Small businesses are often strapped for resources, but all that means is that you need to be more creative with the ones you have.
You don’t have a team of marketing experts on hand to help you do the research and planning? No problem—just use our free SEO tools!
The truth is that there are lots of online tools out there designed specifically with small businesses in mind, and they’re just waiting for you to tap into them.
If you’ve got a budget that barely covers your groceries each month, you don’t have to miss out on the benefits of these free SEO tools. They can help you grow your business and get ahead of your competitors without having to spend a dime.
In this article, we’ll go over some of our favorite free SEO tools for small businesses so you can see how they can help make your life easier when it comes time to manage your site’s SEO or social media strategy.
Free Seo Tools For Small Businesses Productivity
Search Engine Optimization is important. Everyone knows it, but it can get really annoying to get so psyched up and then let down. You know you want to rank well on Google, you’re willing to put in the work and then BANG! Now you have to spend hundreds of dollars to use software and tools to “do it right.”
Don’t let this inhibit your efforts. When I started out with SEO in college, I was not about to pay hundreds of dollars of software for clients that weren’t even paying me that amount to work with them. I got through it by finding tools and offerings that were free.
Taking this knowledge, I’ve created a list of Free SEO tools that I personally used with my clients and still continue to use till this day.
SEO Book Rank Checker
This tool allows you to make sense of all the Search Engine Optimization mess. Rank Checker will parse the internet and report your rankings on keywords you designate. This way you can finally know how you do compared to your competitors. You may be thinking that you can easily just do a quick check on Google to compare. Yes that is true, but when you have ten competitors with 20 different keyword phrases you’re trying to rank for, this tool will make your eyes not wither away in the endless scrolling of the white background and blue text of Google results.
There is one disclaimer with this tool: You have to use to Mozilla Firefox. So for those die-hard Chrome fans or you hard-nosed, stubborn Internet Explorer users, you’ll have to download Mozilla Firefox. For those who are already using Firefox, guess the odds were in your favor.
Moz Local
Moz is the king of SEO. Trust me. Ask any SEO professional and they will know Moz. The company’s main offering is a Search Engine Optimization software, but they take it way beyond just software. The company dominates Search Engine Optimization education and has many free offerings for users. One of these offerings is the Moz Local tool. The tool checks your business’ information across all directories across the internet. By doing this, you can see how your business is listed and which directories need some fixing. This offers you a great starting point.
Many businesses never think to check the accuracy of information, but verifying your listing across the web will put you ahead of most small businesses. Note that fixing listings can take hours and even days. In order to help people not kill themselves, I’ve created a small business guide on adding your business listing.
Ubersuggest or Google Keyword Planner
I know you may think you know all your keywords, but you just need to cover your bases. Everyone talks in their own ways and there is no telling what people are typing into Google to find your service. Well I lie, there is a way to tell, and the two tools listed can help you figure out what people are typing in.
Google Keyword Planner is the industry standard tool that many people use. It allows you to get info directly from Google on recommendations they think you should consider. I personally use this tool a lot, but the reason many people stray away from this tool is in large part due to the AdWords interface and also the relevance. At the end of the day Keyword Planner recommends based on algorithm, not a real person.
If you’re having a hard time getting use to Keyword Planner, I’d suggest used Ubersuggest. The interface is much cleaner and intuitive. The icing on the cake is that you don’t have to sign up with the site. Just go their site and you can start immediately. On AdWords you need to have an account in addition to putting in your credit card.
LetterCount
I know, I know it sounds pointless, but LetterCount has been there for me through thick and thin. Title tags and Meta Descriptions are an extremely important part of your Click Through Rate (CTR) and positioning on Google. The problem is that you have limited amount of characters you can use before Google places the “…”. I don’t know about you but I think of the world in letters and words, not characters. So writing title tags and meta descriptions can get difficult in terms of ensuring that I am within the certain amount of characters allowed.
(Title Tags = 50 – 60, Meta Description = 150-160)
You can use Microsoft Word, but in my opinion is has been much easier to just use Letter Count. Word has tendencies to want to format and correct everything you do, so you run the risk of miscounting the amount of characters you used.
Quick note, if you want to see what your title tags would look like on Google, Moz has a nice title tag simulator. It also counts characters so its offers a nice alternative. Note there isn’t a meta description simulator though.
Ahrefs, Open Site Explorer and Majestic
These three sites offer the ability to scalp for back links. The purpose is to see who is linking to you, but more importantly who is linking to your competitors. If you can see who is linking to your competitors, it offers you the ability to try and obtain those same links. The three companies (Ahrefs, Open Site Explorer, and Majestic) above have pretty similar offerings and functions for the tool. All three offer a free version that only does so much. You’ll have to pay to see everything, but as a small business you really don’t need to get the full version. Use it as an idea generator for you to start thinking of link building opportunities.
