By putting your site in front of the people who are already seeking services like yours, SEO is a powerful way to reach high quality leads. That said, it can feel a bit like trying to thread a needle while wearing a blindfold if you don’t have the right tools in place.
Google’s native Analytics, Keyword Tool, and Webmaster Tools are surprisingly helpful as free options, but SEO software is a must if you want to see the whole picture.
Here are a few ways you can take advantage of such software:
- Using link tracking software, you can easily identify which pages on your site have been most successful as link bait
- The same software can also be used to isolate which pages on your competitor’s sites are best at capturing links, which can be a great source of inspiration
- Analyzing your competitor’s link profile is a good way to find sites to build relationships with in order to build links
- Rank tracking software can help you identify the relationship between your actions and your rankings. At the same time, it’s important to understand that nearly all short term changes in rank have more to do with changes in the Google algorithm, server information, and the behavior of other sites, than your own actions. Focus on long term ranking changes to identify what is working.
- By combining rank tracking information with link tracking information, you can get closer to identifying which rank changes are the result of link building efforts, and which are more likely the result of changes made by your competitors
- Using SEO toolbars, you can quickly identify the domain and page authority of a website you are considering working with. You can factor this into your decision of whether or not it makes sense to collaborate with them as part of your link building strategy, and how much effort is worth spending on it.
- Tools such as Followerwonk allow you to identify prominent social media personalities who talk about keywords similar to yours. This makes it easier to focus your efforts on interactions with people who are more influential online. You can also use it to discover people that your followers follow, or people that you have previously worked with follow. This gives your interactions context that make it easier to start a conversation.
- Keyword research tools can help simplify the process of identifying which keywords are most worth targeting. Google’s Keyword Tool is specifically designed for AdWords, not organic search, and so it doesn’t provide all the information that is most useful to an SEO. Keyword tools that help you identify the amount of competition you are up against, for example, dramatically simplify the process of choosing which keywords are worth chasing.
How to Interpret Data from SEO Software
Also, when you are taking advantage of tools, it’s a good idea to understand a few principles from statistics and try to remain as objective as possible:
- Correlation does not equal causation. Just because two things often go together, it doesn’t necessarily mean that one of them is causing the other. What you think are cause and effect could actually be reversed, or they may both share a common cause.
- Try to identify root causes. In a perfect world, you would do this by creating some kind of controlled experiment, where one version of your content used a tactic, and another version of your content did not. This would allow you to identify whether or not the tactic actually had any impact. Clearly, the world of SEO is too messy to make this work in most circumstances. However, you can vary your tactics over time and analyze the results in the long term to see which of them make a difference, and which don’t.
- Compare change, not absolutes. If one page has more links or better rankings than another page, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is better. Older pages naturally have more links, and fresh pages tend to get a boost in rankings for the first week or so. Established pages can also see an improvement in rankings over time even if no links build up. When comparing content, it’s best to only compare pages that went live around the same time.
- Don’t jump on initial numbers as an indication that one tactic or another is a “sure thing.” If you haven’t reached statistical significance, you can’t be completely sure. It’s very difficult to reach statistical significance with something as complex as SEO, which is why it’s important to keep experimenting and trying new things as well as using what has worked in the past.
- SEO is still just as much art as science. Tools can make the process more objective, but they shouldn’t be relied on too excessively. Use them as a guide in combination with common sense and your own intuition in order to achieve the best results.
Conclusion
SEO tools like SEOmoz, SearchEnabler, and Conductor can be a very powerful weapon in your arsenal. They offer access to the data you need in order to identify your most promising strategies. It’s important to recognize that this is what makes SEO software useful. Merely pulling up Analytics and obsessing over changes in traffic and rankings isn’t enough. If you aren’t using SEO tools to identify your best strategies and refine them, they are little more than a distraction.
About Pratik Dholakiya
Yes with the help of SEO small business can create a lot of benefits for us. So using seo software is a good deal for us.
Prakash recently posted..Subway Surfers for PC, Android Free Download APK Online
Great article, very good points which we have been using and improving on.
An interesting post. Nice.
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Twitter: EnviroEquipmnt
says:
Our site has dozens and dozens of pages so they would like to take your advice and start analyzing our site using link tracking software. Which such software is best; SEOmoz, SearchEnabler, or someone else?
Enviro Equipment Blog recently posted..CleanInject Injection Process Successful In South Carolina
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St. thomas dentist…Hello…how r u????What r u doing???
Not endorsing any but nice tool tips for any blogger.
bert recently posted..Ronde tafel Business Club bijeenkomsten Arnhem/Nijmegen
Twitter: mumandbiz
says:
This is a great post. Any bloggers who want to succeed online must have to known how to do SEO. Great tips.
Thanks
Sumbo recently posted..Is it Possible to Make Money from the Internet?
Great tips you have shared here. Many small businesses are still unaware of the wonders of SEO and they do not put much focus on it.
hi,
This is a excellent writing for individuals who believe in doing SEO with SEO software programs. Google’s toools such as Statistics and Website owner resources really can create SEO possible for little companies.
Literally a great read about ‘How Small Businesses Can Get the Most out of SEO With SEO Software’. Good article name
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For anyone looking to improve their SEO this is a must.
Thanks for your comment.
The only real way to improve on your SEO is through this. Great article.
Tracking software is by far the best purchase I have yet made; when it comes to SEO. It highlighted the 4-5 key pages out of 1000s, which was bringing in all my traffic, and enabled me to focus my ad budget and content builders to focus upon that areas. Really, it is the key to success.
hi,
This is a excellent writing for individuals who believe in doing SEO with SEO software programs. Google’s tools such as Statistics and Website owner resources really can create SEO possible for little companies.
Twitter: magentothemes24h
says:
Question: Do you guys know what happened with Yahoo site explorer? It was a good SEO tool to check backlinks. The site tell me to check Bing master tool, but still not find it.
Harry recently posted..Welcome to MagentoThemes24h
You should refer following post. It’s a long story :)
http://www.seroundtable.com/yahoo-site-explorer-offline-13687.html
Pratik Dholakiya recently posted..My post is featured in Best of Search Engine Journal for November, 2012
SEOmoz is probably the biggest SEO community around,that gives full access to their tools including their new web application tool.
Rabia Akram recently posted..Top Twitter Tips for Selling A Property
Twitter: rancorinfotech
says:
Totally agreed Pratik,
If you really serious about SEO then you must use some useful SEO tools. They not just help you to reduce the work load, but helps you to complete your SEO work with quality.
Aasma recently posted..PG in Delhi for Girls
That’s right Aasma. It helps in many ways if used whenever it is required. You don’t even have to spend your time behind cross verifying your findings every month as the tools will tell everything whenever a new crawl takes place.
Twitter: HealthTipWealth
says:
This is a good blog post for people who believe in doing SEO with SEO softwares. Google’s toools such as Analytics and Webmaster tools really can make SEO easy for small businesses.
Steven Jude recently posted..Tips To Succeed Using Google Adwords + How to Choose the Right Type of Ginseng to Suit Your Needs
Twitter: freedommmc
says:
Good point. You have to use the right tool for the job if you want results you can be proud of.
I’m always wondering what bloggers think about using their time to tweak SEO versus creating content.
Which do you think would be most beneficial?
Jacko recently posted..A Back Linking Strategy That Really Works – (RE: UAW Pt.2)
I think both plays an important role. One needs to create great content for their users that is also optimized in such a way that it can be found organically too.
Pratik Dholakiya recently posted..My post is featured in Best of Search Engine Journal for November, 2012