Recommended SEO Tools
Keyword Research Tools :: Website Analytics Tools :: Competitive Research Tools
Ranking Reporting Tools :: SEO Friendly URL Solutions :: XML Sitemap Creation Tools
Keyword Research Tools
Before conducting any search engine promotion it is extremely important
to know the 'terrain' of your online marketplace. The following tools will aid you by providing a glimpse into the searching habits of your prospective customers.
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KeywordDiscovery ($) **** Highly Recommended
This is an impressive tool that will provide you with a glimpse into the annual search frequencies for particular search terms. Also of relevance is a graph provided in the paid version which outlines the seasonal use of keywords (i.e. when is your phrase searched for less during the year). This type of seasonal data can help you plan the keyword targets for varying seasons, ultimately saving you money.
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WordTracker ($) -
this tool has been around a while so the services it provides are time tested and informative. WordTracker is used and recommended by the best in SEO.
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Overture
Suggestion Tool (Free)- this tool is provided to you when you become
an Overture client and it is extremely useful for finding highly searched
terms in a particular marketplace. Just beware that the highest searched
phrase may also mean the most competitive. Additionally, the tool is often painfully slow!!
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MSN AdLabs (Free) -highly recommended! Totally free, this great toolset is enjoyable to explore and use. There is some debate that the data is very worthwhile because of Microsoft's relatively low level of traffic (in comparison to other search engines) but I believe it is worth using.
Website Analytics Tools
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ClickTracks ($) **** Highly Recommended
StepForth uses ClickTracks exclusively because we find their software and support to be second to none in the analytics realm. We love it so much that we now offer ClickTracks reporting services to our clientele. See more information on StepForth's ClickTracks services here.
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Google Analytics (Free)
Opened to the public as a free service in August 2006 this program is very powerful and flexible. It features integration with Google Adwords promotion and a whole host of very cool reports. Our only caveat is a significant one... Google is not very transparent as to what is being done with the data that is collected from your site.
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Omniture ($$$)
Probably the most complex and full featured web analytics program available today. Our experience with Omniture has been very positive but the system is too intense for small business. If you have a large company or a site with loads of traffic (think millions of unique visitors per month) then this is the program for you.
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WebTrends ($$)
We had extensive experience with this program in the early years of StepForth and it was a great tool then but it is even better now. Here is a link to the WebTrends Small Business demo page.
Competitive Research Tools
Need to research a competitor? Are you planning to do this yourself? If so then here are three of the the top programs you need. Think of them as your personal SEO detective kit.
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OptiLink ($)
Discover where your competitor's backlinks are coming from by compiling a list of their backlinks and automatically analyzing them with OptiLink. This program is reasonably priced and provides awesome support plus updates for life - you can't ask for better. This is a mandatory tool in our SEO toolbox.
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OptiSpider ($)
Similar to OptiLink this tool will take a different angle when analyzing your competitor's site. Wouldn't it be wonderful to know just how your competitor's have optimized their website's? This tool will crawl and catalogue their site just like a search engine spider and provide you with a very revealing report.
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WebPosition Gold ($)
Monitor the ranking position of your competitors. With this tool you can keep an eye on your competitors and reveal which search engine keywords they are ranking for. This kind of information can be gold if you are new to the market and don't want to invent the wheel; benefit from their experience and consider targeting the same keyphrase's! Download a free trial of WebPosition here.
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SERPH (Free) : track the ‘buzz’ of yourself and your competitors using this handy social search tool
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SEO for Firefox (Free) : a great plugin from SEO Book
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XENU Link Sleuth (Free) : a popular tool for many SEOs, XENU can quickly analyze your own or a competitor’s site.
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Compete ($) : this great tool can provide a statistical comparison of up to 5 different websites. Excellent for competitor analysis but the final data should be taken with a grain of salt because Compete can only produce stats on the limited data available.
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Alexa: (Free) Alexa is the granddaddy of sources for competitor analysis data. Check out your own website’s profile and see where it stands in comparison to your competitors.