Wrapping Up
These tools will make you feel like a SEO professional. Now of course because these are free they are not as powerful as the paid versions and software, but you’re a small business trying to make it. You don’t have to shell out the money so fast. My personal advice, use these tools first. Once you do that you’ll get a real good idea of which software and tools you may really need in the future and ultimately pay for.
best seo tools for small businesses
To be successful with search engine optimization (SEO), you must use the right tools.
It’s simply impossible to conduct keyword research, analyze competitors, track rankings, track traffic and conversion trends, identify technical problems, and implement effective content marketing without the proper tools.
Yet with so many tools on the market, how do you know which to choose?
Here is a roundup of the top 13 SEO tools for small businesses.
- Google Analytics
google-analytics
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Google Analytics is a powerful and completely free website analytics tool. Once installed properly on your website, you’ll be able to report on which marketing tactics drive the most traffic, which marketing tactics drive the most leads and sales conversions, how visitors use your site, which content they prefer, and so much more.
- Google Search Console
Google-search-console
Google Search Console (formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools) is Google’s free SEO tool. Once you set up your account, you’ll get alerts if Google finds errors on your website and you’ll be able to view key stats like keyword rankings, number of clicks per keyword, number of times your website showed up in the search results per keyword, and your click through rate when your website showed up in the search results.
Plus, you can link Search Console to Analytics to unlock even more reporting tools in your Analytics account. For example, once you’ve linked these two tools, then in Analytics you’ll be able to review keyword rankings, click through rates, impressions, and the landing pages that are ranking in Google.
- AgencyAnalytics
AgencyAnalytics
AgencyAnalytics is our go-to platform for reporting. AgencyAnalytics offers automated reporting, client visible/shareable dashboards, as well as a clean interface for teams to review performance for various different services. We use AgencyAnalytics to report on and review metrics for Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Google Ads, Facebook, Facebook Ads, Bing Ads, Yelp, LinkedIn, and many others. Whether it’s sending out reports each month in a timely manner or drilling into metrics to review client performance, AgencyAnalytics is one of our most widely used tools and we can’t recommend it enough.
- Rank Ranger
rankranger logo
Rank Ranger is a robust, all-around SEO analysis tool. But before you get lost in the data, focus on what Rank Ranger does best: tracking your keyword rankings. You’ll be able to track your website’s organic rankings over time in the major search engines, plus your local rankings in the “map” results. This will help you identify trends up or down in your rankings so you can adjust your strategy accordingly.
Rank Ranger also offers automated SEO reporting, competitor analysis tools, and many other helpful features for analyzing the performance of your SEO campaigns.
- Screaming Frog
screaming frog
Screaming Frog is another SEO tool with lots of bells and whistles. What sets it apart is the free SEO Spider tool that you can use to quickly conduct a technical SEO audit of your website. After downloading the tool, all you need to do to get started is type in your website’s domain name, and click Start.
The best part is that this tool is free (for crawling up to 500 URLs per website.) After downloading the tool, all you need to do is enter the website’s domain name, and click Start.
In just a couple of minutes, you will see a detailed audit of all of your webpages. From meta tags to error status codes, you can spot problems without taking the time to manually audit each and every one of your website’s pages.
- Ahrefs
ahrefs logo
Ahrefs is our favorite tool for analyzing backlinks, SEO content opportunities, and SEO keyword research.
The main tool we love at Ahrefs is the Site Explorer tool. Ahrefs is probably best known for the backlink analysis functions within their Site Explorer tool. This tool is very helpful for identifying the different types of websites that are already linking to your website. You can also view trends in the growth of your backlinks over time. In addition, you can use the Site Explorer tool to analyze backlinks to competitors and find new link-building opportunities.
In our experience, the Site Explorer tool is also incredibly valuable for analyzing top-performing SEO content on your website. You can use this tool to identify what pages and keywords are already ranking well in Google and driving traffic to your website. For example, you can see what pages are driving the most SEO traffic, and which particular keywords the pages are ranking for in Google.
And then, you can also use the Site Explorer tool to identify what pages and keywords are working best for your competitors, and then apply those lessons to your own SEO strategy. For example, if you see some competitors have certain types of SEO landing pages that you don’t have, and they are generating traffic on some keywords that you aren’t focused on, you may want to incorporate those types of content ideas into your SEO plan.
In addition to Site Explorer, we also love Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer tool. It provides a fast, easy way to generate dozens of new keyword ideas for SEO content creation.
