The Best SEO Analysis Tools For Ecommerce

11 min read

There are so many SEO tools on the market that it can be easy for a business owner to become overwhelmed by all of the options. Once you have found the tools you need at a price you can afford, then you can focus on implementing your SEO strategy.

To simplify things, it helps to sort the available tools into various categories. Some tools help with keyword and competition research, others are used for metrics and analytics, and some tools are used to run audits and reports. This guide will examine the best tools in each of these categories.

SEO Research Tools

SEO research tools tend to be expensive, but the subscriptions fees are money well spent. A proper SEO strategy will make or break your online business. This is not an area where you should be pinching pennies in your operating budget. However, some of the top line tools are simply overkill for small businesses. If this is the case for you, you might want to consider some of the second tier offerings in this category.

SEMRush, Ahrefs, and Moz Pro are considered the major players in the SEO research field. Each of these long-standing companies offers a full suite of keyword and competition research tools, with monthly subscriptions starting in the range of $100 per month. Though each platform does offer a very limited free membership, none of the free memberships are robust enough to power a complete SEO campaign.

Ahrefs

This all-in-one suite offers a Site Explorer dashboard that tracks all of the relevant SEO data for your website. This saves you the time that you would otherwise spend digging through multiple reports or creating your own visual dashboard.

Ahrefs has the largest and most accurate backlinks database of the available tools. Their Link Explorer tool is one of their original products and is still the best on the market for exploring backlink profiles and opportunities. This company’s keyword research and competitive analysis tools are also best in class and have the most accurate data.

This is generally the best all-in-one SEO tool for most businesses. You should only use a different tool if you are running a local business, if you cannot afford this tool, or if you need a strong API for custom programming.

Moz Pro

Moz’s link index is not as large as Ahrefs, but it is significantly larger than the database used by SEMRush. The keyword research tools are also more robust than those offered by SEMRush. Moz is well known for its authoritative educational articles about SEO. They literally wrote the book on this topic.

Moz - Moz Pro Overview

If you run a local business, it makes sense to use Moz Pro and Moz Local together. Moz Pro also offers a robust API for developers.

Moz Local

Moz Local is a separate product from Moz Pro, starting at $15 per month. Moz Local is the only professional grade tool available for local SEO management. There are some second tier local SEO tools on the market, but they cannot compare to Moz Local in terms of reputation, features, and pricing. Every local business should sign up for Moz Local.

SEMRush

Semrush is an all-in-one tool suite for improving online visibility and discovering marketing insights.

Semrush - Online Marketing Can Be Easy

Their tools and reports are able to help marketers that work in the following services: SEO, PPC, SMM, Keyword Research, Competitive Research, PR, Content Marketing, Marketing Insights, Campaign Management.

An In-Depth Comparison

WP Beginner has published an in-depth comparison of the three major SEO software suites. The article is titled, “Semrush vs Ahrefs vs Moz — Which One is Better? (Pros and Cons)”. If you need a detailed breakdown of each platform’s features and costs, this is the perfect article for you.

Honorable Mentions

SpyFu

SpyFu started out as a competition research tool, but it has slowly evolved into a full scale online marketing research platform. This company now provides keyword research and tracking, backlink building, SERP analysis, and PPC analysis tools. You can create multiple projects and run beautiful reports. Their pricing is half of the major competitors, and they have an even lower pricing special running at the moment. You can currently lock in a $9 monthly rate for SpyFu’s most basic tier of service.

Ubersuggest

If you’re on a budget, this tool might be all you need. It provides all the tools in the other suites, but the data is not as accurate and the features don’t have as many configuration options. They have great user education and support, and the tool provides all the information you need to seriously improve the SEO of most small business websites.

Ubersuggest is currently offering a lifetime membership for $120. If you sign up for the free trial and cancel, you will be offered even lower rates for lifetime memberships. I have been offered lifetime membership rates as low as $49. If you just can’t afford a monthly SEO tool, you can pay for Ubersuggest once and use it forever. That’s a good deal for a business on a shoestring start-up budget.

SEO Analytics Tools

Once you have your SEO research done and you’ve optimized your site, you need to track your analytics. This will show you the results of all your hard work, and guide you towards improvements that you can make in your online marketing strategy. Both of the major tools in this category are free utilities provided by Google. While there are a few paid alternatives on the market, there really isn’t any point in using them.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics tracks everything about your website’s traffic. You insert a small snippet of code into your website, and Google begins collecting data. You can log into Google to view pre-made reports, or you can create your own custom reports. You can also import your Google Analytics data into Google Data Studio and create a visual dashboard of your metrics.

Google Analytics is currently transitioning from its old format, Universal Analytics, to a new format that is known as Google Analytics 4. Universal Analytics will no longer be supported after 2023. If you are starting a new Google Analytics account, you should start a GA4 property. If you are currently using an old Universal Analytics configuration, you should upgrade your account.

Google Analytics integrates with many other tools. Third party tools are upgrading to work with the new GA4 format. Do not be discouraged by bugs or glitches. The new analytics format is a strong improvement, and it is worth waiting out the adaptation curve.

This Google support document outlines the differences between Universal Analytics and GA4. This article is part of a larger series that details how to migrate from the old format to the new GA4 model. The new concept uses an updated set of metrics to track web performance. It is important to understand how to read and use the new reports.

Google Search Console

After you verify ownership of your site with a simple code snippet, Google Search Console will start showing you valuable data about your traffic, keywords, and competition. Google Search Console also provides tools that let you check for mobile readiness, verify schema data and meta tags, and manage your site maps. Google Search Console data can be combined with Google Analytics data to create a unified Google Data Studio dashboard.

Google Search Console provides up to 16 months of search data for your site, which can be filtered in a variety of ways. There are many pre-made reports available, and you can also create custom reports. The Search Engine Journal has written a comprehensive guide to the Google Search Console features.

SEO Audit Tools

Screaming Frog

Screaming Frog is a UK based online marketing agency that produced a tool for SEO technical analysis. Screaming Frog’s SEO Spider has long been the industry standard tool for deep SEO technical audits. The tool can provide many types of technical analysis. The free version is sufficient for most people’s needs.

The Screaming Frog website provides lots of documentation and tutorials that will help you learn the tool. This article from Seer Interactive gives instructions for over 50 common uses of the Screaming Frog SEO Spider.

Other site audit tools

All of the tools listed in the SEO Research Tools section of this article also include site auditing tools. These tools are adequate for entry level technical analysis. If you subscribe to one of these software suites you may never need more advanced auditing software.

However, the tools provided by the other software suites are all limited in scope. If you need to do serious tech analysis, Screaming Frog is the tool that you need. When you need to fix your rankings, it will be worth the learning curve involved. You can relax with the easy tools until you feel that you’ve hit a wall with your SEO progress. Then it’s time for advanced analysis.

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Mar 2, 2022

About the author

Max has been working in the ecommerce industry for the last six years helping brands to establish and level-up content marketing and SEO. Despite that, he has experience with entrepreneurship. He is a fiction writer in his free time.