks
- Measure citation and trust flow
- Measure the ratio of referring domain names to backlinks
- Analyze the most robust links to your website
- Perform competitor analysis
- Check the ratio of link distribution
- Track the number of do-follow and nofollow links
Rank Tracking Tools
The main purpose of keyword research, technical SEO, and backlink analysis is to improve your website’s ranking. Rank-tracking tools help you:
- Track keyword ranking for desktop and mobile platforms across locations
- Track your website’s ranking to others
- Measure average click-through rates (CTRs) and impressions
- Identify top-performing and low-performing keywords
So, if you are serious about your online business, having the right SEO tools is crucial.
Below, we will cover 37 of the top SEO tools and software platforms that we think every business should use (in no particular order).
The 37 Best SEO Tools in 2024
- Yoast Plugin
- Rank Math
- Ahrefs
- Semrush
- WP Rocket
- Screaming Frog SEO Spider
- MonsterInsights
- Google Search Console
- Grammarly
- KWFinder
- Ubersuggest
- MozBar
- Clearscope
- MarketMuse
- SmashBalloon
- Google Analytics
- Hunter.io
- Google Trends
- ShortPixel
- Schema.org
- Seobility
- SEOquake
- Seolyzer
- Google Lighthouse
- Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
- GTmetrix
- BROWSEO
- Detailed.com
- Cloudflare
- Answer The Public
- Bing Webmaster Tools
- SE Ranking
- BuzzStream
- Google Keyword Planner
- SpyFu
- Seomater
- BrightLocal
Let’s get started…
Yoast SEO Plugin
Yoast SEO is a widely used, all-purpose SEO plugin for WordPress.
If your website runs on WordPress, you need to install Yoast SEO plugin.
It is by far the most robust SEO plugin out there.
It provides real-time analysis and optimization suggestions as users create content, ensuring that blog posts and pages are well-optimized for search engines.
Yoast SEO plugin covers crucial SEO elements, including content readability, title tag and meta description length, as well as keyword optimization.
The best part? It is 100% free.
But you will need to upgrade to Yoast’s Paid SEO plugin to get recommendations on how to use your focus keyphrase to optimize your content for SEO.
But this is a comprehensive SEO plugin with a strong track record. Its features make it a powerful tool for bloggers, website owners, and content creators seeking to maximize their website’s SEO performance within the WordPress ecosystem.
Yoast SEO Plugin Features:
- Schema markup for rich snippets
- Semrush integration to find related keywords
Yoast SEO Pricing
Starts at $99/year.
- Rank Math
Rank Math is a brilliant SEO plugin for WordPress that can help you to optimize your website and improve your rankings.
Like Yoast SEO plugin, Rank Math is suitable for bloggers and small businesses. It offers snippet previews for your content and meta-tag analysis.
Rank Math’s setup wizard is simpler than Yoast SEO’s.
A unique feature of Rank Math is its “Content AI” tool, which provides recommendations to help your website content rank higher.
There is paid plan available but the free plan gives you access to a good amount of features.
Rank Math Features:
- Schema markup tool
- Auto canonical URLs
- Google Search Console integration
- Advanced SEO analysis tool
- 30+ detailed SEO tests
- Setting up redirects
- SEO warnings
- SEO analysis score
- SEO failed tests
- 1-click import from Yoast SEO and AIO SEO
- 1-click import from SEOPress
- Import AIO SEO schema rich snippets
Rank Math Pricing
Starts at $59/year.
- Ahrefs
Ahrefs is a powerful SEO tool designed to help businesses and website owners in optimizing their online presence.
With features like keyword research, backlink analysis, and site audit capabilities, Ahrefs offers valuable insights into competitors’ strategies and assists users improve their search engine rankings.
Its user-friendly interface and detailed reports make it a go-to platform for digital marketers, bloggers and SEO professionals seeking to enhance their websites’ performance.
