Ahrefs is a seo tool that helps you discover and analyze the web. It provides you with the information that you need to understand what’s happening on the web, why it’s happening, and how to make it better.
Ahrefs is one of the most popular seo tools in the industry and has been featured in numerous publications including Forbes, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, Entrepreneur and more. Ahrefs helps users track their rankings for keywords as well as their competitors’ rankings for keywords. By using Ahrefs’ website explorer tool, users can also see how much traffic a website receives from Google, Bing or Yahoo. This information can be extremely valuable when deciding which keywords should be targeted by your SEO campaign or if there are any changes that need to be made to your website in order to improve its ranking on search engines such as Google.
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SEMrush vs. Ahrefs: Which SEO Tool is Better?
Interested in learning more about SEMrush and Ahrefs? Find out which SEO tool may be the better fit for you and your website.
Mara Calvello Mara Calvello on April 27, 2022 (last modified on April 28, 2022) • 21 minute read
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When was the last time you went an entire day without using a search engine?
With roughly 3.5 billion searches on Google each day, it’s more important than ever to track how your website stacks up against the competition. There are a lot of tools that can help you do so, but two of the most popular and commonly used are SEMrush and Ahrefs.
If you’re interested in utilizing one of these reporting tools, you may be unsure which one is better suited for your website and the metrics that matter to you the most. To help you decide, we asked over 30 experts to weigh in and break it all down, so you can make a smarter choice.
Note that we have strictly surveyed people who have been using Ahrefs or Semrush for at least 1+ years actively.
Let’s dive in.
What are SEMrush and Ahrefs?
SEMrush vs. Ahrefs – a Direct Comparison
SEMrush or Ahrefs? The Verdict
SEO Performance Dashboard Template by Databox
What are SEMrush and Ahrefs?
Before we can dive into the ins and outs of each tool, let’s break down what exactly SEMrush and Ahrefs are.
SEMrush is a popular SEO tool that is used to conduct keyword research, competitor analysis, and Google Ad optimization. This software solution was designed with digital marketers in mind as they optimize their website to get as much organic search traffic as possible. It can also be used to see how you rank versus some of your competitors, as well as make smarter decisions around which keywords your website should be targeting.
Similarly, Ahrefs is another popular SEO research and analysis tool. While it’s most commonly used and known for its comprehensive backlink analysis feature, it has expanded over the years to help in many areas of SEO.
At the end of the day, both tools are exceptional SEO software solutions that draw a variety of users every day. Whether you use one or the other, or both, within your SEO strategy, there is a long list of features and functionality at your fingertips.
PRO TIP: How to Analyze Your Best Pages for SEO Performance
To optimize your website for organic search, you probably use Google Search Console to learn which pages receive the most impressions and clicks, and which queries are driving them. Now you can quickly assess your SEO performance in a single dashboard that monitors fundamental metrics, including:
Which search queries drive traffic to my website?
Which of my website pages generate the most impressions and clicks in search engines?
What’s the average click-through rate (CTR) for our website pages in search?
What’s the average position our website pages show up in search results?
How many clicks have our website pages generated in search results this month?
and more…
Now you can benefit from the experience of our Google Search Console experts, who have put together a great Databox template showing the most important KPIs for monitoring organic search performance. It’s simple to implement and start using as a standalone dashboard or in marketing reports, and best of all, it’s free!
SEO-google-search-console-dashboard-templata-featured-section
You can easily set it up in just a few clicks – no coding required.
To set up this Google Search Console Dashboard, follow these 3 simple steps:
Step 1: Get the template
Step 2: Connect your Google Search Console account with Databox.
Step 3: Watch your dashboard populate in seconds.
SEMrush vs. Ahrefs – Direct Comparison
SEMrush and Ahrefs have similar features and can be used in complementary ways. As mentioned, it all depends on which metrics are most crucial to your organization.
As Lauren Amor from Tandem Interactive explains, “Deciding on a preference between SEMrush and Ahrefs depends on what you spend most of your day doing.
For example, if you spend most of your day focusing on link building, SEMrush has a larger link index, offering you a wider variety of backlink options. On the other hand, SEMrush requires a lot of digging and clicking, which can take up too much time.
Ahrefs offers a preview of the link’s text, which makes it easier to look through a long list of backlinks. When it comes to the more technical side of SEO, like the site’s health, SEMrush offers a much more detailed audit that includes errors with broken links, HTTP status code errors, crawl errors, and issues with robots.txt.”
Interested in a certain comparison surrounding a specific Semrush/Ahrefs feature? Jump ahead to:
Domain overview
Keyword research
Backlink analysis
Site audits and technical SEO
Rank tracking
Domain Overview
First things first — let’s talk about domain overviews.
