SEO has been one of the most dynamic and revolutionising areas of digital marketing. Search Engine Optimisation, abbreviated as SEO, is the process of optimising a website to effectively increase its quantity and quality of unpaid traffic through organic search engine results.
In simple words, it’s a set of techniques that help websites achieve better search engine rankings.
SEO optimisation is a rapidly growing industry as these services help websites gain increased quality and volume or organic or free traffic through higher search engine rankings. Search engines crawl and analyse websites and rank them accordingly on result pages.
SEO optimisation ensures the proper optimisation of a website’s content to help it gain better and higher search engine rankings.
How is SEO used in digital marketing?
SEO was originally developed for the purpose of identification of the purpose and content of a particular website and idealize the content to get better search engine rankings.
It is basically a web accessibility extension that adheres to HTML 4 guidelines. It is one of the most important aspects of digital marketing in today’s time.
SEO has been extensively used in digital marketing to increase traffic and potential visitors to a website, through appropriate content, unique page titles with target keywords, strategic keywords and their proper placements throughout the content, to achieve higher SERP (Search Engine Results Page) rankings when the search engine crawler analyses the website’s content.
SEO has been essentially used in digital marketing, not just for the increase in organic traffic but also to boost results of other marketing campaigns leading to better conversion and sales and revenue of a business.
How to choose the best SEO tool for a website?
Choosing the best SEO tool for a website is quintessential to its top ranking on any search engine. While optimisation strategies and efforts are important, using suitable SEO tools plays an equal part. And choosing the best SEO tool for a website depends upon certain parameters and considerations.
- A tool that can comprehensively analyse and audit the SEO standards of a website providing detailed reports of the SEO performance and parameters of your website and pages along with traffic analysis and filtering, trend charts, custom dashboards, etc.
- A tool that acts as a technical SEO crawler or site audit tool to diagnose and report any and every fault of a website, identifying duplicate content, broken links, and any HTTP and HTTPS conflicts.
- An SEO tool that optimises your website for mobile browsing to effectively increase traffic.
- An SEO tool that has a user-friendly interface along with language support and other convenient integration features and detailed white-label reports can be a great choice for a business website.
- SEO tools that provide backlink analysis and in-depth keyword analysis along with search volume results, competitor analysis, SERP keyword ranking, and other associated features.
List of SEO Tools to grow your business website in 2020
The field of SEO is extremely dynamic and ever-evolving, with new techniques, tools and strategies being constantly invented and implemented for better results and traffic generation of a website.
With efficient SEO optimisation, a website can gain increased traffic that can lead to increased sales and revenue of a business. Although, for the perfect SEO of any website, the implementation of proper optimisation strategies and the use of efficient and effective SEO tools is essential. With these tools and strategies, the best results can be achieved.
Since SEO services have been in huge demand all across the world, let’s take a look at the list of the top SEO tools that can effectively help to optimise and grow your business website through improved search engine ranking and increased traffic generation.
1. Google Analytics
Being the most popular search engine and having the best knowledge about search engine crawlers (especially their own), Google is one of the masters of the SEO field with some of the best SEO tools under their name.
Google Analytics is one of the most important tools in SEO and one of the best website analytics tools in the industry. It provides in-depth and real-time insights into the visitors of your website, their location, intention, and a complete demographical backdrop.
It helps in historical and detailed traffic analysis of your website for ideal optimisation.
Top features
- Comprehensive traffic report
- Traffic filtering based on preferable metrics
- Demography, location and other details of visitors
- Conversion Tracking
- Custom dashboard feature
2. Google Search Console
Another benchmark SEO tool provided by Google, the Google Search Console (Webmaster Tools) is a suite of essential tools that helps in obtaining the most genuine organic search data. It helps you understand how crawlers and visitors view your website and help in its optimisation for better SERP rankings.
Along with that, it helps in detailed monitoring of your site and identifying various issues of the website, while also providing troubleshooting facilities to improve your site’s visibility and presence on SERPs.
