What’s in Your SEO Toolkit?

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What's in Your SEO Tool Kit?

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Table of Contents

What’s in Your SEO Toolkit?

To help you optimize your SEO strategy and create an SEO toolkit, we’ve gathered insights from 13 marketing professionals, ranging from founders to digital marketing specialists. Discover their go-to tools, from Google Data Studio Dashboards to Keyword Research Tools, and learn how these experts enhance their SEO efforts.

  • Google Data Studio Dashboards
  • Screaming Frog for SEO
  • Chrome Extension for Keywords
  • Google Search Console Mastery
  • Cost-Effective UberSuggest
  • Ahrefs’ Organic Traffic Report
  • Cluster Keywords Tool
  • Supermetrics for Data Analysis
  • Grammarly for SEO Writing
  • Quality Writing as a Tool
  • Podcast SEO Benefits
  • MozCast for Algorithm Updates
  • Keyword Research Tools

Google Data Studio Dashboards

One of the most essential tools in our SEO toolkit is the use of dashboards using Google Data Studio to track our progress.

This is extremely helpful for seeing trends related to how website visitors use and engage with content, which ‌allows us to know where to focus our efforts and make adjustments as needed.

With a comprehensive dashboard set up, we can continually monitor SEO performance and use this information to make informed decisions on actions that need to be taken to improve success. Dashboards are an invaluable asset for improving SEO results.

Natalia BrzezinskaNatalia Brzezinska
Marketing and Outreach Manager, ePassportPhoto


Screaming Frog for SEO

Screaming Frog is a key tool in our SEO process. It delivers clear and up-to-date information on issues, allowing us to monitor, prioritize, and solve issues in a timely manner.

We have a global team, so it’s useful to extract the data we need straight into collaborative sheets online so we can all work together efficiently and effectively.

Andy WayAndy Way
Head of Digital, Worldwide, PartyLite


Chrome Extension for Keywords

This Chrome extension has transformed how I research keywords and sites for my backlinking strategy. Once added to your Chrome, the site will identify the top keywords people are searching in relation to a particular term when you search for something on Google.

Open up sites like YouTube, and it will also show you the top keywords in a video alongside other information, such as keyword difficulty and how well a video is optimized.

Liam LiuLiam Liu
Co-founder and CMO, ParcelPanel


Google Search Console Mastery

If I had to choose just one tool in my SEO toolkit, it would be Google Search Console.

GSC is an often overlooked SEO tool. It’s very easy to jump into the likes of SEMrush and Ahrefs, and use those as your go-to (I use both a lot). However, GSC offers a few unique features that make it a vital tool. The notable aspects include:

  1. Crawling and Indexing Data: This is where SEO begins. It’s paramount for SEOs to get a handle on this data. Diagnose the issues and optimize for success. Handling this alone can bring SEO wins.
  2. Organic Query Data: Clicks, impressions, CTR, and average rank are all things GSC tracks at a keyword and URL level. This is data straight from the horse’s mouth. Use it to optimize your content and find opportunities.
  3. GSC offers some unique technical tools too, such as robots.txt tester, mobile usability, and schema enhancements. These are all important for SEO too.

Search Console is a must-use for SEOs, and I advise any SEO to get good with it.

Ben PoultonBen Poulton
SEO Consultant and Founder, Intellar


Cost-Effective UberSuggest

UberSuggest is one of the most cost-effective tools for keyword research and backlink tracking. It’s intuitive to use and allows me to see my ranked keywords, the number of new and lost backlinks, and other data at a glance. I can connect my Google Analytics to UberSuggest to track website traffic and see which pages are getting the most hits.

I also use this tool for my writing clients. I can do keyword research in seconds and see search volume, difficulty, and other data for keywords. The tool will also recommend similar keywords so I can help my clients rank for the best-fit terms.

UberSuggest will also give me recommendations to improve my on-page SEO. I can see exactly what’s wrong with my website (or a client’s website) and make the changes. It’s an invaluable tool that I highly recommend for businesses on a budget.

Alli HillAlli Hill
Founder and Director, Fleurish Freelance


Ahrefs’ Organic Traffic Report

Knowing your competitor’s organic traffic and where they rank will help you understand the market and where you stand to compete. Therefore, I always use the organic traffic report in Ahrefs. This report helps you understand your competitor’s traffic, keywords they are ranking for, backlinks they have, traffic from search engines, and so on.