Madeline McMaster at BluShark Digital shared how Ahrefs is her go-to tool for domain overviews, amongst other things. McMaster states, “Our agency has seen great success using Ahrefs. With Ahrefs our content team uses the content gap tool to find missing keyword opportunities, our link building team is able to pull client and competitor backlinks for comparison, and our accounts team is able to track key data points — like domain authority.”
Keyword Research Features
A heavy hitter in most SEO tools is features that focus on keyword research — but how do they compare?
Sam Gooch from Kinsta elaborates on keyword research by saying, “SEMrush started off as a keyword research tool, which it does very well. SEMrush has so many features and reports that it can sometimes feel a bit intimidating, but this isn’t a problem for someone who lives and breathes SEO and doesn’t mind getting lost in the data.”
Agreeing is Drew Estes at Massview, who shares, “I’ve found SEMrush to be very useful. It has sophisticated keyword research capabilities for SEO (and PPC), has a clean user interface, and makes it easy to find the best keywords to focus on — both the ones you’ve considered and many that you haven’t. Not to mention the competitor research tools are far better for informing content strategy.”
Also on team SEMrush is Ally Anderson from Akari Digital uses SEMrush for developing their content strategy, “I work primarily with developing content strategy and keyword strategy most often and I find that the keyword research tool for SEMrush is easier to use and provides better-related ideas and results.”
Finally, Alex Hamilton from White Chalk Road keeps it short and sweet by saying, “For keyword research and content ideas, we use SEMrush.”
And because we always need someone going against the grain, Joanna Vaiou tells us how they use Ahrefs, “I use both tools but I prefer Ahref in terms of usability and most specifically because of the Clicks per Search (CPS) metric that allows me to prioritize between a team of keywords for the same target page into main keyword and secondary ones. It helps my SEO strategy design process.”
Sam Richards at Trivia Games, Inc elaborates on why he prefers Ahrefs: “Ahrefs is more robust and can give instant visibility into what keywords a page is ranking for and what keywords are earning featured snippets. We can also easily see visual trend lines showing how keyword rankings have changed over time. And it’s important to note the initial configuration of Ahrefs is much less time-consuming.
Backlink Analysis
Another popular feature for both tools is backlink analysis. Starting off the comparison is Buzz Carter from DotcomBlinds. Carter explains, “When it comes to links stats, Ahrefs just has SEMrush beat, as it literally has billions of indexed URLs in their system. While both tools are great, this is simply just flat out a bigger and better sample size than what SEMrush is working with.”
Sam Gooch from Kinsta is back to elaborate on how he uses Ahrefs for backlink analysis. He continues, “This isn’t an easy choice – I use both tools every day for different reasons and find both have excellent features and have continued to release new useful tools over the years.
Ahrefs started out as a link tool, which, in my opinion, it does a great job of. It’s easy to navigate and the tools are intuitive and easy to use. This makes it perfect for those with less time to dive into the data, but want to surface those low hanging fruits, and I especially love the broken links report!”
Also on the Ahrefs train is Filip Silobod at China by Teaching, so shares, “While both tools are great, I prefer Ahrefs because of it’s more focus on backlinks. Both tools are very similar, but according to some tests, the crawler that Ahrefs uses captures more URLs.”
Site audits and technical SEO
Many people use SEMrush and Ahrefs to conduct site audits and take a deep dive into metrics surrounding technical SEO. But how do they compare?
Joe Balestrino starts things off by sharing, “SEMrush is a great all-in-one tool. I can run audits, track keywords, keyword research, find content ideas, and so much more. I use these features on a daily basis and it makes my job more enjoyable and easier.”
On the other hand, there’s Storm McManus from Storm Marketing Consultancy, who leans more towards Ahrefs. McManus states, “I’ve been using Ahrefs for over 12 months in my content marketing and SEO support business. I absolutely love their site audits that provide detailed areas for both on-page and technical SEO improvements. Being able to see all the audits and how the site has improved over time with fixes allows us to show clients exactly how their site is performing.”
Rank Tracking
Rounding out the comparison is rank tracking, where Bruce Hogan from SoftwarePundit believes SEMrush reigns supreme. Hogan shares, “Ahrefs and SEMrush are both outstanding. However, SEMrush is slightly more versatile – it includes a wider range of tools that support a greater percentage of our marketing efforts. For example, SEMrush’s keyword rank tracking is above and beyond anything we could ever need. It’s truly changed the game.”
SEMrush or Ahrefs – The Verdict
Oftentimes, the tool that is best suited for you and your needs is going to depend on what exactly you’re using it for. So for that, let’s get a verdict on each of the features and functionality that these SEO tools bring to the table.
Need to know which tool is best for something specific? Jump ahead to:
Which Tool is Best for SEO Keyword Research?
Which Tool is Best for Analyzing Backlinks?
Which Tool Has the Best Technical SEO Site Audit Feature?
