Do You really Need an SEO Tool to Grow Your Website?
The effectiveness of SEO tools is debatable.
Most online tutorials recommend you to signup for an SEO tool to grow your website traffic,
They make it sound like it’s almost impossible to get more traffic without one.
Alright, before I dismiss the idea, there are levels to this.
SEO tools can be used by anyone with web property. Anyone with an App, Blog, Website, Freelance business, 9-5 job demanding SEO, etc. can benefit from it.
If you’re an SEO professional or you have a corporate job in a web development firm, you NEED an SEO tool. There is no way around it.
There are just so many tasks you won’t be able to do without an SEO tool to accomplish certain goals as an SEO professional.
It allows you to do site audits, creates local SEO optimization checks, discovers backlink opportunities, scans for poor pages and more.
However, a blogger has different needs. A typical blogger would need an SEO tool to
An SEO tool would sure to be a catalyst for growth for many bloggers.
But is it absolutely essential?
How much does a blogger need to rely on an SEO tool?
That depends on what kind of blogger you are. There are 2 cases in which you may or may not.
Case 1: Content Focused Blogger
Not much.
If I speak from personal experience, not a bit.
When it comes to using SEO tools, I’ve used many of the popular companies.
Over the last 4 and a half years, I’ve used Ahrefs, SEMrush, Mangools, Spyfu, Magistic SEO, Moz, ScreamingFrog, and many more.
Along with other tools such as SEOProfiler, Google’s keyword planner and free tools such as Thruuu and Varvy.
None of these tools have contributed anything towards the growth of BforBloggers or any other blogs I’ve owned in the past.
As a marketer for consultation, they have been quintessential. I can’t work for any client and not use SEMrush or ScreamingFrog.
SEO tools fulfill my requirements like sending a client an SEO audit, analyzing their content traffic to keyword ratio, cannibalization, redirection errors and so on.
But as a blogger, they have been no use of.
Partly, because I’ve never used them for building niche websites. And you absolutely don’t need to.
The only SEO tool that ever proved useful to me as a content creator, is AnswerThePublic.
AnswerThePublic as many would say, isn’t an SEO tool. It is a content research tool, built for content marketers.
Put any keyword in AnswerThePublic, and it will show you questions asked by users of Google and other search engines.
This gives you an idea of what you should be including in your content. If you include some of the relevant questions on your content, chances of getting traffic from hundreds of different keywords increase.
It’s a nice tactic that works for me very well.
And by using AnswerThePublic, I don’t need a keyword research tool.
I don’t actively build backlinks for my blog, so I don’t use any backlink checker as well.
All I need an SEO tool for is to perform site audits. But it happens only once in a month.
So, when you notice something wrong with your websites such as traffic downfall, high bounce rate, low conversion and errors in the search console, you might need an SEO audit.
Which is extremely easy to conduct using tools like SEMrush.
In my case, I don’t need an SEO tool. I can still manage to grow without it as I’ve done so far.
Using them would of course same my time and give me peace of my mind.
So if you can afford to buy one without cutting costs in your marketing and content production, go for it. It’s worth it.
If you can’t, no worries. You can still grow exponentially, by implementing smart inbound marketing strategies.
Case 2: Conversion and Profit Focused Blogger
But when tables are turned, and you are a blogger with ambition for high profits, what then?
The different league of bloggers includes those who build niche blogs. A niche blog is a highly content focused blog that covers a very narrow set of topics. Take watches for example.
A blog that publishes articles only on watches is a niche blog.
Niche blogs are a good source of income. If you’re able to hit the right topic with the right blog posts, you might be able to earn very high revenue.
Niche bloggers don’t even start a new blog without researching through an SEO tool.
The main focus of a niche blog is to generate as much profit as possible. Which can only happen if you are in a niche that has high-ticket products and a targeted audience ready to make a transaction.
Roughly speaking, most of the niche blogs promote affiliate products. You won’t find them using other monetization methods such as AdSense or selling products.
And affiliate marketing requires high quality, persuasive content along with tons of organic traffic to make money.
So, to keep getting more and more traffic every month, bloggers need to actively research high traffic and low competition keywords. They need to study their competition, to find content gaps to capitalize.
None of which can happen without an SEO tool. Specifically, Keyword Research and Competitor analysis tools.
That’s why a niche blogger, who’s looking to built multiple blogs to generate profits has to rely on SEO tools.
Conclusion
The bottom line is – if you are looking to make more money online, get an SEO tool. It’s going to help you achieve your revenue goals.
But every good SEO tool is premium. Certainly not priced for a beginner.
There are a few affordable SEO tools you can choose from:
- Mangools – best for beginners, multiple SEO tools in one plan. Read full Mangools review.
- LongTailPro – cheap, but a highly effective keyword research tool
- ProWritingAid – not an SEO tool technically, but it does help you write better. A great editor to improve your content readability and structure.
This means if you are comfortable investing money into your blog, go for it. It’s an investment, not an expenditure. Over the time, it will pay for itself.
If you’re some who’s not focused on investing huge sums of money to get more traffic, you don’t need an SEO tool. It’s not necessary.
I’ve grown BforBloggers to a six-figure blog without any SEO tool. I’ve free access to SEMrush, LongtailPro, AnswerThePublic and others – but I use them for review and tutorials. Never for personal projects.
All you need is patience and hard work. Success will come as soon as you go for it.
You can gradually grow your blog by consistently publishing high-quality content. With proper on-page SEO implementations and active link building, you’ll grow faster.
I hope you’re enjoying the BforBloggers Success Series.
If you’ve any questions, let me know in the comments below.