Matthew RamirezMatthew Ramirez
Founder, USMLE Test Prep


Cluster Keywords Tool

I really like Cluster Keywords (clusterkeywords.com) for creating topic clusters. It’s free, which is nice, but it’s also a really solid tool. And it isn’t like many “free” SEO tools that limit your usage.

If you want to incorporate topical authority into your SEO strategy (which you should), this tool gets the job done.

A few features I really like…

  • It lets you either upload your own list of keywords, then it will group them into clusters; Or, you can feed it one seed keyword and it will do its own keyword research in the background, and spit out a ton of related keywords, all clustered for you, of course.
  • It not only groups your keywords into clusters, but it also includes search volume for each cluster, and a difficulty score (how difficult it may be to rank).
  • It outputs your keyword clusters on-screen and gives you the option to download them to a spreadsheet, which has even more search volume and difficulty score data.

Ryan BeMillerRyan Bemiller
Founder, Shopping Signals


Supermetrics for Data Analysis

As an SEO expert, one tool in my kit is Supermetrics. Supermetrics is a powerful data integration tool that allows me to pull data from various sources, such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console, into one place.

This saves me time and allows me to analyze the data more efficiently. With Supermetrics, I can easily analyze keyword performance, identify trends and opportunities, and create reports to share with clients or team members.

Overall, Supermetrics is a valuable tool for any SEO professional looking to streamline their data analysis process.

Ben LauBen Lau
Founder, Featured SEO Company


Grammarly for SEO Writing

Grammarly. Having a tool looking over your shoulder as you write makes it easy to write with speed, and trust that the typing errors will be caught prior to being uploaded to the web. Paid versions aid in understanding the tone of your writing and can help with grammatical errors that might be missed on a cursory re-read.

David HigginsDavid Higgins
SEO Analyst and Content Writer, Gardner White Furniture


Quality Writing as a Tool

Quality and unique writing is the first tool I pull out of my SEO toolkit every time. Writing has always proved to be a valuable asset in marketing, and SEO has always thrived through the use of quality, unique writing.

I love working with talented writers because it is a benefit to your campaign in several ways, including:

  • The chance to gain more links. Other domains are looking for quality pieces to link to, and a well-written article has a better chance of acquiring those links.
  • Google recognizes unique, well-written content.
  • Quality writers better understand SEO and can optimize certain things like meta descriptions, sub-headers, and more.
  • Experienced writers can often be more creative in their content creation and will have fresh ideas to use.

For these reasons, I always prioritize finding the best writer I can for SEO campaigns, and it’s the first thing you’ll find in my SEO toolkit.

Joe Davies, Co-founder, FATJOE

Podcast SEO Benefits

My podcast, Talk Copy to Me, is one of the best SEO assets. Not only am I able to provide backlinks for my guests when I write each episode’s show notes (which makes me your friendly internet neighbor!), but I optimize every single episode’s podcast title and description so I can get the benefit of off-site SEO as well.

Podcast players, like Apple and Spotify, are search tools, even though we might not immediately think of them in that way. When podcast listeners want to learn about something specific, they’ll use the search function of their podcast player to find a new show or episode that covers that very topic. If you’ve done your SEO research, chosen a quality long-tail keyword, and optimized the title and description with that phrase, your show is going to be the one they find. I’m still surprised to learn that so many podcast hosts aren’t investing in SEO because it serves so many purposes—even more than the two I mentioned here.

Erin OllilaErin Ollila
SEO Copywriter and Host of the Talk Copy to Me Podcast, Erin Ollila | Talk Copy to Me


MozCast for Algorithm Updates

Keeping up with the constant changes within Google’s algorithms can be overwhelming and impossible since the company doesn’t announce each change. Besides reporting algorithm updates, MozCast also provides insights into Google’s potential changes.

As part of being prepared, your company should be informed, and MozCast is the ultimate solution.

Marco Genaro PalmaMarco Genaro Palma
Co-founder, TechNews180


Keyword Research Tools

One essential thing in an SEO toolkit is a keyword research tool, which allows website owners and SEO professionals to discover the search terms and phrases that their target audience is using to find relevant content. This tool helps to identify high-traffic keywords, analyze keyword difficulty, and uncover new keyword opportunities.

By using a keyword research tool, website owners can optimize their content to target the most relevant and high-traffic keywords, improving their search engine visibility and driving more organic traffic to their websites.

Kristi WellsKristi Wells
Digital Marketing Specialist, Ferguson Computers


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