Ahrefs Features:
- keyword research tool
- Technical SEO website audit
- Backlinks analysis
- Position tracking
- Content Explorer
Ahrefs Pricing
Starts at $99-$999 per month
- Semrush
Semrush is the most popular, all-in-one digital marketing tool that offers a wide range of features to help businesses enhance their online visibility. From keyword research and competitor analysis to site audit and backlink tracking, Semrush offers actionable insights to improve SEO and content marketing strategies.
It is similar to Ahrefs, and both are highly rated and mostly used by professional marketers and bloggers looking to stay ahead in the competitive digital landscape.
Both Ahrefs and Semrush will show you the keyword difficulty and search volume for a term. And you can use either Ahrefs or Semrush to find long-tail keywords, low-volume search terms that can help you win website traffic that converts.
Like Ahrefs, Semrush has a free WordPress plugin, but it is very different. The Semrush plugin is a “writing assistant” that makes suggestions for improving blog posts.
The Semrush plugin is free. Full access to the online Semrush platform starts at $99.95/month.
Semrush Features:
- Website audit tool
- Position tracking tool
- Listing management tool
- Semrush copilot ai
- SEO writing assistant
- On-page seo checker
- Social media toolkit
- Keyword overview tool
- Domain overview too
- SEO content templates
Semrush Pricing
Starts at $119.95-$449.95 per month
- WP Rocket
Did you know that optimizing your website speed is a form of On Page SEO?
Search engines like Google reward good user experience and penalize poor user experience. So it is not surprising that website loading time is a ranking factor.
This is where a website caching plugin like WP Rocket comes in: you can speed up your website in minutes.
Pro Tip: Check your website’s loading time, before and after WP Rocket, in Google’s PageSpeed Insights.
Anyone who cares about increasing their website traffic and conversions should make sure their website is loading as fast as possible.
WP Rocket Features:
- Minifies and combines CSS and JavaScript files
- Browser caching, page caching, and pre-loading
- File compression plus lazy loading of images
WP Rocket Pricing
Starts at $59/year
- Screaming Frog SEO
Screaming Frog SEO is a website audit tool for intermediate-level or advanced webmasters and do-it-yourselfers. It is a website crawler that analyzes your website’s URLs and gives you a list of issues. It provides an in-depth analysis of every issue that could affect user experience or ranking.
Screaming Frog SEO provides dozens of metrics including:
- A complete list of internal and external links on your website
- Duplicate content, including in title tags or meta descriptions
- Identification of broken links and security issues
This SEO tool integrates with Google Analytics, Google PageSpeed Insights, and Google Search Console to deliver in-depth analysis of page-level performance issues.
Website designers, professional marketers and bloggers use Screaming Frog SEO to analyze website structure. And it is often used by website project managers when migrating a website to a new platform.
Screaming Frog Features:
- Integration with Majestic, Moz and Ahrefs
- Hreflang attribute auditing
- Website architecture visualization
- Structured data validation
Screaming Frog Pricing
Starts at free.
- MonsterInsights
This SEO plugin takes the guesswork out of analysis by showing you how your SEO actions are impacting your website results.
MonsterInsights SEO plugin connects to Google Analytics and provides simple displays of your website’s most important data, including:
- Which pages, forms, or pop-ups are converting the most people
- Revenue trends
- Average order value and top-selling products
It is a good complementary tool for WordPress SEO plugins like Yoast. Once you know what is working, you can do more of it.
MonsterInsights Features:
- Simple user interface
- Ecommerce tracking
- Track popularity of website content, tags, categories and authors
- Integrates with top plugins like EasyDigitalDownloads, WPForms, and WooCommerce
MonsterInsights Pricing
There is a free plan available. Premium plan starts at $99.50 per year.
- Google Search Console (GSC)
Google Search Console is a free online tool that supports your SEO strategies.
When launching a new website, one of the first actions you will take is to submit your sitemap to Google. And this is where you do that. The only requirement is that you must first verify your site.
Sitemap submission helps Google’s crawlers know when you publish new site content or modify existing website content.