Which Tool is Best for Rank Tracking?
Which Tool Has the Best Unique Features?
Which Tool is the Best Overall Value?
Which Tool Is Best for SEO Keyword Research?
If conducting keyword research is front and center in your SEO strategy, which tool should you add to your tech stack? The survey says… the winner here is SEMrush.
Here to convince you is Andrew Ruditser from MAXBURST, who kicks things off by saying, “Which tool you should use is always going to depend on what your main focus is. For all things SEMrush values keyword research, you should be using SEMrush.”
Agreeing is Tony Mastri from MARION Inbound Marketing. Mastri shares, “I prefer SEMrush because of its competitive keyword discovery functionality. This one feature makes SEMrush more valuable than any other SEO tool I have used in the last six years.”
Samuel Hurley from Novos also believes that SEMrush is the winner here. Hurley states, “Being an eCommerce SEO agency, we use both the tools but from purely an SEO perspective, I would say SEMrush is more preferable for keyword research. It offers the features to enable detailed keyword research which is one of the most important parts of any SEO strategy.
Although Ahrefs also offers similar features, the in-depth access to keyword related data given by SEMrush makes it the most comprehensive SEO tool out there.”
Which Tool Is Best for Analyzing Backlinks?
Moving along to analyzing backlinks, you may already know who is going to win this round, based on what was shared above. At the end of the day, the SEO tool that is an absolute must-have for taking a deep look into backlinks… is Ahrefs.
Starting off sharing the love for Ahrefs and the power it brings to backlinks is Kerry Sherin from Lifetime Value Company. Sherin says, “I prefer Ahrefs over SEMrush when it comes to building links and strategizing content. In my opinion, Ahrefs has a more comprehensive database of live links and the metrics associated with them.”
Another fan of Ahrefs is Gerald Lombardo from The Word Counter. Lombardo states, “I prefer Ahrefs which provides keyword research, traffic estimation, and an overall timeline of backlink growth. A huge benefit of Ahrefs is its massive backlink index. In my opinion, it is the most comprehensive solution for backlinks, and also the best for checking competitors’ search traffic and identifying which pieces of content creates the most income.”
Agreeing is Tim Absalikov at Lasting Trend, who shares, “At Lasting Trend, we use both SEMrush and Ahrefs for several years. Ahrefs has one of the best backlink checkers. It’s essential to see as many competitor’s backlinks as you can when you need to create a marketing strategy.”
Also a fan of using Ahrefs for backlinking is Josh Imhoff at Always Relevant Digital. Imhoff shares, “I’ve used many SEO tools, and hands-down I prefer Ahrefs. Ahrefs’ backlinks report is more useful than anything similar offered by any other SEO tool. It lets me easily research my own pages and competitors to find new linking opportunities.”
Finishing out explaining about backlinks is Quincy Smith from TEFL Hero, who shares, “Ahrefs is invaluable to our marketing. I appreciate the user interface of Ahrefs plus its link building functionality. There really is no better option for us and we use the tool daily.”
Which Tool Has the Best Technical SEO Site Audit Feature?
If you’re looking for a tool that can take your SEO site audit to the next level, Elizabeth Weatherby from CSI Financial Group believes that Ahrefs is the clear winner.
Weatherby shares, “I prefer to use Ahrefs. I think the data presented is just generally more accurate and Ahrefs tools seem to be a bit more helpful for the advanced level of SEO I perform. The site audit functionality gives you such good insight as to what your issues are, and how you can fix them.”
Which Tool Is Best for Rank Tracking?
In regards to rank tracking, Ahrefs wins this round.
As Ronan Rohan Kadam from Vital Feedz shares, “I am a huge fan of Ahrefs. The tool covers every metric that should be measured for an effective SEO campaign. It has a good backlink analyzer, keywords generator, and an exceptional rank tracker. It can be pricey but I think the investment is worth it.”
That being said, Ryan Prior from MarketingArsenal notes that one weakness of Ahrefs’ rank tracker is that it doesn’t update daily. It’s one potential reason why users might consider Semrush or another Ahrefs alternative.
Which Tool Has Best Unique Features?
While the above features are the tried-and-true functional dashboards that most SEO tools have, what about features that set them apart from each other? According to our contributors, it seems like SEMrush has more unique features than Ahrefs.
Milosz Krasinski starts off by believing that both tools offer unique features, “While both tools are great you can’t have everything in one place. Ahref will show you the total number of outgoing links from a given domain while SEMrush can’t do that. In contrast – the SEMrush traffic analytics module helps you to fully evaluate a given domain by showing you how much traffic is being delivered by different channels, from which countries – something that Ahrefs struggles to deliver.”
