SEO Resources

This is my list of recommended SEO tools and recourses. See also my other recommended Resources for WordPress and Internet Marketing.

SEO Blogs & Resources

• SEO Book – My favourite SEO blog and resource, by Aaron Wall. I’m a member of Aaron’s SEO Book training program. At $300 a month to be a member it may seem expensive, but I consider it excellent value. It’s where I’ve learnt the majority of my SEO and internet marketing skills. Includes a private forum with 100% noise free, cutting edge content. Even if you don’t join his program, make sure you read his blog and use his excellent range of free tools.
• SEOmoz – My second favourite resource, written by Rand Fishkin and the gang. I don’t always agree with some of the blog posts, but they are certainly stimulating and I’ve learnt a lot. I’m a member of the SEOmoz Pro membership. This article on ranking factors is a must read.
• Search Engine Land – A daily must-read. Suffers from a tiny bit of noise (or less than awesome blog posts) but for the most part is highly informative. Founded and largely driven by the SEO industry’s grand-master Danny Sullivan.
• Occam’s Razor – the definitive blog on analytics (particularly Google Analytics) written by Avinash Kaushik

SEO Tools

Keyword Research

• Google Keyword Tool
• Microsoft Advertising Intelligence – excellent Excel plugin for performing keyword research
• Wordtracker
• Google Trends
• Google Insights
• Google Search Based Keyword Tool
• Wordstream Keyword Tool & Niche Finder

Analytics Tools

• Google Analytics
• Clicky – analytics package (ideal for sites you don’t want to use Google analytics with)
• Mint – Super simple self-hosted analytics package (requires PHP and MySQL)

General Tools

• Advanced Web Rnaking – My favourite rank checking tool set
• SEO Book tools – Aaron’s collection of free SEO tools – highly recommended
• SEOmoz Tools
• Google Webmaster Tools
• Bing Webmaster Tools
• Yahoo Site Explorer
• Open Site Explorer
• Microsoft IIS SEO Toolkit

Testing Tools

• Crazy Egg – helps visualize what visitors are doing on your site
• ClickTale – record videos of how users interact with your site
• Google Website Optimizer – A/B testing (not as simple as I’d like, but free)
• Visual Website Optimizer – makes A/B split and multivariate testing really simple

SEM

• Google AdWords – advertise your site on Google search engine results and content network sites
• Microsoft adCenter – advertise on the Bing search engine results and Bing content network sites
• Yahoo Search Marketing – Yahoo’s search marketing solution. Big accounts also get access to Yahoo analytics

Books

• Web Analytics 2.0 by Avinash Kaushik – every page is pure gold (see also Avinash’s excellent blog).
• The Art of SEO by Eric Enge, Stephen Spencer, Rank Fishkin and Jessie Stricchiola – the best in-depth book on SEO I’ve read.

Podcasts

• Internet Marketing Podcast from the awesome dudes at Site Visibility.