8 Best Online SEO Tools to Skyrocket Your Rankings in 2024

We often speak about being unique but when it comes to SEO, every business and brand has one goal – to be on the 1st page of search results.

Is it too much to have such goals? No!

Is it a realistic goal? Of course!

Can businesses and brands achieve it within months or less? No!

That one thing with SEO is that people assume they can do it just like that, but the truth is the opposite. Even if you have a list of online SEO tools you still need a lot of time, patience, and hard work to boost your rankings.

But it’s still doable if you get the basics on track, which is why we’re curating this blog with a list of must-have SEO optimization tools online. Get your coffee or tea and let’s get started!

Ahrefs

Anyone who’s looking for online SEO tools shouldn’t miss Ahrefs. It’s one of the popular tools that businesses and brands use religiously. A one-stop web crawler that will help you improve the SEO of your business or brand.

The best part is that you don’t need to look for online SEO audit tools separately as Ahrefs special feature is site auditing. You can find the areas of your site that require improvement. It helps you conduct competitor analysis, and identify quality backlinks, and prospects for link-building.

This is ideal for digital marketers, business owners, and those who have personal brands. By using Ahrefs, you can look for broken links, void links, and other factors that slow down your entire procedure. The in-depth reports from this tool will help you get a better understanding of replicated and underperforming content. Knowing them will help you make informed decisions to enhance the quality of your site, which will also increase traffic, leading to better rankings.

If you’re not yet sure whether you want to try Ahrefs, you can check out the Ahrefs free option to explore webmaster tools.

Pricing:

• Lite (starts at $99 per month)
• Standard (starts at $199 per month)
• Advanced (starts at $399 per month)
• Enterprise (starts at $999 per month)

Semrush

Semrush is a software-as-a-Serivce (Saas) platform and is primarily used for keyword research. It offers quite a lot of features, including an on-page SEO checker, SERP analysis, rank tracker, site audit, reports with plots and graphs, and much more. However, you can’t get complete use of it if you opt for the FREE version yet their free version is pretty amazing. If you want to put the free version to full use, make sure to plan how you’re going to utilize the credits they provide for you.

The interesting thing about Semrush is that you can sort keywords by search volume, difficulty, and competitiveness. If you’re running a marketing campaign, you have the option to check pay-per-click value putting your budget to full use.

This is one of the most versatile SEO tools that any business or brand can ask for!

Pricing:

• Pro ($129.95 per month)
• Guru ($249.95 per month)
• Business ($499.95 per month)

Google Search Console

If not for Google, what else is qualified enough to tell you about your site ranking? Google Search Console, formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools is another popular SEO tool. You can use it to analyze your site’s indexing while also optimizing the pages. It’s easy to check whether there are server errors, site loading issues, or security problems through Google Search Console.

This has a good visual user interface. Above all, it’s completely free so if you’re looking for free online SEO tools, this is a good option.

The coolest thing about Search Console is that you can use Google Analytics alongside this because they are compatible. Using Google Analytics you can get information about your site’s traffic and then use it on Search Console to refine the data even more.

Pricing: Free

Moz Pro

Life doesn’t get easy for anybody, but for content creators and SEO managers, it’s hard – thanks to constantly challenging algorithms. But the good news is Moz Pro is a step ahead in terms of Google Algorithm. It makes sure to study the best ways to optimize SEO and so by using Moz Pro you too can think ahead of your competitors.

This tool offers features, such as keyword suggestions, site crawls, competitor research, domain overview, and link research. While there are many free online SEO tools for website analysis, this particular tool boasts a wide range of free tools. You can check SEO metrics, such as domain and page authority. The domain authority will provide details about ranking in SERPs.

Pricing:

• Free trial (for 30 days)
• Standard ($79 per month)
• Medium ($143 per month)
• Large ($239 per month)
• Premium ($479 per month)

AnswerThePublic

Just like the name suggests, the tool answers the public’s queries. AnswerThePublic (ATP) offers a unique service when compared to other SEO tools. It curates keywords by studying what people actually search for and ask for on public forums, social media, and blogs.

Bringing down keywords to their realest form is the best thing about this tool. When compared with other regular keyword research tools, you’ll likely see that it’s a bit distanced from real users’ search intents. But when it comes to AnswerThePublic, it straightaway handles users’ intent.

ATP’s SEO report will provide enough data and insights for you to make informed decisions regarding user intent which can be utilized for your business or brand. Once you enter a search query on this tool, you’ll get an overview of cost-per-click and volume of keywords. Along with that, it will also provide a visual breakdown of transactional intent and volume potential.

You’ll discover a lot of features in this tool and they all come at a reasonable rate. If you need raw data to create content, this is the best tool to rely on.

Pricing:

• Individual ($9 per month or $99 lifetime)
• Pro ($99 per month)
• Expert ($199 per month)

Screaming Frog

Screaming Frog is one of the coolest online SEO audit tools for your business. You can use the analysis tools to find out the technical issues and optimize the website for better search ranking. This tool is particularly focused on back-end site audits and technical know-how.