One unique feature that SEMrush brings to the table is its integration with Google Data Studio. Shilo Jones of 1970 elaborates to say, “The major reason we decided to switch to SEMrush is its integration with Google Data Studio. We’ve standardized all of our client reporting on Google Data Studio. We also prefer the intuitive user interface of the SEMrush site audit tool compared to that of Ahrefs.”
For others, it’s all about the level of reporting and ease of use. Carley Hanna at Supplement Warehouse states, “Our team prefers to use SEMrush. SEMrush’s reports are very extensive and are extremely easy to read and comprehend. I think the overall user-friendliness is, ultimately, what made us stick with SEMrush.”
Agreeing in regards to the user interface is Josien Galama at Salted.pro. Galama shares, “I prefer SEMrush above Ahrefs mainly because of the user interface. It’s much easier to navigate and work with.”
On the other hand, Victor André Enselmann from Bankly prefers the features that Ahrefs brings to the table, stating, “I prefer Ahrefs over SEMrush because Ahrefs has a number of unique features that no other tools have. I love that you can reverse-engineer your competitors’ backlinks to find link-building opportunities. You can also get unique data about different keywords, such as the click distribution between paid and organic results. And finally, compare a website’s current and historical rankings.
These are just some of Ahrefs’ features, and besides these, Ahrefs displays data in a very digestible way, which gives you a great overview of all the data you need. I use most of these features in my daily work, so I pretty much wouldn’t be able to work without using Ahrefs.”
Sam Bretzmann from BretzMedia thinks a little differently and believes it’s all about what you’re using the tool for. Bretzmann explained, “I think for strictly SEO use Ahrefs is slightly better, but I end up using SEMrush because it has additional features that I use for client work (like social media post scheduling). SEMrush also seems to be innovating more, trying and adding new features.”
Since most of our contributors have paid for both tools before (a whopping 93%), we can say that both Ahrefs and SEMrush have unique features that are worthy of your investment.
semrush vs ahrefs level of paid users data
Which Tool Is the Best Overall Value?
Now that we’ve broken down each SEO tool based on the features they bring to the table, you may be wondering, if you had to go with only one, which is the best overall value. The experts weighed in below.
The case for Ahrefs
Brett Greedy from Bee Greedy starts off, “Ahrefs has been an easy SEO tool with all of the upfront information to get your site on track and has a fantastic site audit tool that even a new kid on the block can wrap their head around.”
Janice Wald at Mostly Blogging shares, “I prefer Ahrefs. Ahrefs is considered the best in the SEO industry. Truly a one-stop-shop for SEO tools, Ahrefs has everything you could want in an SEO tool. Ahrefs has a keyword rank tracker, tells me the movements of all my keywords, even the keywords I am not tracking, and tells me new keywords. Ahrefs tells me content gaps so I can compete against other bloggers in my niche. Ahrefs support staff is helpful, friendly, and respond promptly. I look forward to paying up to enjoy even more features of Ahrefs.”
Agreeing is Miranda Perez at Miranda Made, who states, “Hands down Ahrefs. It’s a no brainer answer. Ahrefs is an all-in-one SEO tool for everything you need for your SEO Campaign. Besides keyword research (both Ahrefs and SEMrush have this feature), Ahrefs has a ranking monitor, backlink monitor, and content explorer. You pay for one tool, and you could replace all other SEO Tools.”
Another expert on Team Ahrefs is Gabriela Covay from Bright Valley Marketing. Covay adds, “Hands down, Ahrefs is the gold standard when it comes to SEO tools. We wouldn’t be able to run our digital marketing agency without it. Compared to SEMrush, Ahrefs has an incredible amount of valuable tools that make our work as digital marketers so much easier. Their database is updated constantly, so the data you’re looking at is fresh and accurate. What’s more, Ahrefs is constantly innovating and providing more and more tools to its existing customers, without raising its rates. I’ve been grandfathered into a very generous rate since I signed up.”
Also agreeing is Alex Williams from The Website Flip, who uses Ahrefs when working for clients. Williams shares, “I definitely prefer working in Ahrefs whenever I’m doing SEO work for a client. I do a lot of work looking at the backlinks of sites and I find that Ahrefs is much better for backlink analysis than SEMrush. Ahrefs also regularly introduces new features that make it even more valuable. For my personal affiliate sites, I also prefer using Ahrefs for both backlink analysis and keyword research.”
Angela Han of Sharp Growth prefers using Ahrefs because it’s more budget-friendly for her needs, “Don’t get me wrong, I love SEMRush. But since I’m on a budget and I can only use one tool, I choose Ahrefs because it’s actually a bit more accurate in terms of the data that it provides. Ahrefs has a larger keyword database set. You can also see the seed keywords and get even more information if you really wanted to do your research. It is able to find more backlinks so you can reverse engineer your competitors.”
