Small businesses can make a noticeable difference in their search rankings with the right tools. This piece discusses the best SEO tools for small businesses in 2023.
Just like you can’t do repair jobs around your house without the specific tools, you can’t optimize your website for search engines without the right tools. Search engine optimization requires keyword research, backlink analysis, competitor analysis, keyword tracking, and KPIs monitoring. SEO tools make them all a breeze of the air.
You can’t do a grinding job with a scraper. Similarly, all SEO tools are not suitable for every type of need. Small businesses can do with simple SEO software to turbocharge their growth.
Our SEO team is familiar with a range of SEO tools they use for our clients, including small businesses and large enterprises. Let’s look at some of them:
7 Best SEO Tools in 2023 for Small Businesses
1- KeywordTool.io
It is one of the ideal SEO tools for small businesses at the initial stages of their keyword research. It is simple and easy to use. The software uses Google autocomplete on your entered search term to fetch hundreds or thousands of long tail keywords from related search queries with your submitted keyword.
Features
- It offers tons of new key phrases on any subject, like your brand’s industry, service, and product-related keywords.
- It gives keyword suggestions depending on search engine results pages from YouTube, Google, Bing, Amazon, Play Store, eBay, Twitter, and Instagram.
- Its free version returns more than 750 long-tail keyword ideas for every keyword you submit.
- Users can filter the search term results depending on particular words or stop specific words.
- You don’t need to make an account when using the free version, which is ideal for the primary phases of keyword research.
Pricing
Its free version only offers a list of keywords, while the paid version gives the keywords as well as their cost per click, total search volume, average trend, and average competition.
2- Google Keyword Planner
Keyword research is the foundation of Search Engine Optimization. You can’t optimize a website or landing page without knowing the search query or long tail keyword it will appear for in the search results.
We write content on topics, but they revolve around a primary keyword, which may be the whole search query or a phrase searcher type when looking for specific information.
Google Keyword Planner gives us a list of keywords people search for on its platform, meaning its information is the most authentic insider data that no other SEO tool can provide.
You need to enter your target keyword in the search bar of Google keyword planner, and it will return the keyword’s search volume along with other search term suggestions.
You can use the tool for simple keyword research, but it offers clearer results when you run an ad campaign. However, you can use it to find some search queries and then move to another SEO tool to discover further.
Features
- Marketers can find new and relevant keywords that others are bidding on in Google Ads, which helps identify search demand and competition levels for picking blog ideas.
- Rather than using a search term, users can also input their site’s link or a competitor’s site for more methods to recognize new target keywords.
- While Google Keyword Planner offers average search numbers for a month, site owners can only view ranges like 1k- 10k unless they are running an ad campaign that would show exact search volume data.
Pricing
It is a free tool that is a part of Google Ads.
3- Google Analytics (GA)
It is one of the best SEO tools that help websites analyze their traffic. Developed by Google, Google Analytics lets you create a maximum of 100 accounts and add 50 properties to every account.
You should apply a Google Analytics tag to your website to make your small business look credible. GA allows businesses to better understand their audiences, identify the locations their visitors belong to, how they browse the website, the most visited pages, the length of an average session, and more.
Features
- On Google Analytics, you can view the channels visitors come from, like organic traffic from different search engines, social media sites, and other platforms.
- You can easily discover how people use your website, such as which pages are seen, in what order, and their session length.
- Businesses can link their Google search console to GA to see data for web pages and search terms from GSC within Google Analytics without hassle.
- They can establish Goals in GA to monitor their preferred conversion actions such as purchasing a product, submitting a form, and if a specific set of landing pages or pages was visited, a phone call occurred, or a link was clicked.
Pricing
Google Analytics runs on the freemium model, but most small companies only need a free GA account. However, you can buy Analytics 360, its premium model with more sophisticated features such as reporting for large organizations and unlimited insights.
4- Google Search Console
Previously known as Google Webmaster Tools, Google Search Console lets website owners keep tabs on their site and fix any issues in Google Search.
Business owners can manage how your website looks in Google searches and troubleshoot any possible problem.
Are you ready to start? Log in to your Google account and create a new property for your website. Then, validate it using one of the given methods.
Features
- Users can add their XML sitemap file (often auto-generated by the CMS your site is built on or the extensions such as Yoast or RankMath if using WordPress.
- They can add new web pages to ask for fast indexing of the pages into Google Search.
- Marketers can find content that Google has indexed and shows in search results.
- They can find which search queries produce impressions for their content and attract clicks to their website.
- Users can check backlinks to their website that Google has found along with their internal links.
- Google Search Console finds pages that Google might have blocked from being indexed and site penalties for violations such as poor quality content, keyword stuffing, or link spam.
- GSC finds if your website pages respond on mobile devices and have features to help you check the functionality or loading issues.
Pricing
Google Search Console is free. Users can add a maximum of 1000 properties to one account. Google suggests making a property for each website you want to monitor separately.
5- Semrush
Semrush is a suite of tools for enhancing online rankings and exploring market data. It includes keyword research tools, keyword rank tracking, competitor analysis, backlink analysis, and site auditing.