You can also inspect any URL on your website. Add it to the field at the top of GSC to see if the web page is indexed. You can click a button to request indexing.
More importantly, GSC shows you how your website content is been performing in search results. Specifically, the Search Console Insights page provides
- Your most popular blog posts
- Total clicks for the month
- Which web pages grew the most in traffic
Search Console Insights also shows which search queries are responsible for the most click-through rates to your website.
So, who is GSC for? Every website owner should have a Google Search Console account. It is indispensable for sitemap submission and website monitoring.
Google Search Console Features:
- Click and search term metrics
- Alerts for sitemap errors or manual penalties
- Insights into content performance
Google Search Console Pricing: Free
- Grammarly
Grammarly is a browser plugin that corrects spelling and grammar mistakes and makes suggestions on how you can improve the writing in your content.
Once installed, you can leave it running in the background.
Or, you can click on the extension and open up Grammarly by clicking on ‘Grammarly for Chrome’ so that you can paste the text into the tool.
When you do, Grammarly asks you what your goals are for the piece of content.
The tool gives you suggestions on how to improve your content. Plus, it gives the content an overall score and ratings for correctness, clarity, engagement, and delivery.
This helps you create engaging content that is error-free which provides a much better experience for your audiences.
- KWFinder
If you merely need to conduct keyword research, you may not always require a feature-rich SEO tool. It is a powerful tool that bridges the gap between copywriting and technical SEO work is KWFinder.
You can pick keywords that are not too challenging to rank for but could nonetheless be traffic generators.
The best part of KWFinder is how darn easy it is to use.
But do not let this fool you into thinking KWFinder is not powerful. It is a legit keyword tool that lots of pros use.
The ability of KWFinder to switch between languages and geographical areas smoothly enables you to reach your readers anywhere in the world.
- Ubersuggest
Get keyword suggestions and competition data.
Ubersuggest has a lot of features that are usually only found in premium SEO tools.
But it is 100% free.
To use it, type in a keyword that you want to rank for or a competing website that you want to rank above.
And Ubersuggest will give you detailed data on keyword difficulty, monthly search volume, and more.
Plus, you get a list of suggested keywords that are based on the keyword you typed in.
- MozBar
MozBar is a killer browser extension that saves you time by allowing you to see the domain authority (DA) of websites right in the SERPs.
But why is this helpful?
Let’s say you want to target a keyword to rank for.
With MozBar, you can search for the term in Google and see the DA and page authority (PA) score for the ranking websites without having to leave the SERP. This allows for a quick evaluation of the competition and potential opportunities.
The free plan also allows you to examine search results from alternative search engines and on-page elements such as:
- Page title
- Heading tags
- Meta description
Plus, you can also highlight different types of links present on a page such as Dofollow and Nofollow internal and external links.
If you need to quickly check the ”canonical tag” on the page, you can do that too, as well as see how long the page takes to load.
- Clearscope
Clearscope helps you plan and create high quality content that gets more website traffic.
You start by adding a target keyword to Clearscope, which runs a report on it.
Using your keyword, Clearscope sifts through real-time Google data to provide clues to searcher intent. This is how the Clearscope report helps you create high quality content that is better organized, more helpful, and more comprehensive than your competitors’.
We think this tool is a good fit for small business, professional marketers and bloggers that need to scale.
Clearscope Features:
- Reveals themes present in top-ranking content on a given topic
- Displays searcher questions related to a keyword
- Content grading (up to “A++”)
Clearscope Pricing
Starts at $170/month
- MarketMuse
MarketMuse is AI-based software for planning and creating high quality content that ranks. It is also powerful for building topical authority.
Add a keyword to MarketMuse and it will pull data from related search results into a report that you can use to guide content creation.
MarketMuse is a good fit for content teams that need to scale. However, solopreneurs and bloggers can benefit from the free plan.
MarketMuse Features:
- Keyword difficulty score based on your existing website content
- Competitive content analysis
- Keyword research that supports topical authority strategies
- ChatGPT integration
MarketMuse Pricing
Starts at $149/month for 1 user.