Rounding out the picks for Ahrefs is Carlos Rosado from Outlook Studios. Rosado shares, “After working with both over the years I have leaned towards Ahrefs as my SEO tool of choice. I love the updates they are making and the easy user interface. I’ve compared estimated traffic before on similar keywords that rank well and Ahrefs has proven to be more accurate. Competitor analysis has been one of my favorite features by reviewing link building, most popular pages, and keywords to target. Ahrefs has improved their platform and how much more you are capable of doing with SEO, competitor analysis, and link building.”
The case for SEMrush
Starting things off for SEMrush is Sam Thomas at Embryo. Thomas shares, “Overall for me, it’s SEMrush because it’s a better all-rounder in terms of campaign and client management.”
Agreeing is Enric Batalla from Robert Silicon Valley HS. Batalla states, “As the marketing manager of a fully digital company I always need the most powerful tools to be able to perform my work. In my company, I choose to have SEMrush. I feel that it is a more intuitive and accurate tool than Ahrefs. During these last years, I found that SEMrush is easier to use for my novice employees, as a result increasing their efficiency. I also find that the information displayed in SEMrush has a higher grade of accuracy.”
Also a big fan of SEMrush is Kevin Miller from GR0. Miller adds, “SEMrush is a great tool and is best for their ‘traffic value’ metric and their position tracking. I use this to go and choose my top 25 keywords per brand and monitor their fluctuation day over day, week over week, and month over month. This is fantastic to keep track of where we are for our most valuable keywords to the business.”
Also agreeing is Jesse Heredia at Ravecode Solutions. Heredia shares, “Although both tools are excellent and offer a similar set of features, I prefer to use SEMrush because of its additional data available for keyword research and its inclusion of PPC data which you cannot find in Ahrefs.”
Vanessa Keen of webSMART thinks both tools are great, but slightly leans over toward SEMrush: “Both are great tools and we use both, but if I had to pick one over the other, SEMRush has helped streamline a lot of my work and reporting over the years. We use Data Studio for client reporting, and not only can I plug them into our data connectors, we also include the iFrame of their Sensor for SERP volatility. Plus, they’ve provided great customer support over the years, and that alone goes a long way.”
Finishing things off is Mark Robinson from Albion Forest who shares, “I use SEMrush as I prefer how it interacts. The level of information I get from it is great and it perfectly suits my needs. As a novice in the world of SEO, it is really user-friendly and gives me regular updates on everything I need to know as well as fixing problems that I have.”
SEO Performance Dashboard Template by Databox
Get the Best of Both Worlds with Databox
For the best of both worlds… look no further than Databox.
Because truth be told, each reporting tool has its limitations, but when you track metrics from SEMrush and Ahrefs in Databox, you are able to monitor your metrics in one spot.
The Databox Ahrefs integration makes it easier than ever to stay on top of your content quality, in addition to metrics regarding link building, URL rankings, and keyword research.
There is also the SEMrush integration that is designed to pride digital marketers and online businesses across all industries with the most comprehensive data regarding marketing decisions, all while monitoring your data from anywhere.
We have recently added over 50 additional SEMrush metrics for you to track. Now you can better monitor your website and page rankings as well as find new PPC keyword opportunities. In addition, the new metrics will also enable easier tracking of your backlinking strategy progress and allow you to see high-level stats like your domain ranking and authority score.
No matter which one you choose, it only takes minutes to connect your account and start analyzing the data that matters most for your business.
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Si Quan Ong April 21, 2020 English
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Si Quan Ong
Marketing @ Ahrefs. Current learning project: Korean. I also summarise books on my personal blog.
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Looking for a list of free, useful SEO tools? Then look no further.
We asked over 10,000 SEO professionals in our Facebook group—and our 53,000 Twitter followers—to vote for their favorites.
facebook seo tools poll 2
We then tried and tested each suggestion, picked the best ones, and grouped them by category.
If you’re on a tight budget, this list should serve you well.
Here are the categories:
Keyword research tools
On-page SEO tools
Link building tools
Technical SEO tools
Rank tracking tools
Analytics tools
Local SEO tools
Other tools
Keyword research tools
These tools help you discover the topics your audience is searching for.
- Answer The Public
answer the public
Answer the Public pulls the questions people are asking (and a few other types of queries) from Google’s autocomplete results. It’s super useful for generating topic ideas.
SIDENOTE. Answer the Public is a freemium tool. You can do two searches a day for free.
Similar alternatives: Keyword Sheeter, Keywordtool.io
- Google Keyword Planner
google keyword planner
Google Keyword Planner is Google’s keyword research tool. Use it to generate keyword ideas based on up to ten seed keywords, or from a website or URL.
While Keyword Planner does have limitations such as a lack of absolute search volumes, it’s useful for finding keyword ideas that you might struggle to find using traditional keyword research tools.
