Top SEO tools you use?

[owenprescott]

First of all I am a new member so hello. Second, I am curious what general SEO tools members use and find most useful? Perhaps you could provied a top 5, 10 or 15? I would appreciate some lists, also if possible a side note giving an indication of whether the tool if free to use or not would be helpful. If anyone points out a must have SEO tool that costs I would consider it. I am relatively new to SEO but here is a list of general tools that I have been using on my new site.

1. Google Analytics (free)
2. Google Webmaster (free)
3. Addthis (free)
4. Tynt (free)
5. Keyword Density Analyzer Tool (free)

Most of those are more general tools which is why I am after recommendations.

[Test-ok]

Look to your right and try some of those, tools really only help if you learn SEO techniques and apply it to the tool, I don't like using tools that claim to 'do it for you' then your relying on what they know and paying a subscription of some sort to continue believing in their techniques. Most of the other tools just gather data which you need to interpret, ranking, back links, web ranking compared to your competitors, etc.

Being relative new to SEO, I'd suggest you first learn about the industry/techniques and see what tools help with-in that realm.
And I'd be weary of free tools, they really aren't free, why would anyone create a free tool that's worth anything to you (the person downloading or adding code to one's site) Why? because their getting something out of it, so be careful of the free tools. Nothings free.
Disclaimer:
The above is just my opinion.

[tstolber]

I am a big fan of SEO Moz Pro ($99 / month for 5 sites), it gets a lot of stick from some members which I don't understand. For me its a reporting and productivity tool. There is also Raven and Majestic which are good tools.
There is a lot of stuff you can do with Google & Google Docs, creating templates and analysis systems that help to increase productivity.

I loathe automated submission stuff and do it all for you at the click of a button stuff, but I am a big fan of tools for productivity.

[owenprescott]

Look to your right and try some of those, tool really only help if you learn SEO techniques and apply it to the tool, I don't like using tools that claim to 'do it for you' then your relying on what they know and paying a subscription of some sort to continue believing in their techniques. Most of the other tools just gather data which you need to interpret, ranking, back links, web ranking compared to your competitors, etc.

Being relative new to SEO, I'd suggest you first learn about the industry/techniques and see what tools help with-in that realm.
And I'd be weary of free tools, they really aren't free, why would anyone create a free tool that's worth anything to you (the person downloading or adding code to one's site) Why? because their getting something out of it, so be careful of the free tools. Nothings free.
Disclaimer:
The above is just my opinion.

Thanks for the comments, when I say tools I am more interested in finding useful keywords. MY site is around 70% image based, some pages with around 70 individual images which are all fairly different but grouped together. They index ok in Google images though I would find it useful to have a tool that suggests keywords so that I can spend less time editing images. Each image has a p, alt, title and h3 tag linked to it which means lots of hard work finding relevant keywords for the image.

As for SEOMoz, I read the articles but that price is far to much for me. As a student with one website which is not geared towards sales I assume that package is not aimed at new guys.

[KernelPanic]

google analytics, WMT and backlinkwatch. That's it. The rest are ripoffs IMO.

[raven907]

Set I use:
1. Google Analytics
2. Alexa
3. Colibritool

[NewDelhiSEO]

I am surprised no one mentioned - PageSpeed, Yslow
Dont you want to see if the sites loads fine? Don't you want to see if you can minimize resource utilization on the website?

then I use Rank Tracker, SiteMap builders (if I don't have my automatic SiteMap builder loaded on the website)

[seohuntanalytic]

1) Google analytics
2) Google webmaster tools
3) ahrefs
4) SEMrush

From time to time test some others, don't remember exactly their names.

[Chedders]

Well as I got P***ed off with a lot of sites wanting to charge a fortune for simple reporting and on a ongoing basis monthly so I decided to write my own.
Its something I put together over Christmas and its very much still in beta testing so might be a bit buggy.

If you wanted to try it, its free and can be found at SERPS Donkey - SEO suite of tools.
Don't expect too much from it yet but I plan to make it a lot more powerful as time permits.

If you decide to try it I would be interested if it works or does not work for you.

Many thanks to joshz for being the first beta tester and offering his help and advise on the software

[emizrglobal]

Yea, it is true, SEOmoz is really very important to get updated seo practices. but only the experts can get the 100% benefits of those higher discussion.

[jbhappy15]

Hi, Im still new in the forum.. so I would like to say hello to everyone... I've been doing internet marketing before then i stopped, and after a few years I decided to go back since I am broke at the moment. It was so easy back then to earn at least $100/month, but these days since the updated SEO stuff by google(that I just see from books back those days),earning just a single dollar makes it hard for me to cope up with.. So I am trying to learn more with these new trends..



For me for free keyword analyzer google analytics is the best... and for paid one they say Market Samurai is the best.. any insights about these guys?

Cheers,
Jay

[Arnab R]

I am surprised no one mentioned - PageSpeed, Yslow
Dont you want to see if the sites loads fine? Don't you want to see if you can minimize resource utilization on the website?

then I use Rank Tracker, SiteMap builders (if I don't have my automatic SiteMap builder loaded on the website)

Does RankTracker is to Just know where a Particular Page ranks only, or it helps to optimize the PR also ??

[owenprescott]

Thanks everyone for adding to the list, I am currently checking the free tools out though I am focusing more on improving my site. I actually just unearthed a free SEO toolkit that I downloaded ages ago but never really used. It is a Microsoft extension called "Search Engine Optimization Toolkit" so Google it as I am unsure if I can link to it, it is very useful and after analyzing my site it has is picked up over 900 errors .

As I am new I cannot post a thread in the help section, I have found out that mught site contains "multiple canonical formats". Some (http://www.owen) and others (http://owen). Does anyone have an idea how I sort this out, I have made sure all links point to the (http://www.owen). The error is causing warnings even for the images which means hundreds of canonical links.

[NewDelhiSEO]

Arnab,
RankTracker only gives you the SERP ranks for a list of keywords on your preferred search engine(s).
BTW, I am alien to the concept of optimizing PR. Can you explain that to me please?

[Arnab R]

Arnab,
RankTracker only gives you the SERP ranks for a list of keywords on your preferred search engine(s).
BTW, I am alien to the concept of optimizing PR. Can you explain that to me please?

With PR I meant to say Page Rank and related Optimization..not to be confused with Public Relations Online !!! And are You alien about Page rank Optimization..I mean is that what You meant ??