This is a transcript of a talk from HubSpot at the HubSpot User Group Meeting in June 2019 in London.
Wednesday, October 30, 2019
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Monday, October 28, 2019
Instagram Marketing for Business [The Definitive Guide]
email marketing lead generation
Did you know over 500 million people use Instagram every day (Source: HubSpot)? Additionally, a whopping 75% of users take action on a post; like visiting a brand's website or making a purchase.
Instagram Marketing Tips For Charities & Non-Profits 2020
email marketing is typically performed
Ah, Instagram! The social media rock star that has captured the imagination of people of all ages, from every type of background, and, yes, celebrities' agents. But, Instagram is an excellent tool for non-profits and charities, as well, and that's what we will centre upon now. Your London-based charity or non-profit may not be taking advantage of this ubiquitous site.
Friday, October 25, 2019
The CRM is the Fastest Way for Manufacturers to Boost Revenue
email marketing software for windows 7
Low-hanging fruit.
Our approach to boosting the revenue of any client we partner with is to build strategies that appreciate in value over time. The compounding effect of our marketing tactics result in steadily increasing ROIs that grow your revenue for years to come. This long-haul approach, however, requires an upfront investment that has to be justified in the short term. This is why we love the low-hanging fruit.
Youtobe
Thursday, October 24, 2019
The Beginner’s Guide to Advertising your Business on Facebook
email marketing key to response
It's not really optional. In 2019, every business should at least consider advertising on Facebook. This is a company that reaches more than 2.4 billion monthly active users, which is more than a quarter of the world's current population. In the United Kingdom alone, 36 million active Facebook users represent a majority of all U.K. citizens.
Youtobe
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Video Marketing Increases Your Brand Engagement
Keep Potential Customers Engaged with Your Brand through Video Marketing
Did you know how significant videos are for Internet users today?
When it comes to providing valuable and engaging information online, most marketers turn to video content. The overall combination of visuals and sound makes videos more remarkable for Internet users.
Tuesday, October 22, 2019
Hi, I’m Neil Patel, Co-founder of NPDigital. Ask Me Anything!
email marketing automation tools
Today, I thought I would do something a bit different, as 66.9% of my website traffic is brand new.
For those of you who don’t know, my name is Neil Patel and I’m the co-founder of a digital marketing agency called, NPDigital, where we help companies of all sizes get more traffic and sales.
I’ve been an entrepreneur for roughly 18 years now and most of the companies I co-founded have been in the software arena, specifically the web analytics sector.
And now, I’m back at it with Ubersuggest, my latest software company.
In addition to that, I’ve angel invested in dozens of companies. Some have done well, and others haven’t.
Overall, I’ve been blessed with a few successes that have made up for my failures plus more.
So today is your day to ask me any questions you have, and I will do my best to answer it. You can ask me about entrepreneurship, marketing, or anything else. I’ve dealt with class-action lawsuits, an FTC investigation (which I passed), and I’ve lost out on acquisitions from Fortune 1000 companies because of stupidity on my part.
All I ask of you is. Please keep your question as short as possible. One to two sentences max as I will get hundreds of comments (potentially even 1,000 or more).
So, what can I answer for you?
*** You may have to scroll a bit down to see the comment section***
What is Pay Per Click Advertising? The Beginner's Guide to Google Ads
Digital marketing is complex. Without help, a single channel can take weeks and months to master in a way that builds revenue for your company. There are hundreds of possibilities, and not all of them are free.
Monday, October 21, 2019
Your 7-Step Guide To Successful HubSpot Sales Hub Deployment
email marketing effectiveness statistics
Successful CRM deployment will not unfold on its own. It requires a clear strategy, technological support, and the commitment of stakeholders and staff. Most importantly, a well-defined, customized process is necessary to make a smooth transition to a new CRM.
Thursday, October 17, 2019
Case Study: What Does an Inbound Marketing Campaign Actually Look Like?
The theoretical benefits of inbound marketing are well established. An approach based on value, built on an in-depth understanding of your audience and market needs, will naturally drive more leads and customers than a simple push of promotional messages your audience may never care about.
Tuesday, October 15, 2019
The Real Secret to My Social Media Success
The other day I was recording a podcast episode with my co-host Eric Siu and he wanted to discuss something in particular.