SIDENOTE. If Bing is a search engine you want to optimize for, don’t forget they have their own Keyword Planner tool.
Recommended reading: How to Use Google Keyword Planner (Actionable Guide)
- Ahrefs’ Keyword Generator
ahrefs keyword generator
Keyword Generator is one of the free tools offered by Ahrefs. It pulls the top 100 keyword ideas for any seed keyword or phrase from our database of over ten billion keywords across 170+ countries. It shows the estimated monthly search volume for each suggestion, plus Keyword Difficulty (KD) scores for the first ten ideas.
You can also see the top 50 related questions.
ahrefs keyword generator results
SIDENOTE. Keyword Generator can also find keyword ideas for Bing, YouTube, and Amazon.
- Google Trends
google trends ipad pro
Google Trends shows the popularity of a topic over time. Use it to catch and capitalize on trending topics, and avoid creating content about those with waning interest.
Recommended reading: How to Use Google Trends for Keyword Research: 7 Effective Ways
- Keyworddit
keyworddit
Keyworddit extracts keywords from Reddit. Just enter any subreddit (e.g., /r/bigSEO), and it’ll pull a list of keywords with estimated monthly search volumes.
It’s useful for finding topics that your audience are interested in, but that you may not have otherwise considered.
Here are some of the keywords it grabbed from the r/entrepreneur subreddit:
keyworddit results 3
- AlsoAsked.com
alsoasked
AlsoAsked.com scrapes the questions from Google’s People Also Ask (PAA) boxes. Use these to find subtopics and questions that might be worth answering in your article.
For example, if you were writing an article about “how to clean a coffee maker using vinegar,” you might want to answer questions like:
How much vinegar should you use?
How many times should you run vinegar through the coffee machine?
Is cleaning vinegar better than regular vinegar?
also asked questions 3
- Keyword Surfer
surfer seo
Keyword Surfer is a free Chrome Extension that shows estimated global and monthly search volumes for any query typed into Google. You can also see similar keywords and related terms in the sidebar.
This makes it easy for you to do keyword research and competitive analysis without leaving the SERPs.
On-page SEO tools
These tools help you optimize your pages to rank higher in the search engines.
- Rank Math
Posts Demo Rank Math SEO WordPress 3
Rank Math is a WordPress SEO plugin that helps with on-page and technical SEO.
Here are a few things it can help with:
Adding titles, meta descriptions, OG tags, and other meta tags to posts and pages;
Adding structured data markup for rich snippets;
Redirecting URLs;
Finding and fixing dead links on your site.
Similar alternatives: Yoast SEO, All in One SEO Pack, and The SEO Framework.
- SERPSim
serpsim
SERPSim shows what your web page will look like in Google’s search results. All you have to do is enter your proposed title, meta description, and URL.
SERPSim will also tell you if your title and description are too long. You should fix these issues to avoid truncation in the search results.
Similar alternatives: Portent’s SERP Preview Tool
- Google’s Rich Results Test
rich results test 3
Google’s Rich Results Testing tool checks the structured markup on your page to see whether it’s eligible for rich snippets in the search results.
Recommended reading: Rich Snippets: What Are They and How Do You Get Them?
- Merkle’s Schema Markup Generator
schema markup generator 2
Merkle’s Schema Markup Generator creates structured data markup in the JSON-LD format. Just select the type of Schema markup you want to generate (e.g., local business, FAQ, product, etc.), fill in the form, then copy and paste the generated markup onto your site.
You can then check the validity of any Schema markup using Google’s Structured Data Testing tool.
Recommended reading: What is Structured Data? And Why Should You Implement It?
- Ahrefs’ SEO Toolbar
ahrefs seo toolbar
Ahrefs’ SEO Toolbar is a Chrome and Firefox extension that shows Ahrefs’ SEO metrics right in the browser.
It also generates an on-page SEO report for the visited page with important elements such as the page’s title, meta description, word count, headers, hreflang tags, canonicals, OG tags, and more.
Besides that, it:
Checks for broken links;
Traces redirect chains (full path);
Highlights nofollow links;
Displays Ahrefs’ SEO metrics in the Google SERPs;
And much more.
Recommended reading: Ahrefs SEO Toolbar – What’s New?
Link building tools
These tools help you acquire more links to your site.
- Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker
ahrefs backlink checker
Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker shows the top 100 backlinks to any website or web page.
It also shows the five most linked pages, most common anchor texts, the total number of backlinks and referring domains, and our proprietary Domain Rating (DR) and URL Rating (UR) scores.
It’s powered by the same industry-leading database as our premium tool. Some stats:
16 trillion known links;
170 million unique domains;
7 billion pages crawled each day.
- Hunter.io
hunter domain search
Hunter.io finds email addresses associated with a website. It’s free up to 50 requests per month.
