What are the Best SEO Platforms?

Choosing the right SEO platform can be difficult with so many options, packages and features. It can also be confusing and full of jargon: Algorithms, URLs, on-page SEO; how does it all fit into the theme? Whether you are upgrading from an existing SEO tool or looking for your first SEO platform, there is a lot to consider.

Not only are there hundreds of tools that could help you scale your SEO and appear higher up the SERP in search engines like Google, Bing and others, but they each offer different features. From all-inclusive platforms to more specific software that focuses on certain aspects of SEO, there are many options on the market that can help you improve your SEO strategy.

If choosing an SEO platform is a bit dizzying, you've come to the right place.

We believe that an informed buyer is the best type of client.

That's why we are here to give you an overview of the best SEO platforms available so that you can make the best decision based on the needs of your business and your team. But first it is important to note that there is a difference between SEO platforms and SEO tools. In this article we will discuss both types of SEO software.

First, what is an SEO platform?

An enterprise SEO platform allows you to research, develop, implement, manage and measure every aspect of your search visibility. It is used to discover new topics, to manage the brainstorming and production of content, and to implement search engine optimization or SEO as part of a larger digital marketing strategy - all while continuously monitoring the results.

And that's just the beginning.

To align your entire digital marketing team, an SEO platform brings all your data together to deliver a single source of truth. Instead of working with information scattered across many tools and systems, SEO teams base their decisions on the complete data picture. In essence, SEO platforms are capable of empowering large brands and agencies to perform any task within the SEO lifecycle.

The analysis and research is provided in real time, so there is no need to add updates to a spreadsheet or access and re-gather data from another source. An all-in-one platform scales your SEO results so you can achieve consistent and repeatable SEO growth.

Let's start by telling you what the following three SEO platforms offer, with a brief description of each one.

The value of an SEO platform

What's important with the software I'm about to introduce is that you have a team that can use it. We recommend that you focus on evaluating an all-in-one platform if at least two of the three points apply:

• You plan to hire or have at least one dedicated SEO team member
• You have content marketers who support the optimization and writing of content for your website
• Your need to scale your SEO efforts and centralize your processes and data to drive SEO growth

Due to the breadth and depth of data and capabilities, this type of technology is very expensive. So to get the most out of your investment, you need enough support to make the most of the insights. (For less expensive technology, consider a niche SEO tool).

But once that is in place, the value you get is unsurpassed. If you have the right talents, your new SEO platform will support them:

BrightEdge

BrightEdge helps clients create powerful content marketing strategies, build high-performance websites, and determine SEO results and associated ROI and competitive performance.

This SEO software provides users with research, rankings, and recommendations to help you:

• Identify what customers are looking for on the Internet
• Develop an effective content strategy that appeals to the right customers, guides them through the sales funnel
• Keeps them in touch with your brand
• Strengthen your social media campaigns
• Be visible during local searches
• Put mobile customers at the center of your SEO
  

Conductor

Conductor believes that SEO is as simple as connecting customers looking for information with your company's expertise.

They do this by offering "off-platform" services that - similar to BrightEdge - uncover new customer insights, create powerful marketing content and track SEO performance. By performing advanced SEO tasks such as tracking rankings, the platform generates insights that feed into strategic digital services such as content optimization and performance measurement.

And of course, its overall goal is to maximize the return on your search engine optimization and content marketing investments. If you want to know more, take a look at their app, which provides an instant snapshot of your customers' world.

SearchMetric

Do you want to be able to easily identify global and local search opportunities, support decision making, and link SEO to marketing strategy - all with a clear reference to revenue?

SearchMetrics offers this through:

• Analyzing the rankings and traffic of mobile search engines to optimize search across mobile devices
• Access to millions of data points in 30 countries
• Enables drill-down analysis of data for hundreds of cities in 14 countries
• Optimization of website performance with backlink analysis
• Optimal website architecture to make your website attractive for search engines
• Evaluation of the effectiveness of paid search campaigns and comparison with organic search results
• Identification of opportunities through keyword analysis and completion of websites and content
  

seoClarity

seoClarity (that's us!) offers our clients a single source of truth that enables them to simplify, structure and scale their SEO within their organization. Our platform seamlessly combines everything: content optimization, rank tracking, analysis, crawler capabilities and more.