- Moz
Moz logo
MozPro (including Link Explorer)
Moz is one of the most popular SEO software suites and we use their tools regularly. Moz is probably best known for their ‘Domain Authority’ (DA) metric. DA predicts how likely a website is to rank in Google, with a range from 0 to 100, with higher scores corresponding to greater likelihood of ranking. The main factor with DA is the quality and quantity of links.
Moz Pro is a suite that includes many tools, including Link Explorer, a backlink analysis tool. Unfortunately, no tool is 100% accurate when it comes to finding all of your backlinks or the backlinks of your competitors. That’s why we recommend using multiple tools (Ahrefs, Moz, among others) to get the full picture.
MozBar
MozBar is a simple tool but saves a tremendous amount of time when reviewing websites. It’s a Google Chrome extension that allows you to quickly and easily view a site’s Domain Authority, Page Authority, backlink information, and spam score. At the click of a button, you can also view a Moz page analysis, as well as followed and no-followed links on a page.
MozLocal
One of the biggest factors in your local “map” rankings is citations. A citation is simply a mention of your name, address, and phone number (NAP) on another website online. The most common citations are business directories like Yelp, Bing Local, and even Facebook business pages.
Moz Local is one of the best tools available to quickly audit your citations. You’ll see if your information is consistent across all directories, if you’re missing any important directories, and if you have duplicate listings that could be dragging down your rankings.
- SpyFu
SpyFu logo
SpyFu is an amazing tool that allows you to see how your competitors are performing with SEO (as well as Google Ads). By using this tool, you’ll be able to find out:
The keywords your competitors are ranking for in Google organically
Which pages are generating SEO traffic
What types of inbound links they have
SEO traffic estimates and trends in SEO traffic
Plus, SpyFu is our go-to tool for Google Ads competitor intelligence. With SpyFu, you can see competitor Google Ads data such as:
Which of their keywords are performing the best.
How long their ads ran or have run for certain keywords.
The clicks and impressions they received from their ads.
The best performing ads.
Your competitors’ ad copy.
Your competitors’ monthly ad spend on campaigns.
So if you’re managing SEO as well as Google Ads campaigns, we definitely recommend using SpyFu to analyze your competitors.
- SEMrush
SEMrush
SEMrush is one of the most complete all-in-one SEO software packages.
This platform pretty much does it all, including:
Competitor research
Keyword research
Backlink analysis
Automated On-page SEO audits
And much more
Our favorite feature with SEMrush is the toxic backlink audit feature. In our view, their backlink audit tool is the best option for quickly analyzing potentially toxic backlinks to disavow via Search Console.
- WhiteSpark
whitespark logo
Citations (directory listings with your business name and contact info) are important for ranking high in Google’s local “map” results. But how do you find citations?
That’s where WhiteSpark comes in…
Citation Finder is one of our favorite tools offered by WhiteSpark. In a simple interface, Citation Finder allows you to add a business alongside some priority keywords. Once you’ve added the business info, the tool will start running and after a few minutes, Citation Finder will present you with a list of citation opportunities that competitors have. At this point, you also have the ability to add additional competitors. Once the list of competitors is set, you can review citations the business you added already has, you can review opportunities in a single list, and finally, you can review opportunities in comparison to the full list of competitors. In particular, we’re big fans of the ability to export these findings as a CSV.
Plus, WhiteSpark also provides the option to pay them to set up the citations to save you time.
- BrightLocal
brightlocal-
BrightLocal is yet another citation building tool that is similar to WhiteSpark. In our experience, these tools will uncover different citation opportunities so using both can ensure you get the most exposure. Plus, BrightLocal has the same option to pay them to create the citations for you.
- SEO Quake
SEO Quake is an all-in-one SEO toolbox that comes in the form of a browser plugin. Essentially, it’s a very handy quick reference tool for evaluating both your own site as well as the competition. Quick and easy SEO metrics for individual pages or a full SEO Audit function which instantly evaluates the quality of a site’s on-page and off-page SEO.
- ImportXML
connector-google-sheets-logo
OK, this one isn’t exactly a tool, it’s a formula that is available in Google Spreadsheets. If you’re comfortable with spreadsheets, but you’re not familiar with ImportXML, then you’re going to love this!
Although it can be used to pull any type of data into a Google sheet, from sources as diverse as XML, HTML, CSV, TSV, and RSS feeds, it is particularly useful for businesses trying to organize SEO webpage data. For example, you can pull the current title tag, meta description, and even headers of a webpage into a single sheet, so you can review and document edits. Here’s a quick primer on using ImportXML for SEO.
This is a huge time saver!
Conclusion
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