You can also use the tool to find the email address of a specific person. Just enter the domain and the person’s name.
Install the Chrome extension for quick access, or use the Google Sheets add-on.
Similar alternatives: FindThat.Email, Voila Norbert
Recommended reading: 8 Actionable Ways To Find Anyone’s Email Address
- Ahrefs’ Broken Link Checker
ahrefs broken link checker
Ahrefs’ Broken Link Checker shows the top ten broken inbound and outbound links for any domain, subdomain or URL. You can use this tool to:
Find broken link building opportunities;
Find broken outbound links on your site, which you can fix to improve user experience;
Find broken pages on your site to reclaim “link authority”.
If you prefer using Chrome Extensions to check broken links on the fly, you can use LinkMiner or Check My Links.
- Scraper
scraper extension
Scraper is a Chrome Extension that allows you to scrape data from any web page. It can be used for a variety of purposes, e.g., scraping link prospects from Google search results.
Recommended reading: 6 Actionable Web Scraping Hacks for White Hat Marketers
- Help a Reporter (HARO)
haro
HARO is a free service that connects news sources with journalists looking for their expertise.
How it works: Journalists have questions. They need experts to answer them. HARO sends emails with those questions to subscribers. Anyone can respond and potentially become a source for these publications.
No matter whether you’re starting out or have an established site, it’s a great way to build authoritative links.
A similar service is SourceBottle.
Learn more about how to use HARO effectively in this video:
- Streak
streak crm 1
Streak is a freemium Chrome Extension that turns your Gmail inbox into customer relationship management (CRM) software.
With Streak, you can schedule and send mass personalized emails, see if someone has opened them, and more. It’s a great tool for blogger outreach.
Technical SEO tools
These tools help you improve the technical aspects of your website.
- Google Search Console
google search console 2
Google Search Console (previously Google Webmaster Tools) is a free service from Google that helps you monitor and troubleshoot your website’s appearance in their search results.
Use it to find and fix technical errors, submit sitemaps, see structured data issues, and more.
Bing and Yandex have their own versions too.
Recommended reading: How to Use Google Search Console to Improve SEO (Beginner’s Guide)
- Ahrefs Webmaster Tools
ahrefs webmaster tools
Ahrefs Webmaster Tools is a free tool that’ll help you improve your website’s SEO performance. It allows you to:
Monitor your website’s SEO health
Check for 100+ SEO issues
View all your backlinks
See all the keywords you rank for
Find out how much traffic your pages are receiving
Find internal linking opportunities
It’s our answer to the limitations of Google Search Console.
- Screaming Frog
screaming frog seo spider 1
Screaming Frog is a desktop-based website crawler. It’s one of the most popular tools available for analyzing and auditing technical and on-page SEO issues.
With the free version, you can crawl up to 500 URLs.
- Cloudflare
cloudflare
Cloudflare is a free global CDN. Not only can it speed up your site, but it can also protect it from malicious attacks.
Recommended reading: What is a content delivery network (CDN)?
- GTMetrix
gtmetrix
GTMetrix analyzes the loading speed of your web pages. Alongside the performance score, it also shows actionable recommendations to make things load faster.
Similar alternatives: Google PageSpeed Insights, Pingdom, WebPageTest.
Recommended reading: How to Improve Page Speed from Start to Finish (Advanced Guide)
- Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
mobile friendly test tool 1
Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test checks how easily a visitor can use your page on a mobile device. It also identifies specific mobile-usability issues like text that’s too small to read, the use of incompatible plugins, and so on.
With Google’s move to mobile-first indexing, having a responsive website is more important than ever.
- Smush
smush wp plugin
Smush is a free WordPress plugin for compressing, optimizing, and resizing images. Use it to ensure your web pages load lightning fast.
Note that free users can only optimize 50 images at a time. You have to keep clicking the “resume” button to optimize the next batch of 50.
Similar alternatives: Shortpixel (free up to 200 images/month)
- Where Goes?
wheregoes
Where Goes? is a simple tool for checking redirect paths for any URL.
Just paste in a URL, and it’ll show both the type (e.g., 301, 302, etc.) and the number of redirects in the chain. You should minimize the number of unnecessary redirects because it slows down your website and contributes to poor user experience.
Furthermore, although Google confirmed there is no longer any PageRank dilution via 3XX redirects, having too many redirects in a chain may waste crawl budget.
If you’re looking for an SEO Chrome extension with the same functionality, you can check out Ahrefs’ SEO Toolbar.
Recommended reading: 301 Redirects for SEO: Everything You Need to Know
- Robots.txt Generator
ryte robots txt generator
Robots.txt Generator creates a properly-formatted robots.txt file in seconds.
More advanced users can use the custom option to create individual rules for various bots, subdirectories, etc.