He wanted to talk about how I got to 62,000 Instagram followers in a very short period of time and without spending any money on ads or marketing.
Eric is a great marketer as well, and when it comes to social media, he spends much more time than me on it and he even has people at his ad agency dedicated to helping him grow his personal brand online.
And of writing this post, he has 4,056 followers.
It’s not just with Instagram either, I beat him on all platforms.
Heck, he even does something that I don’t do, which is smart… he continually pays for advice. For example, he had his team jump on an hour call with Gary Vaynerchuk’s social media team so they could learn from them and grow his brand faster.
So, what’s the secret to my success?
Well, before I get into it, let me first start off by saying I love Eric to death and the point of this post isn’t to pick on him or talk crap… more so, I have a point to make and you’ll see it in a bit below.
Is it the fundamentals?
Everyone talks about strategies to grow your social following… from going live and posting frequently or talking about the type of content you should post and what you shouldn’t do.
I could even tell you that you need to respond to every comment and build up a relationship with your followers, which will help you grow your following and brand.
And although all of this is true, I dare you to try the fundamentals or the strategies that every marketing guru talks about doing. If you do, I bet this will happen…
It will be a lot of work and, if you are lucky, in the next 30 days you may get 10% more followers.
Sure, some of you will get much more growth, but you’ll find that you can’t always replicate it and it won’t be consistent.
So, what is it then?
Is it luck?
Luck is part of some people’s success, but not most. The problem with luck is it doesn’t teach you much and it isn’t easy to replicate.
The reality is, some people will just get lucky and have tons of traction.
In other words, luck isn’t the secret. But if you do want to get “luckier”, then you can always become an early adopter which helps a bit.
How early is early?
When you jump onto a social network when it’s new, it’s easier to grow and become popular.
For example, I got to over 30,000 Twitter followers extremely fast when Twitter first came out.
At that time, I wasn’t as well known… it happened because of a few reasons:
- Social algorithms are favorable early on – algorithms are typically favorable and most people will see your content. There aren’t many restrictions, hence it’s easier to grow. After a social network becomes popular, algorithms tighten up.
- Algorithms are easier to game early on – when you are early, you can use a lot of hacks to grow faster. For example, on Twitter, I would just follow tons of people a day and unfollow anyone who didn’t follow me back.
- First movers’ advantage – social networks want more users, that’s what they need to succeed. In the early stages of any platform, they want to help you gain more of a following so you will keep using their platform.
But here is the thing: even though being an early adopter helps, it’s not the secret to my success.
Just look at Instagram, I am really late to the game. But I started growing fast just this year as that is when we really started.
If you can get in early, you should do so, assuming you have the time to invest. For example, this is the time to get in on Tiktok.
When you get in early, there is always the chance that the social network may end up flopping. But if it does take off, you’ll be ahead of your competition.
So what did I do?
Here was the secret to my growth… and it still works today. Eric Siu is even doing it with me right now.
It’s piggybacking on brands that are already popular.
When I first started, no one knew who I was. And I’m not saying everyone knows who I am today… by no means do I have a large brand like Tony Robbins.
What I did early on in my career was piggyback off of other popular brands.
For example, I hit up Pete Cashmore from Mashable, Michael Arrington from TechCrunch, Adrianna Huffington from Huffington Post, and so many other popular sites like ReadWriteWeb, Business Insider, Gawker Media, and GigaOm to name just a few.
I know some of them don’t exist anymore, but back then they were extremely popular. Anyone who was in tech, and even some who weren’t, knew about each of those sites.
So, when I got started as a marketer, I hit up all of those sites and offered all of them free marketing in exchange for promoting my brand and adding “Marketing done by Neil Patel” or “Marketing done by Pronet”, which was my ad agency back then.
Just look at the image above. TechCrunch used to link to my site on every page of their site… forget rich anchor text, it really is all about branding.
The hardest part is, I had to email and message these influencers dozens of times just to convince them to let me help them for free. And a lot of them ignored me or didn’t accept my offer.
But of a few said yes.
Pete from Mashable was one of the first to say yes. Once his traffic and rankings skyrocketed, his competition hit me up. Especially TechCrunch.