Free plan supports 1 user, 10 queries per month, and limited page-level insights.
- SmashBalloon
This is a beginner-friendly plugin that adds social media feeds to your website on WordPress, the right way. The problem with social media feeds is they usually bog your website down.
SmashBalloon stands out because it optimizes all those ultra-high-definition images in your feeds so they load fast. It also minimizes external requests and that speeds things up too.
SmashBalloon is fast and easy to use.
SmashBalloon Features:
- Boost SEO and CTR with embedded social content
- Display multiple feeds
- Increase conversions with social media testimonials
SmashBalloon Pricing
Starts at $49/year per month.
- Google Analytics
Google Analytics is a powerful web analytics service offered by Google that allows website owners to track and analyze their website’s traffic. By providing detailed statistics and reports, Google Analytics helps users understand whether or not their SEO marketing efforts are paying off.
We’re talking about data like:
- Organic traffic
- Time on website
- Page speed
- Bounce rate
- Traffic sources
With customizable dashboards and real-time data, you can make informed decisions to optimize your website and improve the overall user experience.
Google Analytics is super powerful on its own.
But when you combine it with the GSC?
It’s even MORE powerful.
Linking your Google Search Console account with GA hooks you up with helpful info, like the keywords people use to find your website, your organic click-through rates (CTR), and more cool stuff.
- Hunter.io
Hunter.io is a great tool to find email addresses that you can use in your link-building strategies.
Instead of manually finding them yourself, using Hunter.io means you can just enter a domain name and instantly find the email addresses associated with it.
You can save the email addresses you are looking for as leads.
Plus, you can filter the results by type and department so that you only see the email addresses you need for your campaign.
Hunter.io can speed up your link-building outreach effort.
- Google Trends
Google Trends is a free keyword research tool that gives you real-time information about trending topics.
You can take a look at the search interest trends for different keywords and see if they are increasing or decreasing over time.
You can also break down results by geographic region, find related searches, and search trending topics related to a keyword.
Google Trends is great to use when doing niche research as well.
- ShortPixel
If your website images have large file sizes then they are probably slowing down your page load speeds. This can be super frustrating for users and can lead to high bounce rates you definitely do not want.
ShortPixel is a powerful tool that allows you to compress and resize your images allowing for faster page load times.
ShortPixel gives you the option to upload JPG, GIF, and PNG files that are up to 10 MB in size. To remove this size restriction, you just need to sign up for a free account.
All you need to do is choose your SmartCompress level and then upload your files.
ShortPixel then automatically compresses and optimizes the images without sacrificing quality.
ShortPixel also allows you to input your URL so it can analyze your website and optimize the images it finds. This helps to improve your website’s performance.
- Schema.org
Schema markup is incredibly important for your website.
It offers structured data that helps search engines like Google understand the content and context of your page.
If you have not implemented schema markup on your pages, then you are REALLY missing out.
One of the best methods is to use Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper as it guides you through the process.
All you need to do is fill in your information, copy the code and insert it directly into your web pages.
When implemented correctly, it can enhance the appearance of your page in the search engine results pages (SERPs) by displaying rich snippets alongside your title tag and meta description.
This could potentially increase your CTRs by enticing users to click on your link.
- Seobility
It’s a free SEO-checker tool. You can use it to determine whether your website complies with the most recent SEO best practices. By entering your website’s URL, you may inspect it and receive suggestions about search engine optimization issues like:
- Sitemap problems
- Technical SEO issues
- Slow loading pages
- Blocked pages
You usually only get this type of stuff from premium SEO tools. So it is really nice that Seobility gives you this data for free.
- SEOquake
An add-on for Google Chrome called SEOquake is another free SEO browser extension.