Recommended reading: Robots.txt and SEO: Everything You Need to Know
- HEADMasterSEO
headmasterseo
HeadmasterSEO is a simple tool for bulk checking the status codes for a list of URLs. The free version allows you to check up to 500.
If you prefer a web-based application—and only wish to check up to 100 URLs—try HTTPstatus.io.
- Keep-alive Validation SEO Tool
persistent connection checker
Use this tool to check if persistent connections are enabled or disabled on your web pages.
- Chrome DevTools
chrome devtools
Chrome DevTools is Chrome’s built-in web page debugging tool. Use it to debug page speed issues, improve web page rendering performance, and more.
From a technical SEO standpoint, it has endless uses.
- View Rendered Source
view rendered source
View Rendered Source is a Chrome Extension that shows how the browser has rendered a page’s original HTML into the DOM, including modifications made by JavaScript.
It’s a great tool for those who need to audit or troubleshoot JavaScript issues.
- Hreflang Tag Generator
hreflang tag generator
Generate hreflang tags to specify the language and geographical targeting of a webpage. Just add your desired URLs, select your target country and language, then click generate.
Recommended reading: Hreflang: The Easy Guide for Beginners
Rank checking tools
These tools help you check rankings in a target location.
- Ahrefs’ SERP Checker
ahrefs serp checker
Ahrefs’ SERP checker shows the top 10 rankings for any keyword in over 170 countries.
For the first three search results, you’ll also see important SEO metrics like the number of referring domains, number of backlinks, estimated search traffic, etc.
ahrefs serp checker results
- Local Search Results Checker
brightlocal search results checker
BrightLocal’s Local Search Results Checker shows you search results from any location—down to the city, town, or even ZIP level.
Depending on the country, you can even specify the language:
local search results checker language
Similar alternatives: Valentin.app.
- Mobile SERP Test
serperator
MobileMoxie’s SERPerator tool allows you to check your mobile rankings in any location, right down to an address, city, state, or zip code.
You can even compare devices since some SEOs believe that Google shows different results for iOS and Android.
Analytics tools
These tools help you measure and analyze data on your website.
- Google Analytics
google analytics 3
Google Analytics is quite likely the most popular analytics tool out there. It gives you a whole range of data, which you can use to improve every aspect of your marketing.
Bing’s version is Bing Webmaster Tools, and Yandex has their own called Yandex Metrica.
Recommended reading: How to Use Google Analytics to Improve SEO Performance
- Keyword Hero
keyword hero
Keyword Hero attempts to replace the “(not provided)” data in Google Analytics with real search keywords.
The free tier allows you to analyze up to 10 URLs and 2,000 sessions per month.
- Google Data Studio
google data studio
Google Data Studio lets you create interactive dashboards and reports.
It integrates with Google’s suite of tools, which makes it easy to merge data from places like Google Search Console, Google Analytics, etc.
- Ahrefs’ WordPress SEO Plugin
Ahrefs SEO WordPress plugin
Ahrefs’ WordPress SEO Plugin helps you perform content audits and monitor your backlinks.
The plugin combines data from our backlink index and Google Analytics to give you recommendations on how to improve your content—completely free.
Recommended reading: How to Do a Content Audit and Boost Your Organic Traffic [Template Included]
Local SEO tools
These tools help you rank higher in local SERPs.
- Google My Business
google my business
Google My Business lets you manage how your business appears in Google Search and Maps.
Claiming and optimizing your GMB profile is likely the most important thing you can do in local SEO. According to Moz’s 2018 study, GMB is one of the top local ranking factors for both “snack pack” and organic results.
- Whitespark’s Google Business Review Link Generator
whitespark google business review generator
Whitespark’s Google Business Review Link Generator creates a shareable link that lets customers review your business with one click.
Since getting reviews on your Google My Business profile is crucial for local SEO, you should consider sharing this link via email, social media, and elsewhere to make the reviewing process as easy as possible.
- Whitespark Local Citation Finder
whitespark citation tool
Whitespark’s Local Citation Finder helps find NAP citation opportunities for your business.
According to Moz’s 2018 study, citation signals are an important signal for local rankings.
Other tools
These are the tools that didn’t fit into the categories above.
- Algoroo
algoroo 3
Algoroo is a Google algorithm tracking tool. It allows you to see if there are any fluctuations in the Google SERPs, which can be an indication of a Google algorithm update.
Similar alternatives: Ayima Pulse, Rank Risk Index.
- Wayback Machine
wayback machine 2 1
Archive.org’s Wayback Machine shows how pages looked in the past.
This is useful for a variety of tasks. For example, if you’re doing broken link building, it is helpful to see what was originally on the dead page so you can replicate it.
- Google Alerts
Google Alerts Monitor the Web for interesting new content 3
Google Alerts lets you monitor mentions of your name or business online. You can also use it to monitor your competitors.
Conclusion
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