Dozens of Marketers Share How They Choose Which SEO Tool to Use and Buy

On March 28, 2019, Kevin Indig, VP of SEO & Content at G2.com, tweeted a question that sparked some good discussion on how to find the best SEO tools to use.

With 45 replies and dozens of sub replies, we were able to compile a great list from a host of digital marketers and SEOs.

These are the sources people said they use to find SEO tools:

• Peers/Network/Co-workers/Mentors (17 mentions)
• SEO articles, blog reviews and case studies mentioning SEO Tools (13 mentions)
• Twitter (9 mentions)
• Event/Conference speakers and sponsors (5 mentions)
• Google (4 mentions)
• Webinars, YouTube videos (3 mentions)
• @G2CrowdReviews (2 mentions)
• Product Hunt (2 mentions)
• LinkedIn
• AppSumo
• Detailed.com
• Ahrefs blog
• Backlinko blog
• Moz blog
• Google Trends
• Forums
• Search Engine Journal
• Magazine articles
• Reddit
• GitHub

And then this is how they determine whether or not to use/buy the tool they find:

David Iwanow (@davidiwanow) suggested the following:

• CS support and post sales service
• Willingness to improve the product and fix issues/bugs (not shrug them off)
• Aggressively adding to and improving the product
• Proactive support

Alexandra Tachalova (@AlexTachalova) looks to the source:

• Try to understand the {SEO Tools} data source. There are a HUGE number of tools simply reselling someone else’s data.

Arnoldo Cabrera (@spanskseo) looks for the following:

• It is scalable multilingual, geographies, data set
• provides api connectivity not only to your data but to your toolbox
• time saving, e.g. reporting time
• it has good support and product managers listen to the user feedback
• enable cross collaboration outside seo team

Matt Ramage (@ramagetime)

• Cost and ease of use. And, of course, the data.

Hardik Oza (@Ozaemotion) lists the following:

• Freshness of data
• Quality of data rather than quantity
• Number of users
• Support

Kelly Stanze (@KellyStanze) offers:

• Similar clientele and their happiness
• The tool features itself, and how data for those tools is supplied/supported
• Support – do we get an account team? What’s included?
• Pricing structure (don’t nickel and dime me)
• Innovation

Seb Adler (@seoseb) advises:

• Does it state to be the all-in-one solution → skip it
• Do a trial, test it on a real life project, check against existing workflows. Does it automate workflows oder provide additional insights? If so:
• Does it integrate well in our data warehousing.

Damien Anderson (@echwa) suggests you:

• Understand and document needs
• Ask select vendors to demonstrate to needs

Willow Colios (@willowcolios) puts forward these thoughts:

• Can you align the tool with team processes and workflow?
• Is it usable for those that use it every day/week?
• Is it a good fit for the organisation
• Right spec at the right price?

Adam J. Humphreys (@Making8) offers some great insight:

• Features, UX (time savings, compatibly with other platforms, easily exported reports, actionable data summaries), price compared to others (this really matters as some are 2500 a month per client)
• The best way to engage with us is letting influencers in search test it then blog about it on a main journal.
• One can’t really win over our industry without letting us test it out and given our time constraints we often don’t get to use it right away so capping amount of uses vs time is also best.”

Biggest Takeaway: Use your network to find tools that they love and would recommend. If at all possible, sign up for a trial run to find out if it can solve your needs and will be compatible with your processes and workflows.

It may be cool but is it the right fit?