What was funny, though, is that I was constantly emailing TechCrunch and didn’t hear back. 6 months from my first email, they eventually accepted my offer.
I made a deal with Michael Arrington at the time in which once I boosted his traffic, he would add a logo that I did marketing for him, which you saw above.
In addition to that, he would tell all of his venture capital friends what I did for him and share the results (so hopefully they would share it with their portfolio companies, which would help me make money) and write a blog post about me.
He didn’t end up writing the blog post, which is fine, but he did the other two.
When he sent out emails to VCs showing a Google Analytics graph of his traffic growing at a rapid pace, I quickly got inundated with inquiries about my marketing services.
In addition to that, I was building up my brand… and my social media following. I was gaining “social clout” because I was doing good work for influencers.
One could argue that boosting traffic for someone like TechCrunch by 30% is worth millions and I should have charged for my services. Although I spent countless time doing free work, I wouldn’t trade it for any single dollar as it is what made me and helped build up my reputation.
And I didn’t stop there. Even today, I try to associate myself with other popular brands. Just like how I was lucky enough to work with Robert Herjavec, who has a popular TV show in the US along with Mark Cuban…
Here’s how many visitors I was getting for my name “Neil Patel” on a monthly basis before I started working with Robert.
And this is how many visitors I get for my name on a monthly basis a few months after I worked with Robert.
That’s a 37.84% increase in a matter of months!
By piggybacking off of popular brands, it doesn’t just help my website traffic but also helps to grow my social media following as well.
Just like as you can see below with my Instagram growth…
Now it isn’t just me who can do this, anyone can.
How can you piggyback off of other brands?
Just like how I piggybacked off of brands like TechCrunch, Eric is doing something similar to me at the moment.
We have a podcast that generates over 1 million downloads a month.
Eric’s had a podcast for years, but the one he has with me has more than 10x the listeners. This has helped him grow his brand a lot over the last year.
Let’s just look at the data. According to Eric, due to the podcast, he has signed up 6 clients, which has generated 540,000 dollars in annual revenue.
Now when he goes to tech conferences, 3 to 4 people tend to come up to him and mention how they love Marketing School and his work. In addition to that, it has been easier for Eric to set up meetings (people respond back to him more now), and he is also getting advisory shares in companies due to his growing brand. And the best part is, he is getting more paid speaking gigs for up to $10,000 a pop because of the podcast.
The data shows it was a good move by Eric for partnering up with me. He pushed me to do a podcast years ago and I told him no because I was too lazy. He didn’t give up though. Eventually, he got me to say yes and flew to my house in Las Vegas to record our first episode.
He did all of the work and it has been a great mutual relationship as doing this podcast has also helped grow my brand at the same time.
Now you are probably thinking, why isn’t his follower count growing fast enough?
Well, he needs to do what he is doing with me with a few more influencers to really put fuel to the fire. Just like how I didn’t only piggyback off of TechCrunch… at one point the Gawker Media network was linking to me on every page of their sites, which was seen by over 100 million unique people per month.
That really gets your brand out there!
Another example is Brian Dean from Backlinko as he did something similar with me back in the day. Years ago I approached him to write a detailed guide on link building with him and he also created videos that were on my old marketing blog Quick Sprout, which helped him grow his brand.
I can’t take credit for “making” Eric or Brian successful. They would have done well without me… and in the grand scheme of things, I really didn’t do much for either of them.
It’s like saying TechCrunch made the Neil Patel brand. Of course, it helped, and helped a lot… but one partnership won’t make or break you.
And if I didn’t continually blog, create videos, speak at events, or do any of the other stuff that I did, the TechCrunch partnership wouldn’t have been as effective.
Eric and Brian would have grown their brand in other ways because their work stands for itself, hence they would have been successful on their own. I just helped provide a little boost, just like how TechCrunch provided me with a boost.
And once more people get to know you, you’ll naturally do better on the social web.
For example, when Will Smith created his Instagram account, he didn’t have to buy ads or anything. Everyone just knows him already and that’s why his Instagram account blew up really quickly.
And you can do what Will Smith did on a smaller scale. Similar to what I did.
But don’t expect it overnight. Will Smith has been on television for over 20 years. It’s multiple shows, movies, and connections with other famous people that have really helped grow Will’s brand.
