Online SEO Tools and Resources

There are many tools available online to help webmasters and website owners to optimise their website for search engines and we have listed below the most useful.

Google

Google won't tell you exactly how to tweak your site to rank better in their SERPS (Search Engine Results Positions) as they oppose webmasters who try to manipulate their results (see what they have to say here) - but they do give advice on best practise.

One of the better tools from Google is their Sitemaps feature which not only allows you to submit the content of your entire website to Google but keeps them informed of any changes. You will need a Google account to do this. In the admin panel Google also displays the top search queries that return pages from your site plus the top click throughs as well and checks your robots.txt file is correctly formatted.

To take advantage of Google sitemaps you will need to create an XML sitemap which Google's spiders can find - this XML sitemap will tell the Google and Yahoo spiders the current status of your website content. There are several tools to create this XML sitemap, one of the best is XML Sitemaps.

Another fantastic tool is their Keyword Suggestion tool for Adwords - Google's pay-per-clicks (PPC) programme - which has display stats on search volume and competition (in terms of PPC advertisers). Overtures keyword suggestion tool is here.

Another feature you can use with Google's search is to see at a glance how many pages from your site they have in their index and how many 'important' web pages link to your homepage. In the Google search box, simple precede your website URL with a "site:" or a "link:" respectively, eg: "site:www.4w.co.uk" or "link:www.4w.co.uk". You can also try the same with Alltheweb and Yahoo - which may return more link results.

Google Toolbar and Pagerank

Google pioneered Pagerank - an indication of how powerful a page is by virtue of how many other pages link to it - the idea being a 'link' to a page is a 'vote' for that page's content. Pagerank is pretty crucial in attaining a good ranking in search results, so knowing the Pagerank of your own pages, and pages that link to you (as they pass on some of their own Pagerank) is important.

The best way is to download the Google toolbar (or Firefox has several extensions that will display PR as well) plus other useful info.

Website Stats and Robots

All self-respecting website owners should study their visitor statistics - Google provide an Analytics package but there are many others including Statcounter or Mint (a very good inexpensive commercial package which you need to install on your server)

More experienced webmasters will also study their server logs to track robot/spider/agent activity as well and of course you must ensure your robots.txt file is correctly formatted. It is worth using a professional program for this if you are not experienced with accessing or analysing server log files.

Another good housekeeping idea is to run an internal link check to ensure all links on your pages are correct.

Page Validation

Always a good idea to make sure your code validates - you can check your pages with the W3C Validation tool plus add this link to all your valid pages: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=referer
Why? Because the page on the W3C is a Pagerank 7 (very powerful!) and links back to your referring page.

P3P Policy

The W3C recommends all website have a P3P Policy and it is probably a small factor for search engines in determining the quality of a website, so it is best implemented, plus it overcomes some problems with Cookies in Internet Explorer. You can check your policy is valid here. The 4W P3P Privacy Policy is here.

Online Tools for SEO

Marketleap

Marketleap provide more advanced tools than the above "site:" and "link:" search commands, including a Link Checker, Site Content checker and Keyword Position checker.

SEO Chat

SEO chat is a resource for web professionals and has a large inventory of SEO tools available.

Digital Point

Some useful tools including a keyword suggestion tool and SERP tool.

WebProNews Videos

SEO has gone mainstream! Check out the WPN videos for some useful advice including Tips for Visibility: Title Tags and The Science of SEO.

Discussion Forums and SEO Articles

Webmasterworld

Probably the most subscribed to forum for SEO professionals, the founder Brett Tabke is the guy who generally names the Google updates (eg: Florida, Jagger, Bourbon, Brandy, etc) and wrote a particularly good post (among many others) on creating a successful site in 12 months (you will need to register with the site to view this). The Google search news forum is the place to hang out, and the forum is occasionally posted to by Matt Cutts ("Google Guy") - an engineer from Google.

Search Engine Watch

Search Engine Watch, formally edited by Danny Sullivan - a good resource to check out, especially the Google Search forum.

I Help You

Another popular Google search forum with some good professional contributors.

Blogs

Official Google Webmasters Blog

Matt Cutts