It helps you to analyze lots of different search engine metrics in real-time such as:
- Semrush ranking
- Bing index
- Pinterest pin count
- Auditing internal and external links
- On-page SEO audits
- Comparing URLs and domains in real-time
- Google index updates
- Facebook likes
- Web archive page
SEOquake can be a little tricky to get used to at first, especially for beginners.
But, once you have got the hang of SEOquake it becomes a really valuable tool in your SEO marketing.
Once installed, the SEObar will appear underneath the URL for each website you visit.
This means you can immediately analyze the data without having to do anything.
You can use the tabs to change the metrics so that you can see the exact data you need.
- Seolyzer
Use the free website crawling, log analysis, and SEO tool Seolyzer to see how search engines view your website. Seolyzer collects information that the crawling bots record in your server’s log files to locate and construct your SEO KPIs when they visit your website. The program also displays redirection, issue codes, and page speed results.
- Google Lighthouse
Google Lighthouse is one of the widely used free SEO tools by webmasters.
It is a browser extension that gives you detailed reports about your website’s SEO performance and actionable tips on how to improve it.
You just need to add the extension to Chrome and then open it when you are on the page you want to analyze.
Then, click ‘Generate Report’.
It then gives you various metrics related to your website’s performance, such as:
- Page load speeds
- SEO
- Accessibility
It also shows you SEO elements on your website that are currently harming its performance.
Plus, it gives you the option to get advice on how to optimize these SEO elements to improve performance.
- Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
You might have heard that Google recently made a big change to its algorithm.
This change is officially called “Mobile-First Indexing”.
If your website is not optimized for mobile devices, you are in big trouble.
Fortunately, you do not need a full-time developer to make your website mobile-friendly. All you need to do is run your website through the Mobile-Friendly Test tool.
And it tells you whether or not Google considers your website mobile-friendly.
- GTmetrix
GTmetrix is a website performance testing tool that analyzes the technical health of your website. By providing a detailed report on page load times, performance scores, and optimization opportunities, GTmetrix assists website owners identify areas for improvement. This tool is essential for ensuring a fast and user-friendly website experience, which is crucial for search engine rankings and overall user satisfaction.
- BROWSEO
You can view your website in a condensed form and analyze it with the help of the SEO browser BROWSEO to check its UX, content, and SEO. The result will focus on your HTML when you enter the URL, allowing you to see the website’s structure, optimal search phrases, and other SEO-related elements.
- Detailed.com
Detailed gives you a curated list of the most popular websites in your industry.
That way, you can size up your biggest competitors.
And copy what they are doing.
- Cloudflare
Cloudflare is a CDN (content delivery network) that caches static content across multiple servers.
Using a content delivery network means that content can be served to users from a location close to them which results in faster page load times.
It also automatically offers a free SSL certificate for your website.
This is really sweet as HTTPS makes your website more secure and is a ranking factor for search engines like Google as well.
- Answer The Public
AnswerThePublic is a unique content marketing tool that generates insights into user search queries by visualizing data in the form of content ideas. By analyzing search engine autocomplete suggestions and related searches, it assists content creators identify relevant topics and address the specific needs and questions of their target audience.
This tool is particularly useful for brainstorming content strategies that resonate with users and drive organic traffic.
Most SEO tools get their data from the same place: The Google Keyword Planner.
Answer the Public is different.
This awesome tool finds questions that people ask on blogs, forums and on social media platforms.
And it turns those questions into awesome keywords.
- Bing Webmaster Tools
Bing Webmaster Tools is a comprehensive suite provided by Microsoft to help website owners optimize their website’s performance on the Bing search engine.
It provides valuable insights into how Bing crawls and indexes your website, allowing webmasters to analyze traffic, troubleshoot potential issues, and enhance overall visibility.
And unlike the Google Keyword Planner, the data from Bing is strictly for organic search (not Bing PPC).
Bing Webmaster Tools include features like website diagnostics, keyword research, and data on backlinks, empowering users to refine their SEO techniques for improved search engine rankings.