Of course, we won’t get on TV as Will has, but you can piggyback on other popular brands multiple times to create a similar (smaller) effect.
All you have to do is help these influencers out for free.
If you are a web designer, offer design services. If you are a marketer, offer marketing services. If you are selling a product or service, keep giving it away for free and maybe someone will talk about your company.
If you don’t have anything you can offer that has value, just look at whatever influencer you want to associate with, see where they may need help, learn that skill, and offer it for free.
It’s the easiest way to become popular on the social web.
Conclusion
That’s my secret to being popular on the social web.
It’s also how I built a decent size company… purely by leveraging other popular brands in the early days.
You can do the same, but you have to be patient. Don’t expect it to happen overnight.
For example, Eric’s brand has been growing but we have been doing a podcast together for over 2 years now.
Plus, he continually pushes on his own and doesn’t just rely on leveraging other influencers.
Remember, nothing worthwhile happens overnight.
You have to be persistent with your emails, your direct messages, your text messages, and whatever else you can do to get a hold of these influencers. Most will ignore you but it is a numbers game and, eventually, you’ll be able to associate your brand with someone popular, which will grow your brand.
And last but not least: Don’t expect an influencer to make you successful. Sure, multiple influencers are better than one, but that’s not what I meant.
If Brian Dean from Backlinko wasn’t good at link building, creating content, SEO, and educating, he wouldn’t do well… no matter who he associated himself with. The same goes for Eric.
Your skills, your abilities, your product… whatever you are trying to brand needs to stand on its own.
So, what do you think about my secret? Are you going to copy it?
Friday, October 11, 2019
What is White Hat SEO?
White Hat in SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is a set of strategies used by site owners that increase the chances of being on the first page of search engines when certain keywords are typed in.
Youtobe
What is Black Hat SEO?
When it comes to driving traffic to your website, search engine optimisation (SEO) is one of the best methods to do so. If your site ranks high on search engines, such as Google and Bing, the likelihood that internet users come across your page is much higher.
Youtobe
Google Grants for Charities: An In Depth Guide
Around the world, there are billions of individuals with the means to support charities. Although these numbers provide sky-high possibilities for support, the difficulty is in reaching a large group of this population. For non-profits, reaching a large portion of the population can be very difficult through the traditional advertising platforms.
Youtobe
Tuesday, October 8, 2019
The Ultimate List of Free SEO Tools
Who says you have to spend money to get more traffic?
For today’s blog post, I thought it would be fun to break down all of the free SEO tools. Sure you may know of some, like Ubersuggest, but there are many more options than just my own tool.
Now before I dive into the tools, I’ve broken them down into the following categories:
- Keyword Research
- Content Marketing
- Rank Tracking
- Link Building
- Technical SEO
So, are you ready to dive in? Let’s get started!
Keyword Research
All of the tools in this category will help you find more keywords. Many of them have different ways of coming up with keyword suggestions, so you may want to check them all out.
Ubersuggest
Ubersuggest has many different keyword research options. First of all, it shows you how many searches a keyword has had over the last 12 months so you can see if there is any seasonality.
In addition to that, it pulls keywords from a few different sources such as Google Suggest and its own database, it shows you all of the keywords your competition ranks for, and it provides keyword suggestions based on questions, comparisons, and prepositions.
My favorite feature of Ubersuggest’s keyword research capabilities is that it not only can you see how competitive a term is, but it also tells you how many links the average ranking website contains.
That way you know how many links you need to build to rank well.
What’s also unique about Ubersuggest is that it provides local keyword suggestions. This is great if you are trying to do local SEO.
Answer The Public
Answer The Public leverages Google Suggest to find all of the questions people may have related to any industry or keyword.
Just type in a keyword and it will give you a laundry list of questions people are searching for related to that keyword.
Similar to Ubersuggest it also shows you comparison and preposition related keywords.
What I like about the tool is compared to any competing tool, it represents the data in nice visuals.
KeywordTool.io
SEO doesn’t just exist on Google. You can also rank higher on Amazon, YouTube, Bing, and tons of other sites.
KeywordTool.io uses the same concept of Google Suggest, but for a handful of sites like Amazon, Play Store, and YouTube.
