Essential Tools for SEO

GOOGLE ADWORDS KEYWORD TOOL

(https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordTool-External) The AdWords Keyword Tool data is limited to just Google, unlike Keyword Discovery and Wordtracker, and it includes Google's content network, so it's not solely based on search. But it provides accessibility to rich data, freely, via a clean and simple interface.

Be sure to experiment with some of the hidden columns of data, such as showing the search volume trends or the month the highest volume occurred. There are differing opinions on match type, though for natural search, we generally recommend selecting exact match because the data is often being used to select the primary phrase for page optimization, or what we call the “declared search term.”

Good link building requires some level of human effort, no matter how powerful the tools employed. That said, tapping into a set of tools to assist in the process goes a long way.

Fortunately, the keyword list you built during your keyword research will also serve as a foundation for much of your link building and will be something to turn to as you work with many of the link building tools.

Tools for link building are nearly endless and a bit overwhelming. The list below is truly just a sampling to help get you started.

Before settling on your subset of link building tools for your toolbox, experiment with as many tools as you can, and chat with others about their experiences to determine which tools aren't merely “the best,” but are the best ones for you.

YAHOO! SITE EXPLORER

(http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/) This is the starting point for many link builders. The price is right (free) for this search engine supplied utility that reports on who is linking to you. It provides only the first 1,000 links, but they can also be exported to a TSV file for working with as you wish (e.g., load the list right into Excel). You can continue to refine your lists by “exploring” individual pages of your (or your competitors') site is to see the links coming into specific sections or pages.

Site Explorer is also excellent for your ongoing benchmark tracking, and for comparing the number of links coming into the home page, the entire site, and including and excluding the links from the domain itself. Tracking and comparing these different metrics over time will help you to gauge the relative health and change of your site's link profile.

LINK DIAGNOSIS

(http://www.linkdiagnosis.com) As free tools go, Link Diagnosis is pretty impressive given the amount of information it provides, though analysis is limited to the home page and top-100 pages of a site. To get the most out of the tool, you should install the Firefox extension; and to save reports and ongoing tracking, create an account.

In addition to quickly seeing basic metrics such as total backlinks and total unique anchor texts, you can view the individual URLs of the linking pages and get specific details about each link. The detailed link information includes the page's PageRank, the anchor text used if it's a text link, and the number of other outbound links on that page, as well as a calculation they make on the strength of that link.

You can also view a link report from the other direction, getting analysis of the 101 pages of your site that measures the total number of links coming into each page and a strength measurement for the page. Or you can view a report that just details the most popular anchor text for the links analyzed.