Google Search console helps in all-round tracking of a website’s performance like security issues, identifying duplicate metadata, page indexes, etc.
Top features
- Identifying security issues of a website
- Speed and mobile optimisation of a website
- Page Index coverage
- Enumerates keywords performance
- Provides sitemap status
3. Ahrefs
Ahrefs is one of the best all-round SEO package tools in 2020. It is a paid tool that takes care of every aspect of SEO of a website including backlink analysis, keyword analysis, competitor analysis, and top-performing page assessments.
The tool also provides effective assistance on traffic analysis, keyword research, rank tracking and web monitoring of a website. It helps detect broken links, and unlinked mentions along with other valuable information like user interests to enhance the presence and visibility of a website.
Ahrefs has become one of the most widely used SEO tools in 2020 for its comprehensive SEO support and all-round capabilities.
Top features
- SERP checker
- Backlink audit
- Keyword analysis and exploration
- Rank checking and traffic analysis
- Site and Content exploration
4. Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO is considered to be one of the top WordPress SEO plugins. Apart from being an excellent WordPress tool, it provides comprehensive website audit and review assistance for an in-depth analysis of your website.
It is known for its rapid and seamless sitemap generation and optimisation of permalinks along with content optimisation facilities and readability tests to develop ideal content based on specific keywords for better SERP rankings.
Internal linking solutions are also provided with an updated version of the plugin. It also feeds search engines with metadata to analyse your content. With Yoast SEO you can avoid duplicate content and take an all-round check of the SEO factors of your website, pretty seamlessly.
Top features
- Insight on SEO improvement
- Content optimisation recommendations with keyword analysis
- Instant sitemaps
- Optimising permalinks and meta tags
5. SEMrush
SEMrush is one of the top premium SEO tools that is mainly used for various purposes of keyword research and analysis. The tool performs relevant keyword research based on your website, makes specific and target keyword suggestions and tracks the keywords used by competitors through competitor analysis. It is also known for recommending suitable backlink opportunities.
It has a huge database of 120 million keywords and 46 million domains that helps it in tracking several SEO factors including organic domain position or landing URL on SERPs, AdWords copies, etc. SEMRush is one of the most useful and popular apps used for content marketing.
Top features
- Efficient keyword research
- Competitor analysis
- Huge database of keywords and domains
- Backlink auditing
- Domain overview and reporting
- Rank tracking
6. SE Ranking
SE Ranking is an excellent rank tracking SEO tool which also provides additional features like website auditing and review and comprehensive keyword research and recommendations.
Along with rank tracking the tool helps you diagnose issues and identify the errors that lead to rank drops on SERPs. It provides effective suggestions to optimise the issues of a website’s SEO and provides detailed and in-depth health reports of your website’s SEO.
If you have been facing issues with your website losing ranking on search engine results pages, this tool can be a great option for you to perfectly identify and optimise the SEO of the website.
Top features
- SEO Optimisation recommendations
- Website auditing
- Keyword research and recommendations
- In-depth SEO health reports
7. MozBar
MozBar is an excellent toolbar for Chrome and Firefox that provides you with the information of a web page’s page authority and domain authority. It is one of the top-rated SEO tools known for its detailed information about your domain and website.
Along with your own website, it also does a competitor analysis providing keyword suggestions and page optimisation suggestions to develop the SEO of your website.
Top features
- Rank checking
- Page and domain authority checking
- Keyword finding on a page
- Page optimisation recommendations.
8. Alexa
Alexa is a collection of the best SEO tools that can be an ideal choice for you in 2020. Focused on website ranking and traffic estimation, this SEO tool collection comes from the house of Amazon.
With an effective keyword difficulty tool and On-page SEO checker, Alexa helps in achieving better rankings on SERPs and improving the SEO of a website to generate more organic traffic to a website.
It also consists of Site Audit tools and efficient SEO checkers that help in perfect website audit and reporting. It also provides in-depth competitor keyword and backlink analysis to improve the SEO of your website.
