Starting tools for SEO

**LeilaDee** · 12-16-2008 10:50 AM

If you dig a little into the on-line marketing world, you will discover a golden well of hype and information about SEO. If you are just starting out on this road, you might be inclined to display a large amount of enthusiasm and decide you definitely want in on this interesting yet challenging exercise – even if its only for a single website. After you make this decision, the logical next step is to ponder on where to start.

The first step is research. One of the best things about SEO is that you never stop learning what works and what doesn't and how to tweak things to work on different websites. The internet is your best friend and worst enemy on this matter – there so much information out there. If you can't spend much time doing all of the research you need to, there are many, many tools to help you get started and to keep track of what is going on in your niche or with your website.

Again, the internet can be your best friend or worst enemy on this matter. Looking for tools can be time consuming in that you have to find the right ones for you, the ones that are legitimate and the ones with the good reputations. For starting out you will be able to find keyword research tools, meta tag generators (although it would probably be better if you generated these yourself especially if you have a small site), tools that work out the size of your pages (too big and Google won't like them, neither will your visitors) and of course there are blogs and tutorials to help you.

Some examples of “getting started” SEO tools are:

WordTracker – general keyword research tool, one of the best known in the SEO industry. You have to pay for the service but there is a free trial.
Google Adwords keyword tool – Free keyword research tool, specify keywords or enter your URL for keyword performance data.
Meta tag generator tool – Free tool to help you make sure your keyword and description meta tags are formed correctly
Page size tool – Free tool to help you determine the size of your web page
Web developers cheat sheet – PDF file containing SEO friendly tips and hints for the coding of your site.
XML sitemap creation tool – Free creation of a site map in XML format to help the search engines index your site after it has been created and launched.
Robots.txt creation tool – Free creation of a file that tells the search engines if there are any folders or pages you want to be excluded from indexing
Code validators – Free tools that will inform you of any CSS, HTML or linking errors on your site.

There is a wide range of SEO tools out there, not only to help you when you are building new sites but to “spy” on competitors and track your site performance as well. Analytics tools or competitive research tools are a dime a dozen, you can search for them now if you like but I will be giving a list of such tools in the next few days.

What are your favourite tools to help you get started on the SEO of a new website?