The tool will crawl the site similar to a search engine to collect data on all the URLs. Then, it will analyze all SEO elements, such as broken links, meta tags, duplicate content, response codes, loading times, and cannibalization.

If you’re skeptical, don’t try the premium version right away rather check the free version. You will be able to crawl 500 URLs, giving you some understanding of the site.

Pricing:

• Free
• Paid ($259 per year)

Google Trends

You can add Google Trends to your list of free SEO tools online as it’s completely free and resourceful. It’s offered by Google and it allows you to analyze keywords, volume, subjects, and other phrases that are used for a certain period. Unlike every other tool, this one shows historical search volume and helps you see whether the keyword is losing traction or picking up.

This is best for journalists, researchers, marketers, or anyone who’s trying to understand consumers and learn trending topics. The distinct feature of Google Trends is that it offers a macro-level view to get a better understanding of search history globally. Google Trend isn’t about site performance, rather it’s about offering a broader understanding of what people are interested in.

You can utilize the data derived from Google Trends to run marketing campaigns and product launches because the data will help you know the end customer.

Pricing:

• Free

Clearscope

Clearscope is ideal for your content marketing team as they can use it to analyze top-ranking content to see trending keywords. While other tools focus on the wider picture of SEO, including technical audits and backlining, this tool deals with making your content better.

You will be able to produce keyword-optimized content to rank your site higher. When looking for free online SEO tools for website analysis, this is one of the tools, you shouldn’t miss. It utilizes an advanced language processing system to find top-performing content in your industry. This will help you get a comprehensive idea about the content you should produce.

The tool grades your content based on optimization. After analyzing, it offers suggestions, such as better keyword usage, readability, and relevancy. Clearscope works amazingly well on Google Docs. You can also integrate it into your content management system (CMS) to streamline your workflow.

Pricing:

• Essentials ($199 per month)
• Business ($599 per month)
• Enterprise (Custom pricing)

A Checklist To Select The Right Tool For SEO Optimization

As you already have a list of SEO optimization tools online it’s time to focus on a checklist that’ll make your decision easier. It’s reasonable to be in decision paralysis when you’ve got plenty of options, but not if you have the following checklist.

Honestly, SEO tools aren’t affordable for everyone. Some really good tools are out of reach for many small businesses, putting them in a difficult situation. But if you are ready to spend a considerable amount of time researching and playing around with free versions of these expensive tools, you will be able to stick to one or two online SEO tools. Your entire team and creatives will be able to rely on the same tool without needing to spend more money on other tools.

But how do you make the decision? Which tool best fits your business or brand? We can’t give one-size-fits-all answers, so here is the checklist to ease your decision-paralysis situation:

• Pricing – Every business has a marketing budget, you should have too. Compare your budget with the tool’s price and see whether you can afford it. But that’s not enough, even if you can afford it you should see whether the tool has value for your money. We suggest using the free versions to see whether the tool aligns with your business goals.

• Features – Some businesses need keyword research, competitor analysis, and site audits, while others need site audits as well. In this case, some tools provide all of these services by charging a huge amount. On the other hand, some tools provide only a few of these features with a cost-effective option. For example, there are online SEO audit tools that are specifically catered to that. So by analyzing your needs with the tool’s features and costs, you can select the tools that meet the middle ground.

• Usability – This is one of the important points you should keep in mind if you’re looking for SEO tools for your team. The tool should help your team save time, not consume it. This is why it’s vital to select a tool with a user-friendly interface so that they don’t have to spend time learning to navigate it. Some online SEO tools have training materials to make things easy for your team.

• Seamless Integration – You might already be using several tools and platforms, so when you’re selecting an SEO tool, check whether it can be integrated easily. For example, if you have analytics software or content management systems, your new SEO tool should have the capacity to fit into the rest without making the entire process a hassle. The goal is to streamline the workflow and enhance the final output, so the tool should serve its purpose.

• Reliability – Don’t onboard a tool without doing your research, meaning, make sure to read reviews and see whether it does what it boasts about. If you don’t have accurate data, you will not be able to rank high using the sourced data. SEO strategies must be implemented with precision.

• Adaptability – It should have the means to handle more workload as your business grows. When your website grows, it should have the capacity to crawl pages better and faster to get more refined data to rank higher.

Conclusion

Practically speaking, it’s not possible to bring down online SEO tools to just one “best” tool because there are plenty of SEO software. As a business owner or marketer, your part is to sit down and draw up a list as we have explained above.

However, remember, you can’t achieve overnight results for SEO, yes, even if you use these tools. Why? It’s because SEO is a long-term game and you should adapt as the algorithm changes. You will see ups and downs during this procedure but what matters is having a trusted SEO agency on your side. If you feel like LEAD could be that agency, feel free to contact us.