If you are performing SEO on sites other than Google, you should check out KeywordTool.io.
FAQfox
FAQfox is a neat little tool that finds you questions people want to be answered based on any specific site you want information from.
For example, you can type in the word “cat” and quora.com as the URL and it will show you category based questions people are asking on Quora.
You can do this for Reddit or any other site you want keyword ideas from.
Google Keyword Planner
Of course, the search giant, Google, has its own keyword research tool.
Google Keyword Planner gives you suggestions as well as CPC data and click estimates.
You’ll also notice that a lot of other keyword tools have CPC data, but chances are they are pulling it from Google Keyword Planner.
When you are using Keyword Planner, look for terms with a high CPC as they tend to convert well when you rank for them organically.
Google Trends
Out of all the tools on the list, I probably use Google Trends 3 to 4 times a week. That’s how much I love it.
What I love about Trends is that it shows you what is hot right now. In addition to that, it tells you if an industry is getting less search volume or more over time.
You can also filter your data based on a specific country or you can look at the data from a global perspective.
Soovle
Soovle takes the concept of Google Suggest (autocomplete) but for a lot of the popular sites around the web.
Soovle pulls all of the popular keywords on Google, YouTube, Amazon, Wikipedia, Bing, Yahoo, and Answers.com.
AdWords and SEO Permutation Generator
The AdWords and SEO Permutation Generator is a super simple tool that helps you get creative with your keyword research.
You enter in a handful of terms you want to target and it will combine them to make different variations for you.
Not all of the keywords will be popular when it comes to search volume, but it will give you a sense of how you can go after long-tail variations within your site.
Keyworddit
Reddit has a ton of categories (subreddits) and Keyworddit helps you find all of the keywords within that subreddit.
What’s neat is it even breaks down the volume for each of those keywords. That way you can quickly see if any are worth going after.
Generally speaking, you’ll want to use tools like this as it will give you a new perspective on keyword research.
Pulling results from Google is something that all SEOs already do. Because of that, you need to use other sources if you want to get a leg up on your competition.
Bulk Keyword Generator
The Bulk Keyword Generator by Higher Visibility does keyword research a bit differently than most of the keyword tools out there.
First, you pick a business category. Then you select the type of business you have and enter in any locations you are targeting.
You’ll then be given a list of keywords that you can potentially target.
What I like about this tool is that it makes things super simple, especially if you are new to SEO.
WordTracker Scout
WordTracker Scout is a browser extension that gives you a list of keyword ideas from any web page.
Just browse any site or check out your competition, click a button and boom, you are given ideas on keywords that other people are using.
It breaks the keywords down by relevance and volume.
SearchVolume.io
When you are doing keyword research, how do you know a keyword is getting enough searches?
SearchVolume.io lets you bulk upload up to 800 keywords and it tells you how popular each keyword is.
The tool also works for a handful of other regions, such as Brazil, France, and Italy.
Google Location Changer
Serps has a neat tool that works well if you are doing international SEO.
Their Google Location Changer allows you to search Google in any country or city. Just type in a keyword and you’ll see who ranks.
Using this tool in combination with WordTracker Scout can give you unique keyword suggestions.
Content Marketing
Content is the one thing we all have to create if we want more search traffic.
Here are free content marketing tools that can help you get the most out of your search traffic.
Animalz Revive
Have you noticed that your rankings decrease over time?
It’s not just because of Google algorithm updates. In most cases, your old content won’t perform as well because it’s old.
Animalz Revive shows you which content pieces are dying over time.
That way you know what to focus on. Just look at the ones that have declined the most and then spruce them up so you can get more rankings.
What’s cool about this tool is it will save you a lot of time. For example, my team updates 90 pieces of content a month. The last thing you want to do is waste a ton of time on content that never had much traffic.
Google Search Console
Most people use Google Search Console to see which keywords are driving them traffic.
My favorite way of using Search Console is to see which one of my blog posts are getting a lot of search impressions but have less than a 4% click-through rate.
I then go in and modify each of those pages to include the right keywords in my meta tags. Then I look to see which keywords I am ranking for but not really targeting yet, and then either create new content around those terms or modify existing content to also target them.
Content Ideas
Ubersuggest has a feature similar to Buzzsumo but it is 100% free. It’s called Content Ideas.
