In our fast-paced digital world, having a strong and visible online presence is vital for business success, especially if you’re a small or medium-sized business competing in the vast digital landscape. That's where a search engine optimisation (SEO) checker can be a game-changer.
Stats show SEO drives 1,000%+ more traffic than organic social media. It fine-tunes your website, so it’s ideally placed to attract users and push you up the search engine rankings. And best of all, it doesn’t have to cost a thing. We’ll suggest some of the best free SEO tools and reveal how an SEO checker could polish your website, so it stands out from the crowd.
What is the SEO ranking score?
An SEO score tells you how effective your website is for search engine optimisation. Think of it as a website health check.
Typically, an SEO test will look at all or some of:
Your keywords, headings, URLs, and meta tags like titles and descriptions etc.
The quality of your content for relevance, accuracy, value and if it’s unique
Broken links and how many credible businesses link back to you.
Website speed, mobile-friendliness and site structure
User experience, like bounce rates, and how long people stay on your page
An SEO test will also rank your website on a scale of 1-100. The higher your website scores, the better your SEO, and the more likely you are to appear in search engines.
If parts of your website aren’t doing well, your SEO score could suffer. However, there are several free SEO tools available, such as Semrush, Seobility or WebFX and more – that will do the heavy lifting for you. You’ll also get invaluable insights, so you can see what you’re doing right – and, importantly, what you’re not.
To help you, here are our five key takeaways from your SEO check.
Identify technical issues
Over time, it’s easy to forget to update images or videos, remove links to deleted content or check third-party links. And the bigger your website is, the harder these things become.
An SEO checker will highlight broken links, server errors and even tell you how your site works on mobile devices – a key driver of search engine rankings. Fixing these problems ensures your website is accessible, user-friendly and easily discoverable by search engines.
2. Choose the right keywords
A large chunk of your SEO score revolves around using the right keywords – those specific words or phrases that tell people what your business offers.
SEO tools will find the perfect words that match people’s searches, and check your site for them. They’ll even check what keywords your competitors use, giving you the ideal opportunity to boost your online presence by using a mix of commonly searched for words, and unique words, so customers find you first.
3. Know your competition
As well as checking their keywords, some free SEO checkers will let you see your peers’ SEO rankings or compare similar pages, so you can see who comes out on top. And if it’s not you, use the insights to make improvements, so you lead the way next time.
4. Create top-quality content
Search engines love websites with unique, valuable, and engaging content. Avoid duplicating information or providing thin, inaccurate and irrelevant content that adds nothing to the mix.
5. Convert leads
SEO checks often provide data on user behaviour, like bounce rates, how long they stay on a page, which pages they visit, where they drop off and conversion rates. Analysing this data puts you in your user’s shoes and highlights the areas where you’re losing potential customers. Optimising these pages and pathways can help you keep users on board and convert more leads.
Keep in mind that technology evolves rapidly, and it's essential to stay proactive. Regular SEO ranking tests every three to six months will help you stay on top of your website's SEO health.
SEO ensures your website stands out in the digital world. Using free SEO tools helps you spot problems, create perfect keywords and content, understand your competitors and pull in more leads. By keeping a strong online presence and regularly testing your SEO score, you could elevate your web traffic, do better than the competition and drive your business to greater heights.
Want more advice on how free SEO tools or an SEO checker could help your business? Speak to one of our V-Hub Digital Advisers to find out more. You can also read more about how to measure your SEO performance effectively here.