Top features
- Accurate results
- Competitor keyword analysis
- Competitor site analysis
- SEO analysis and understanding of backlink profiles
9. SEO Powersuite
SEO Powersuite is a suite of some of the top quality SEO tools that are desktop-based. It provides all-round SEO optimisation services for a website.
Its keyword research tool and backlink analysis tool are extremely efficient in comprehensive backlink analysis and keyword research to formulate the most suitable solutions and suggestions.
Along with that it also provides rank checking and website analysis tools that help identify and the SEO quality of a website that can lead to better site optimisation and better SERP rankings.
Top features
- Keyword research tool
- Keyword recommendations
- Site auditing
- Rank checking
- Backlink analysis
10. Small SEO Tools
Small SEO Tools provides a collection of some of the most useful SEO tools in 2020. Ranging from SEO quality optimisation, rank checking, image editing to text writing, keyword research and a lot more, Small SEO Tools provide comprehensive support to look after every aspect of the SEO of a website.
It is especially known for its keyword analysis and keyword search features that help in effective content marketing along with the facility of checking Page Authority and Domain Authority of any webpage. You can also find out the number of backlinks for a particular website.
Top features
- Keyword search
- Keyword analysis
- Page Authority and Domain Authority checks
- Number of backlinks determination
- Content marketing recommendations
11. Sitebulb
Sitebulb is one of the most advanced desktop crawling tools available in 2020. It is extensively used by experts in the field for in-depth site audits and reporting. The tool performs a deep analysis of your website to generate the most accurate site reports and visualisation from the reports.
One of the most efficient SEO tools, Sitebulb is known for ranking analysis and a range of other SEO optimisation recommendations to improve the SEO performance of a website and lead to better search engine results and more organic traffic on the website.
It is known for its in-depth website audit and analysis. It also provides white-label reports of website SEO audits.
Top features
Website analysis includes up to 500,000 URLs
- Website SEO audit
- White-labeled reports
- Performance assessment
12. Wincher
Another top SEO tool, Wincher is more of a rank tracker when it comes to SEO tools and it is very well an excellent one that is used extensively to track the SERP rankings of a website, or Google rankings.
It is one of the most user-friendly tools that provide an excellent rank tracking feature. Although it is a paid tool, it offers a 14 days trial period where users can gain some idea about the capabilities of the tool and its effectiveness as an SEO tool.
It provides rank check reports of your website and any other website you want to check, be it your competitors or something else.
Top features
- Comprehensive rank checking reports delivered on a daily basis
- Competitor rank reporting
- Unlimited Keyword Tracking
- Extremely user-friendly after-sales service.
13. SEOquake
SEOquake is one of the best free SEO tools and one of the most popular toolbar extensions available in 2020. It helps in effective and quick viewing of various search engine parameters. The detailed analysis provided by this extension has been appreciated by experts in the field and helps in effective SEO optimisation.
This Chrome extension is one of the best when it comes to on-page analysis and audits, internal and external link assessment, and most importantly, excellent website comparison and competitor analysis that can help you understand the SEO performance of your website when placed against the market competitors.
Top features
- User-friendly dashboard
- Export feature to download and share data
- Competitor analysis
- Website comparison
14. SpyFu
SpyFu has been deemed to be an excellent free SEO tool, although it has some top quality premium features as well. SpyFu has been extensively used for keyword research and analysis to optimise the content of your website for better search engine rankings and consequent improvement in organic traffic generation.
It is also used for checking and analysing real-time search engine ranking results of a website. Along with that SpyFu also helps you search and analyse the keywords on your competitors’ website, and also gain knowledge about their organic and paid competitors, their Google AdWords creations and a lot more. It also helps you determine keyword difficulty and search volume.
Top features
- Detailed SEO analysis
- Keyword search volume
- Paid and organic ranking check
- Competitors website ranking and analysis
- Competitors keyword discovery
15. Varvy SEO Tool
Varvy SEO Tool is an efficient SEO tool available in the market right now. It functions slightly differently from other tools analysing your website’s SEO to check if it adheres to Google SEO guidelines.