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WWW or Not? (Free) : Is link popularity split between two versions of a domain name (i.e. http://domain.com vs http://www.domain.com)? If so, this tool will tell you. This is valuable if you want to see if your own website has extra link popularity sitting on the sidelines from other sites that have linked to the ‘wrong’ address. Learn how to fix this situation for your website.
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PR Prowler ($) : although PageRank is not nearly as powerful as it once was PR Prowler is serves as a helpful method for finding the best sites to get links from or to advertise on.
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Check Server Headers Tool (Free) : although slightly technical this tool that StepForth offers free of charge provides valuable insight into the setup of yours or your competitor’s servers. For example, StepForth uses this tool to verify that our clients have properly set up their server redirects (301’s) so that duplicate content issues are avoided. It is also used extensively within our competitor analysis reports; it is useful to see how your competitors might have an edge over you.
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DomainTools.com (Free) : Domain Tools is one of my favorite sites for competitor analysis. The most useful component, the Reverse IP Tool, allows me to plunk in a single competitor’s domain and then see every other website that is hosted on its server. In rare instances where the co-hosted domains are owned by the competitor I can get a hint at any future marketing plans my clients should be made aware of.
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Robots.txt Syntax Checker (Free) : There is nothing worse than making an error in a Robots.txt file and accidentally dropping a site out of the search engines. The free Robots.txt checker will review your Robots.txt file; ensuring it is properly created and it will provide you with the rules within the file in plain language to ensure everything meets your approval. This is a valuable tool for avoiding serious indexing issues.
Not so sure you want to tackle your own competitor research? StepForth offers basic to advanced competitor analysis services within our SEO Research services area.
Ranking Reporting Tools
Keep an eye on your search engine rankings across the major and minor search engines. If you see a ranking drop or increase you will be better informed and know how to respond. Ranking reporting is vital to being successful online.
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WebPosition Gold ($)
StepForth exclusively uses WebPosition Gold because it has reliably provided quality search engine ranking reports for our clients since StepForth's inception. WebPosition Gold is a top-notch program that will provide you with the ranking statistics you need to stay on top of the competition, maintain your rankings and get to the top of the search engines. Obviously this is only a reporting tool but by knowing where you are 'at' you will have the capability to respond fluidly and in an informed manner. PS. StepForth only recommends using the reporting tool not the optimization tools and such that the program also includes.
What, That's It? Yes, we recommend no other service because we can't think of any that compare! If you would like to submit your software for review please let us know but expect that we will require a full copy to test the program.
SEO Friendly URL Solutions
In many cases website URL's are the reason that web sites are not fully indexed by visiting search engine spiders. Here are a few rewrite solutions that you can employ to correct your unfriendly URL's and open the door to search engine spiders:
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Apache Servers: Mod Rewrite (Free, capability comes with Apache)
In Apache servers and it is called Mod Rewrite. Here is a link to a search engine watch forum thread discussing this.
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Windows (IIS) Servers: ISAPI Rewrites ($)
This is a tool especially designed for Windows IIS servers and it operates essentially the same as the Apache Mod Rewrite. More information on ISAPI Rewrite.
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Windows: .Net Rewrite
Ok, I am no programmer or system administrator so I am getting out of my depth here but I believe this is another tool that would work for rewriting URL's for web sites using .Net (this link is definitely for techies only!)
UNCERTAIN?
Are you unsure if your site uses unfriendly URL's? The answer to an SEO question titled "What are Good and Bad URL's and How to Fix the Bad Ones" may answer your question. In addition, I highly recommend reading "Is Your Website Search Engine Friendly? " to ensure that you have not missed anything else that may be impeding your online success.
XML Sitemap Creation Tools
The following XML sitemap creation tools are extremely handy for creating and maintaining website XML sitemaps for submission to search engines:
Keyword Research Tools :: Website Analytics Tools :: Competitive Research Tools
Ranking Reporting Tools :: SEO Friendly URL Solutions
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