- SE Ranking
SE Ranking examines the health and performance of websites, keyword rankings, and traffic. Additionally, it gives you information about your competitors, which you can use to improve your understanding of the SEO environment and modify your content marketing approach. Because SE Ranking is a white-label SEO solution, you may create unique SEO reports with options for branding and customization.
- BuzzStream
The outreach you perform during link building can resemble cold calling, even though backlinks to your website are essential for a high Google ranking. BuzzStream makes it simple to find the right contacts, craft persuasive email messages, and keep track of who has accepted each link request.
- Google Keyword Planner
Google Keyword Planner is a free keyword research tool that is available through Google Ads. With it, you can find new and related keywords, as well as their average monthly search volume over time. You can also see how much it costs if you decide to bid on specific keywords.
- SpyFu
SpyFu is a Google Ads competitor keyword research tool. It helps with keyword research, competitive analysis of PPC and SEO campaigns, and the creation of custom domain names.
- Seomater
SpyFu is a website crawling and SEO auditing tool. It helps with a technical SEO analysis and testing for on-page SEO. You will receive SEO report after the program has crawled your website that details the many SEO-related components of your website, including internal and external links, page quality and speed, social media, organic presence, and more.
- BrightLocal
BrightLocal is a comprehensive local SEO platform tailored for businesses aiming to improve their visibility in local search results. The toolset includes features for local citation management, reputation monitoring, and local search audits.
This SEO tool enables businesses to manage and optimize their online presence, ensuring accurate business information across various directories and review platforms. BrightLocal’s insights help businesses enhance their local SEO strategy, attract more clients, and maintain a positive online reputation within their local communities.
Best SEO Tools for Digital Marketing: Conclusion
As you can see, there are plenty of SEO tools and software platforms available – both free and paid – that can help you with on-page, off-page and technical SEO. Take some time to learn these SEO tools and software platforms to decide which would work best for you.
Best SEO Tools for Digital Marketing: FAQs
1. How frequently should I conduct an SEO audit on my site?
The frequency of conducting SEO audits depends on various factors, including the size of your website, the frequency of content updates, and the level of competition in your industry. As a general rule, it is advisable to conduct a comprehensive SEO audit at least once every six months. However, for larger websites with more frequent content updates, quarterly or even monthly audits may be necessary. Regular audits help identify technical issues, content gaps, and opportunities for improvement, ensuring that your website remains optimized for search engines like Google.
2. Can these SEO tools assist websites rank higher on Google?
Yes, the SEO tools mentioned—such as Bing Webmaster Tools, Google Search Console, Google Keyword Tool, and Yoast—can significantly contribute to improving a website’s ranking on Google and other search engines. These tools offer insights, analysis, and optimization features that help address various aspects of SEO, including keyword research, on-page optimization and technical SEO. By leveraging these SEO tools effectively, website owners can identify opportunities, optimize their content and technical elements, and ultimately improve their website’s visibility and ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs).
3. What is the difference between on-page and off-page SEO tools?
On-page SEO tools focus on optimizing elements directly within your website to improve its search engine visibility. These SEO tools typically help optimize factors such as meta tags, headings, keyword usage, content quality, internal linking, and website speed. Examples of on-page SEO tools include Yoast for WordPress and various keyword research tools. On the other hand, off-page SEO tools are concerned with optimizing factors outside of your website that influence its search engine rankings. These SEO tools help improve factors such as backlinks, social signals, online reviews, and citations. SEO tools like BrightLocal specialize in managing local citations and monitoring online reputation, which are essential aspects of off-page SEO.
4. How can I measure the ROI of my SEO tool investments?
Measuring the return on investment (ROI) of SEO tool investments involves tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) related to your website’s search engine performance and comparing them against the costs associated with using the SEO tools. Some metrics to consider when evaluating ROI include organic search traffic, conversion rate, keyword rankings, and revenue or leads generated from organic search traffic. By comparing the incremental gains in these metrics attributable to using SEO tools against the costs of purchasing and using the tools, you can assess the effectiveness of your SEO tool investments and make informed decisions about their continued use.