It is the number one SEO tool that is enough for all your SEO purposes. It’s packed with remarkable features and provides loads of SEM, PPC, and SEO data.
Features
- Semrush has a goldmine of new keywords concerning all industries and business types along with local approximated search volumes and keyword competition.
- You can perform an in-depth site audit to ensure that all the on-page elements are optimized
- You can find, assess and compare competing websites in your industry for things like search term rankings, approximated site traffic, and inbound links to unlock new possibilities.
- Gap analysis features allow you to find the ideas and search terms you can add content about on your website as compared to your competitors.
Pricing
Semrush offers three fixed monthly or yearly plans. It offers a week’s free trial and helps users save up to 17% with annual billing.
- Pro: It is for small in-house teams and new marketers. The price is $119.95 monthly.
- Guru: It is for marketing consultants and businesses. The price is $229.95 monthly.
- Business: It is for enterprises and large companies. The price is $449.95 monthly.
6- Ahrefs
Ahrefs is another all-rounder SEO tool suite that contains a powerful site explorer tool for backlink research, rank tracking, competitor website analysis, and site audit features.
Features
- You can find the sources of your competitor’s backlinks and view organic search traffic forecasts for websites and individual pages.
- The keyword explorer tool provides an enormous updated library of keywords to discover depending on your competitors or business, with forecasted monthly search volumes, keyword difficulty levels, search demand trends, etc.
- The rank tracking tool is intuitive to use for monitoring search terms and comparing keyword rankings with competing sites over time.
- The content explorer tool helps marketers assess the highly-performing blogs in their industry to identify low-competition topics and link-building opportunities.
Pricing
Ahrefs’ free version includes the site explorer tool, while the paid versions allow exploring competitors’ sites. It offers a week’s free trial for $7.
It offers four monthly or yearly subscription models and two months free with yearly billing.
- Lite: It is for new freelancers and digital marketers. The price is $99 monthly.
- Standard: It is for small marketing teams and businesses. The price is $179 monthly
- Advanced: It is for growing marketing teams and businesses. The price is $399 monthly.
- Agency: It is for large enterprises and companies. The price is $99 monthly.
7- Surfer SEO
It is one of the ideal SEO software that helps you analyze backlinks, conduct keyword research for particular niches, track competitor’s ranking, and more.
Your small business can boost its site’s organic ranking, improve search traffic and drive more visitors to the site using SEO Surfer.
It is a relatively new tool that has gained traction in recent years and offers one of the most remarkable SEO experiences.
Also check out: 9 Surfer SEO Alternatives you should try out in 2023
Features
- Surfer SEO reverse-engineers Google’s search results for relevant keywords, queries, length of content, headings, pictures, and more that sites use when a user submits a search term.
- It offers a page score as per the suggestions in the user’s content.
- Depending on your target keyword, its content planner utilizes several layers of information to display the most relevant content suggestions and relevant keywords to help produce an ordered group of content for your site that matches your industry and what searchers are looking for.
- You can recognize fresh search phrases opportunities and get search volume forecasts for every month.
- Businesses can copy-paste content smoothly between the Surfer content editor, WordPress, and Google Docs for a seamless editing experience.
- The super relevant landing pages and blogs you can produce depending on Surfer SEO’s NLP technology and ideas supercharge your growth in regards to optimizing your content for users and search engines.
Pricing
It provides three fixed monthly or yearly plans, with a one-week money-back guarantee, and lets you save about 17% with yearly billing:
- Basic: It gives 20 content audits and 10 content editors monthly. The price is $59 monthly.
- Pro: It gives 60 audits and 30 content editors improved with natural language processing. The price is $119 monthly.
- Business: It gives 140 audits, 70 content editors, NLP, API access, and white labelling. The price is $239 monthly.
Bottom Line
The SEO tools mentioned in this article have dynamic features and functionalities and are ideal for small companies, and entrepreneurs. The right SEO tool for your business depends on your unique requirements, goals, and budget.
Before you subscribe to a paid plan of an SEO tool, it’s crucial to weigh all its positives and negatives as per your business demands for the long term.
Your small business can earn the top spots in search engine results pages, drive quality traffic and boost conversions with a proper SEO strategy implemented using the right software. Here is to your SEO success!
FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)
1- What is the most famous SEO tool?
No one SEO tool can be titled the most famous. However, here is a list of some of the most commonly used tools by marketers:
- ClearScope
- Google Analytics
- Google Search Console
- SE Ranking
- Moz
- WooRank
- Ahrefs
- Semrush
2- What is the Google tool that people use for SEO?
Search Console is a Google tool that aids website owners, developers, and digital marketers figure out the performance of their sites on Google Search.
3- What is the best free SEO tool to drive traffic to a website?
Here are some free SEO tools to attract more traffic to your website:
- Bing Webmaster Tools
- MozBar SEO toolbar
- Answer The Public
- SEO Review Tools
- WordStream by Local IQ Free Keyword Research Tool
4- What are some of the most popular SEO techniques?
Here are some of the most popular SEO techniques:
- Analyze competitors
- Prioritizing low-difficulty keyword ideas
- Fill content gaps
- Update old content
- Establish a strong backlink profile
- Create content hubs
- Fix broken links
- Optimize internal links