We try to make SEO as easy as possible so that you can move from planning and preparation to strategy execution. Your customers are out there - optimize your content to get the search visibility they deserve.

Our powerful platform allows you to scale your SEO to deliver consistent results. That's why almost all of our package options come with a dedicated Client Success Manager to help you when you need it. And if you need help developing your data-driven strategies, our Professional Services team is ready to help you accelerate your SEO efforts.

If we had to sum up these Enterprise SEO platforms, we'd say that they are:

• Provide comprehensive functionality
• Have the ability to provide insight
• Create actionable roadmaps

Here is a popular resource from Search Engine Land, whose annual report on SEO tools for companies, which goes deeper into these and other platforms to give you an even broader insight into the SEO tech industry.

Niche SEO tools for specific tasks

If you don't have an SEO team to use the platform, or if the cost of an SEO platform doesn't fit into your budget, what is the interim solution that could be suitable to improve your SEO traffic and conversions?

Unlike SEO platforms, these are more specific or specialized SEO tools, such as keyword research, keyword ranking tracking, backlink analysis tools to inform your link building strategy, etc. They start from as little as $99 per month and could be useful for your business if you don't have an SEO budget or a team that acts on the findings of an SEO roadmap.

Does that sound like you? Then take a look at one of the following brands:

SEMrush - covers many different functions within digital marketing from search to social media. It works well for experienced digital marketers who can turn data into insights for themselves.
Ahrefs - best known for their ability to analyze backlinks, they have also added a number of other features to their platform, including ranking data, keyword research and competitiveness.
Moz/GetStat - this latest merger provides a tool that combines GetStat's daily localized rankings and SERP analysis with Moz's local SEO expertise and its keyword and link research tools.
Authority Labs - has a more limited list of features than some other niche SEO tools, and the price of the plans is based on the number of keywords per month. This could be suitable for smaller companies or those with limited SEO needs. If you want to include more keywords in your plan, you can scale up to over 5,000 keywords for $450 per month.
Screaming Frog - an SEO website crawling and auditing tool that can be combined with custom filters to provide additional insights
DeepCrawl - a little more expensive than some of its competitors, DeepCrawl goes further into your website and provides recommendations that help you prioritize your technical SEO website problems.

These tools all have a lower starting price than the all-inclusive platforms, but the Trade-off is that you may need multiple tools and more time and effort to provide a single view of the data you need.

What about free SEO tools?

If you don't have the budget to invest in SEO technology, you can opt for free SEO tools such as the Google Search Console, Google Analytics and the Keyword Planner.

These options are well suited for specific tasks such as developing keyword ideas, checking search volume, understanding organic search traffic, and monitoring your site's indexing. However, there are some limitations to these options, including They base their data only on Google search queries, you may not always be able to find keywords with low competition, and there may be gaps in the data that make it difficult to know what information you can trust.

You also need to spend time downloading and combining data to create a single, meaningful report. This approach is probably best suited for your business if you only do occasional SEO research or simply want to understand your overall visibility but don't have the resources to execute an SEO roadmap.

There are also many other free tools out there. Many free ranking tools that provide you with ranking data, but only as a one-time check of your ranking, or you can use the incognito window in Chrome to do a search to find out where you might rank. There are also keyword research tools that provide a few free queries per day, and even SEO audit tools that allow you to "try out" their technology with a free one-time site audit.

Next Steps

Whether you want to start with a rank tracking tool as a first step or you are ready to dive into the data, gain valuable insights and act according to a roadmap, there is an SEO platform for you.

Remember, if you are ready to scale your SEO with a comprehensive all-in-one platform, use our evaluation template to compare and contrast the different SEO tools so you can make an informed decision.

We have also outlined some important differences between us and other leading SEO software companies:

• Compare seoClarity with BrightEdge
• Compare seoClarity with Conductor