10 Great SEO Tools For VPS Hosting
If you are serious about search engine optimization (SEO) success, then it’s no surprise that you chose a virtual private server (VPS) for your hosting needs. Many website owners find that shared hosting just doesn’t cut it when it comes to speed, resources and IP range, all of which can affect your SEO performance.
There are tools that can help you improve your SEO and attract more visitors to your amazing website. Below we have gathered the top ten tools for SEO when using a VPS for website hosting. You won’t be surprised to see a few Google websites included in the list, not only those hosted by VPS. However, our list also includes Bing, Mozilla resources and other free tools to help you take control of how your website appears to search engines.
Top ten tools for transforming SEO for VPS hosted websites:
#1. Google Pagespeed Insights
Many website owners underestimate the role that website speed plays in SEO. Search engines know that slow websites aren’t visited for long. Website visitors give pages about three seconds before they move on to quicker sites, so it is crucial to know exactly how long it takes your page to load and ways to boost speed.
#2. Moz
To perform well on search engines, it is important to understand how search engines work and what they are looking for. We are never going to know exactly how the search algorithms work as it is highly classified information. However, we can learn from experts who spend their careers investigating search engine information. Moz is a website that accumulates this wonderful knowledge for you to learn and use in your own SEO efforts.
#3. Google Webmaster Tools (now called Search Console)
VPS owners tend to like to be hands-on in their own website and server administration. Google Webmaster Tools is a great resource for anyone excited to dive in and make the most of their SEO at a more technical level. Analyze clicks or set up your account to receive alerts when something doesn’t look right. Most importantly, you can see how Google sees your website.
#4. Google Analytics
Google Analytics is the go-to tool for most marketers. Simply add the tracking identification number to your website and watch the data pour in. Once you understand what you are dealing with, it’s easy to set goals and work to achieve them. Without the metrics provided by Google Analytics, it can be hard to know if your SEO efforts are paying off, or if you’re just wasting precious time.
#5. Small SEO Tools
From checking backlinks to grammar, Small SEO Tools is a website chock full of completely free tools to help you understand your SEO. Translations, plagiarism, image to text, this website has it all, especially when working with website content. Keep in mind that the tools provided are typically in the form of links to other websites. However, Small SEO Tools is a great dashboard to keep the tools you need in one location.
#6. XML Sitemaps
Sitemaps are XML files that list all of the URLs in a specific website. They also contain information about when the page was last updated and how important that page is compared to other pages located on the same website. Search engines use sitemaps to determine whether your website is current and working properly. The XML Sitemap page is a free tool that helps you generate these files for search engines. Google, Bing or any other search engine can then crawl through your website and rank it accordingly.
#7. Google Keyword Planner
This tool is used specifically for targeting ads to your audience. It can help you determine what your audience is already viewing and help you meet those criteria. If you are relying on organic search alone for marketing purposes, this tool will not be of too much use to you. However, it can help you tailor to fit your blog and website content to the topics that your audience is searching for. Take note that this tool is not free, and requires some budget to provide helpful information.
#8. Bing SEO Analyzer
Bing SEO Analyzer is very similar to Google Analytics, except for that it was created by Bing especially for Bing searches. Many website owners focus on one specific search engine when in reality many users choose to search from a variety of search engines. Bing SEO Analyzer will help your SEO for anyone who isn’t devoted to Google search.
#9. SimilarWeb
Be careful when using SimilarWeb as it can often make you feel like your SEO efforts are a failure. Just as social media makes us feel like we don’t take enough trips or exercise enough, SimilarWeb lets you compare your website performance to other websites. Remember to try to pick websites in your industry that are also a similar size. Otherwise, you might feel like everyone you know is on the beach and you are at the gas station.
#10. Open Site Explorer
While we covered the Moz website in an earlier section, we felt that this specific tool (part of Moz) needed to be highlighted in its own section. Open Site Explorer focuses specifically on looking at your inbound links, or links on other pages that go to your site. Search engines use inbound links as a way of determining how relevant your website is. Inbound links are not easy because it involves websites other than your own, but there might be more floating around than you may think. The only way to really know is to give Open Site Explorer a try.