It is known for its extensive and detailed reporting of this comparison and analysis along with being extremely quick and time-efficient. It provides a variety of information about a website, which is essential for the SEO idealisation and improved SEO performance of the site.
Along with pointing out the errors and strategic mistakes in the SEO aspect of your site, it provides useful recommendations to fix and address such issues.
Top features
- Check your site adherence to Google SEO guidelines
- Fast reports
- Recommendations to fix errors and improve the ranking
16. Raven
Raven is one of the most advanced suites of SEO tools that is designed for business purposes and pro-level usage. Several digital marketing agencies use Raven for SEO idealisation.
It is considered to be a top site auditing tool that can effectively diagnose SEO issues of your website and provide the most accurate suggestions to solve every issue that has been detected.
Content analysis, keyword analysis, site audit and a range of various other SEO functions, Raven provides it all in one package. It also helps you avoid Panda penalties.
Top features
- Site auditing
- Recommendations for fixing SEO issues
- Content analysis to avoid Google Panda penalties.
17. Keyword Density Analysis Tool
As the name of the tool suggests, the Keyword Density Analysis Tool helps you analyze the keyword density of the content on your website. Keyword density is one of the most important factors analysed by crawlers and effectively affects the ranking of your website on any search engine results pages.
Therefore the proper maintaining of keyword density in the content on your website is essential. The tool also helps you to obtain important information about specific keywords along with operational keyword details.
Top features
- Keyword density for a particular URL
- Keyword analysis of competitors
- Specific keywords details
18. SimilarWeb
This SEO tool is a unique one that gives you a complete and detailed view of competitors’ websites, and similar sites’ SEO performance, organic traffic statistics, organic keywords, engagement ratios, and several other useful details.
It helps you compare your website with the sites of your close competitors’, giving you a complete view of their rankings, keyword, and traffic (organic) and helps you optimise your website SEO to gain a competitive edge.
It also helps you get important and useful website traffic data that can help in improving the SEO of your site for better organic search ranking.
Top features
- Complete Competitor and similar website information
- Appropriate SEO strategies recommendations
- Organic traffic analysis
- Error-proof website traffic analysis and report
19. CopyScape
Another extremely useful SEO tool, CopyScape helps in finding any duplicate content on your website. Since duplicate content can lead to penalties and drop of ranks with other serious consequences, ensuring that there is no duplicate content on your website is essential.
This is where CopyScape serves excellently helping you know if you have any copied content or if someone else has copied your content. It also provides useful recommendations for better SEO of your website to generate more traffic and better organic search results.
Top features
- Plagiarism checker
- Information about anyone copying your content on the website
- Important SEO ranking recommendations.
- Maintaining the site reputation
20. Bing Webmaster Tool
While Google is the most popular search engine, Bing cannot altogether be ignored. It is in fact a very popular search engine, right after Google. Bing Webmaster Tool is quite similar to Google Webmaster Tools. It helps you analyse and monitor site data, submit sitemaps and indexing URLs.
Top features
- Detailed keyword research
- Traffic analysis
21. SiteAnalyzer
SiteAnalyzer helps in the accurate diagnosis and reporting of issues of SEO of your website, helping fix the issues for better ranking. It offers great keyword research facilities.
Top features
- Rank checking
- Keyword Research
22. Google Mobile-Friendly Test
A mobile-friendly test tool provided by Google as a help extension in the Search Console, this tool helps in optimising your website for mobile browsing.
Top features
- Mobile-friendly optimisation
- Mobile site speed comparison
Final thoughts
All that being said, the efficiency of SEO in any website is a matter of improvisation, skills, experience and the implementation of proper tools along with the proper usage of the most appropriate and useful SEO tools.
Be it for a personal basis or for business purposes, SEO of a website is dependent on several factors and only field knowledge and constant innovation can help achieve the best SERP results.
The better the SERP rankings, the higher is the organic traffic generation, leading to better conversion and increased sales and revenue. This leads to the eventual growth of a business.