All you have to do is enter in a keyword or phrase and it will show you all of the popular blog posts that contain that term.
The blog posts are then sorted by social shares, backlinks, and search traffic.
This helps you create content around topics people want to read, which means more traffic.
Hreflang Tag Generator
One of my biggest traffic gains has come from translating my content.
A lot of people ask me if they would be penalized from duplicating and translation their content.
The answer is no.
All you need to do is use the Hreflang Tag Generator.
This tool creates tags for you to place in your HTML code so Google knows you are targeting specific languages and countries with certain content pages.
Portent Title Generator
For every 10 people that see your headline, only 2 on average will continue to read your content.
In other words, content marketing is all about the headline.
If you are struggling to create headlines, check out the Portent Title Generator.
Just insert a keyword or phrase and it will generate dozens of suggestions for you.
Title Capitalization Tool
Not sure which words in your title should be capitalized?
This Title Capitalization tool will take care of that for you.
It may not sound important to you, but if your titles look off, people may not click through from SERP results to read your content, which can decrease your rankings over time.
Grammarly
Every SEO should be using Grammarly.
Which do you think Google prefers? Ranking a blog post that reads well or one that contains a lot of spelling and grammar errors?
Grammarly helps you avoid spelling mistakes. This is really important if you want to rank on Google.
Google SERP Tool
Have you noticed that some listings on Google get cut off because the title is too long?
A big misconception is Google uses character counts for meta tags. In reality, they count pixels.
Google SERP Tool will tell you how many pixels your meta tags contain and if they will get cut off by Google.
It also shows you a preview of what your web pages will look like on Google.
Rank Tracking
Google Analytics is a great tool to show you your overall traffic, but it doesn’t tell you where you rank.
If you want to track your rankings, you’ll need to use some tools.
Google Search Console
I know I mentioned this tool above, but Google Search Console is the most unique rank tracking tool out there.
Because this tool is from Google, they can tell you your average ranking for any one of your pages per country.
And because the data comes from them, they average it out to give you accurate information.
You can also go back 16 months and see how your rankings have changed over time.
Ubersuggest
Again, I know I also mentioned Ubersuggest above, but it now has a free rank tracking feature.
It provides the same features as those paid rank trackers. You can track your rankings daily for any keyword or groups of keywords for any country, city, or county.
It also saves your data for you so you can go back as far as you want to see if your rankings have been increasing or decreasing.
Search Latte
If you want to track your rankings manually, you can do so with Search Latte.
Just put in a keyword and select the language and country so you can see all of the sites that rank in the top 100.
You can then manually find your site and keep track to see if you are improving or declining.
You may want to use Search Latte in combination with Excel as you can create a daily log of your rankings.
Link Building
You used to have to pay for tools if you wanted link data, but that’s not the case anymore. Here are the free link tools you can use.
MozBar
This is probably my favorite link tool that I use.
Even though Google doesn’t use domain authority, in general, the higher the authority of a site that is linking to you, the better off you are.
MozBar shows you the domain authority and page authority of every page on the web.
If you are going to build links, focus on the sites with the highest authority.
SEOgadget for Excel
If you are like me, you probably love using Excel when you are building links.
SEOgadget for Excel makes it really easy to pull in data from Majestic and Moz.
If you haven’t tried this yet, you should consider it. It will make it easier for you to find new insights and run your own calculations.
Backlinks
Backlinks is a free tool that shows you all of your backlinks. There are no limits in row count or anything like that… you can just see everyone who links to you.
You can see if any of your links are dofollow or nofollow as well as the anchor text.
You can filter the results to find backlink opportunities when researching competitors and you have the option to look up link data on a domain, subdomain, or a specific URL.
It will also show when a link was first found and last crawled and the authority of each link.
Bulk Metrics Checker
Tired of looking up the domain and page authority manually on each of your pages or sites?
Bulk Metrics Checker solves that for you.
Just upload a list of URLs and within seconds you’ll have a list of your page authority per URL. You can also do the same for domains and upload dozens of domains at once.
Technical SEO
SEO has changed. You no longer can do just a few things and expect your site to rank well. You have to do everything if you expect to beat your competition.
