Every SEO Tool I Actually Use - With Honest Verdicts

Use for: Backlink analysis, competitor research, keyword difficulty

The single most expensive thing in my stack. Worth it for any agency. Not worth it for a single small-biz site.

Use for: Keyword research, position tracking, site audit

Better UI than Ahrefs for beginners. Keyword database slightly smaller in LK. I run both - not either/or.

Use for: Keyword search volume, seasonality

Free but gives volume ranges not exact numbers unless you run ads. Good enough for 80% of research.

Use for: In-SERP keyword data

Cheapest tool I use - shows volume and CPC right in Google. Credit-based pricing, lasts months.

Use for: Finding question-format queries

Good for finding FAQ topics. Use once a month, not daily.

Use for: Site audit, broken links, redirect chains, indexability

Desktop app. Painful UI, irreplaceable output. Free tier up to 500 URLs works for small sites.

Use for: Client-friendly site audit reports

Prettier reports than Screaming Frog - send these to clients directly.

Use for: Clicks, impressions, ranking, indexing, Core Web Vitals

Not optional. Ground truth. If a site does not have GSC set up, nothing else matters.

Use for: Core Web Vitals testing

Use the API version (via Screaming Frog or a custom script) to audit every URL on a big site at once.

Use for: Waterfall analysis

Good complement to PSI - different methodology catches different issues.

Use for: Content brief + on-page scoring

Its NLP keyword suggestions save hours on content planning. Expensive but it pays for itself on the second article.

Use for: AI-assisted content briefs

Cheaper Surfer alternative. AI output is lower quality, briefs are slightly weaker.

Use for: Enterprise content grading

Not worth 2x Surfer's price for most users. Agencies already using it can stay - no one else should switch to it.

Use for: Keyword clustering, brief drafting, schema generation

The single biggest productivity tool added to my stack since 2023.

Use for: Long-form content editing, careful reasoning

Better than GPT-4 at nuanced editing and staying on voice. I use Claude for final content polish.

Use for: Citation-grounded research

Good for research when you need sources. Also a key GEO target - get cited here.

Use for: Tracking AI citations

Worth it for agencies monitoring clients. Too expensive for a single site - just ask the AI directly monthly.

Use for: Traffic, conversions, user journey

Required. GA4 is less intuitive than Universal Analytics, but it is the only option.

Use for: Daily rank tracking

Part of Ahrefs subscription - no separate fee.

Use for: Enterprise rank tracking

Accurate but expensive. Ahrefs/Semrush tracking is good enough for 99% of use cases.

Use for: Meta, schema, XML sitemap, redirects

My default on every WordPress site. Lighter than Yoast, cheaper than RankMath Pro, better schema coverage than either.

Use for: Basic on-page SEO

Market leader by installs but bloated and slow. Free tier is fine for a new blog. Avoid Premium.

Use for: On-page + schema

Genuinely feature-rich free tier. The trade-off is it is heavy on admin queries.

Use for: Fast, lean, Core-Web-Vitals-friendly WordPress sites

My default WordPress stack for the last five years.

Use for: Checking keyword over-use

At alstonantony.com - no signup, no ads.

Use for: Correlating traffic drops to Google update dates

Free tool at alstonantony.com for quick penalty hypothesis.

Use for: Converting headlines to title case, sentence case

Writer utility - small but people use it daily.