Peter Vatistas

As an SEO I always try to stay up to date with techniques, tools and information. A few years ago I started my own Internet Marketing firm offering SEO, SEM, Analytics, Affiliate and Ad marketing services for medium to large companies and over the years I’ve compiled quite a list of SEO tools.

Within the last three weeks I’ve received over 150 requests for what tools and/or applications I use specifically for search engine optimization. Below you will find my list of tools, applications and services I use on a regular basis, I hope this information helps and keep the questions coming if they don’t! :)

Analytics:

Google Analytics
Omniture SiteCatalyst
Web CEO’s HitLense
StatsCounter

Keyword Research Tools:

WordTracker
Google AdWords Keyword Suggestion Tool
Microsoft Ad Intelligence (Excel 2007 Plug in)
Web CEO
SEOBook Keyword Suggestion Tool
SEO for Firefox

Link Analysis Tools:

SEOElite
Web CEO
SEO for Firefox

Competitive Research Tools:

HitWise
Alexa
Compete
SpyFu
Quantcast
DomainTools

SERP Rank Research & Reporting:

Web CEO
SEOBook Rank Checker
Rank Tracker
Free Monitor for Google

SEO Web Browser Tools:

The Best SEO Plug-ins for Firefox

If you have suggestions on SEO tools please comment on this post, I’m always looking for tools to save me time and headaches!

Here is a quick and easy way to track page names in WebCEO’s HitLens analytics application by changing a couple variables in the tracking script. This works perfectly in Community Server 2008!

First let’s take the original code generated by HitLense:

<!–WEBSITECEO:BEGIN:{764EEF2E-BC11-45CF-8627-300CE1BA2219}–>

<!–
Do NOT modify this script to avoid traffic misrepresentation!
Web CEO 4 0300/1
Code initially inserted into: “index.aspx”.
–>
<script type=”text/javascript”><!–
// hitlens v1.2.7
function hitlens_embedded() {
var id = 123456;
var pc = 0;
var PAGENAME = escape(”);
var CONTENTGROUP = escape(”);
var TRANSACTION = escape(”);
var TRANSACTION_ID = 0;
var ORDER = escape(”);
return “id=”+id+”&pc=”+pc+”&p=”+PAGENAME+”&gr=”+CONTENTGROUP+”&tr=”
+TRANSACTION+”&trid=”+TRANSACTION_ID+”&ord=”+ORDER;
}
//–></script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”/webceo.js”></script>
<!–WEBSITECEO:END:{764EEF2E-BC11-45CF-8627-300CE1BA2219}–>

Now lets add a quick line of code to the var PAGENAME = variable:

var PAGENAME = document.title;

What this will do is pull the page’s title and post it in HitLense.

The default tracking code HitLense generates also throws in the following comment that needs to be removed completely:

<!–
Do NOT modify this script to avoid traffic misrepresentation!
Web CEO 4 0300/1
Code initially inserted into: “index.aspx”.
–>

Also make sure to leave the var pc = 0; at 0. The var pc is a unique page identifier, if you use specialized tracking (like above) instead of the wizard-driven setup then you’ll definitely need to keep it at 0 or your going to run into some problems.

Your final tracking code should look like this:

<!–WEBSITECEO:BEGIN:{764EEF2E-BC11-45CF-8627-300CE1BA2219}–>
<script type=”text/javascript”><!–
// hitlens v1.2.7
function hitlens_embedded() {
var id = 123456;
var pc = 0;
var PAGENAME = document.title;
var CONTENTGROUP = escape(”);
var TRANSACTION = escape(”);
var TRANSACTION_ID = 0;
var ORDER = escape(”);
return “id=”+id+”&pc=”+pc+”&p=”+PAGENAME+”&gr=”+CONTENTGROUP+”&tr=”
+TRANSACTION+”&trid=”+TRANSACTION_ID+”&ord=”+ORDER;
}
//–></script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”/webceo.js”></script>
<!–WEBSITECEO:END:{764EEF2E-BC11-45CF-8627-300CE1BA2219}–>

Good luck!

As you all know I am an avid user of Web CEO for my SEO/SEM solutions company. Although there are a few other tools and applications I use, Web CEO is by far the most powerful and stable application I have ever used in this field. I easily spend the majority of my day using Web CEO for just about all steps of my search engine optimization for all my clients.

Become an expert in SEO quickly and easily:

* Web CEO software package consisting of 12 potent tools to organize your efforts
* Professional Training Course in Search Engine Marketing to learn all the best practices

Web CEO is a full-range search engine optimization software with advanced site troubleshooting and web analytics functionality. Here are a few facts about Web CEO:

The choice of 440,000+ businesses.
Web CEO stands on guard of the rankings of IBM and Motorola. These companies have no right to make mistakes. What about you?

Simple and user-friendly.
Packed with powerful features, Web CEO still can boast an ultra user-friendly interface that turns a novice into an SEO expert right away after installation.

Completely Safe.
Employing Google API and cutting-edge human emulation techniques, Web CEO makes the optimization process absolutely safe for you and your site. Some of the important tools you will find in the package will help you:

* Get suggestions for new keywords relevant to your business and research your own keywords
* Get optimization advice and tweak your Web pages in friendly editing environment
* Create link partnerships
* Keep track of your site’s rankings and links
* Get comprehensive real-time visitor reports

I’m sure your looking at this like I just wrote a sales pitch but if you’ve read my blog before you’ll know I don’t sell a damn thing. In addition to that fact - WebCEO is free! Just download, install and get your rank on.

Download the free edition of Web CEO and get access to the Training Course now!

In addition to Web CEO’s awesome application and training program I totally recommend that you grab the latest copy of SEO Book by Aaron Wall. It doesn’t matter how much you know about search engine optimization/marketing, SEO Book is by far one of the best (if not THE BEST) reference and training materials available today.

That. Just. Happened.

I use a great application called WebCEO to track and manage various parts of my SEO/SEM efforts. As much as I would like to get into how awesome their software and support is I would rather talk about the people behind WebCEO.

A couple days before Christmas I received an envelope from Kherson, Ukraine. I wasn’t sure why I had received a letter from the Ukraine considering I don’t know anyone from there, I thought it was some sort of mistake or just a marketing piece. I opened the envelope and pulled out a very rich and shiny holiday card with a little WebCEO logo at the bottom. I figured it was just a holiday promotion printed in the masses - I was wrong.

I opened the card and found a long, had written letter addressed to me - wishing me a safe and happy holiday season. The letter was well written and by the looks of it not rushed at all. In addition the letter never once mentioned anything about business, their products, money, or a holiday deal - just a letter hoping and wishing I have a wonderful holiday.  WOW.

Now this is what I call great marketing, you see they didn’t have to mention what they are about or what they are selling - not even a holiday coupon or discount - just a hand written personal letter directed to me. It made me feel great! I was very impressed with what I saw and very happy to be a customer of theirs. More importantly (for them) it made me think about WebCEO and their products.

In my opinion this is the kind of thing that separates companies apart; even though there aren’t many comparable applications to WebCEO available today I would stick with WebCEO regardless. Something like this shows me (the customer) that I am important to them and they care about me and my business (which they do).
Take note of this guys, a great marketing campaign with little cost and a bigger impact than you could imagine. Thank you WebCEO - Happy Holidays!