And when I mean everything, that includes technical SEO.
SEO Analyzer
If you haven’t already, try running your URL through my SEO Analyzer.
It will tell you what’s wrong with each of your web pages.
From duplicate meta tags and redirect errors to sitemaps and much more… it pretty much looks at every major factor when it comes to SEO.
It will even tell you your overall site speed and what you need to fix in which order to get the maximum results.
And if you register for a free account, it automatically checks for errors each week on your behalf.
Google Analytics Referrer Spam Killer
When you are doing SEO, there is a good chance that your Google Analytics gets messed up by referral spam.
Google Analytics Referrer Spam Killer solves that problem by connecting with your Google Analytics account and blocking off the most common referral spam.
Once you connect it, you’ll find that your data is much more accurate so you can make better SEO decisions.
Pagespeed Insights
Speed is everything. The faster your site loads the better you will rank, especially when it comes to Google’s mobile index.
Pagespeed Insights tells you what you need to fix for your site to load fast on any device.
It doesn’t matter if you are optimizing for tablet devices, desktop, or mobile… it will tell you what to fix.
Pingdom
Fixing your code is one thing, but you’ll also want to make sure your site loads fast overall.
Your overall load time is affected by things like your server and CDN.
Pingdom tells you your actual load time.
With Pingdom, you can pick which location to test your load speed from and it tells you what code on your site is causing the biggest slowdown.
Website Penalty Checker
With over 3,200 algorithm updates each year to Google, how do you know if you have been affected by an update?
Is it related to a core update, your content, or link building?
Website Penalty Checker tells you that.
In a nice graph, it shows your traffic over time and tells you if a Google update has caused your traffic to go up or down.
Structured Data Markup Helper
A simple way to increase your search traffic is to use schema markup.
But there is one big issue, schema markup is a bit complicated to implement. Because of that, Google created a Structured Data Markup Helper to guide you.
All you have to do is select what kind of markup you want to use, type in your URL, and go through the walkthrough wizard.
And at the end, you’ll be given code that you just paste within HTML.
Woorank
Looking for a simple SEO analysis? Woorank shows you a simple report of what’s wrong with your web page.
All you have to do is type in your domain and within a minute you’ll see a thorough report of what you need to fix.
What I love about Woorank is that it is a great tool for beginners because of their easy-to-use interface.
SEOptimer
Just like Woorank, SEOptimer is a simple tool that gives you a technical overview of your on-page SEO as well as your content.
It breaks down things like page speed as well in addition to showing you how your website loads for both desktop and mobile devices.
You can even see social sharing data.
Varvy
Varvy provides a detailed technical checklist of all things related to your SEO.
From your Robots.txt file and your sitemap to security settings and even your links, it covers all the bases.
If you don’t have a technical background, Varvy might be a bit complex unless you take the time to read each of their articles that outline what each tip/recommendation means.
301 Redirect Code Generator
When you are doing SEO long enough, eventually you find yourself changing your older URLs.
But if you don’t add a 301 redirect, you’ll lose your rankings.
301 Redirect Code Generator creates the code you’ll need to tell search engines your URLs have changed.
Panguin Tool
This tool is similar to the Website Penalty Checker but it is more accurate because it connects directly with your Analytics account.
If you think you have been hit with a Google penalty, use the Panguin Tool.
Now if you want to see if your competition has also been hit, this tool won’t work, but the Website Penalty Checker will.
None-the-less, they are both great tools.
Google Search Console
I have to include this tool again. Why? Because if there is something wrong with your site, such as it getting hacked, it will notify you.
It even tells you the pages that were indexed and which ones aren’t.
One thing that you have to do within your Search Console is to submit an XML sitemap.
XML Sitemaps
XML Sitemaps generates a sitemap for you that you can submit to Google Search Console.
You’ll need to do this so you can get more of your content indexed.
Submitting a sitemap doesn’t guarantee that Google will index your content, but it does help… mainly for sites with low domain authority.
Conclusion
Tools don’t have to cost money. I got into SEO because it was the free traffic source I could leverage to compete with the big companies.
If you want to grow your search rankings, you can leverage one of the free SEO tools above.
Sure, there are amazing paid tools as well, but why not start with the free stuff?
What other free SEO tools do you use?
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