My “Secret” SEO Toolkit

September 23, 2009

Recently – I’ve been pushing out some sites that are doing very well in the search engines (and doing it very quickly). Now, while I can’t give away EVERY secret for this, I can let you know some of the tools I’m using to make this happen.

We’d all like to think that we can manage on our own without any help – and, eventually, maybe you can. But, if you want to move quickly – and get your site out there and ranking (or make some drastic improvements to your site) it helps to have several tools at hand to make life a bit easier.  The beauty of it is, none of these things are all that expensive, and they aren’t garbage “Secret SEO Software” that will rip you off for  a couple hundred bucks. Each of these tools has paid for itself in time saved and results.

Be forewarned though – you still have to put in some work to make things happen here, but this is a really good start. Here’s the cocktail I’ve used to get to the top 5 in several competitive categories:

Shoemoney PPC/SEO Tools.  Hands down the best deal in intensive niche research. Jeremy is letting you try this out for $3.95…so it’s cost effective way to test it out.

Thesis Wordpress Theme. Wordpress is the best blog engine out there, and Thesis is the best way to leverage it. I credit the super-SEO readiness of this theme with about 60% of my recent success. Watch the video and see for yourself.

Nichebot Keyword Research. It’s not the prettiest, but it’s the best value.  Lots of ways to generate more, and better, keywords for SEO and PPC.

Cheap/Awesome Hosting Services – Hostgator has provided me with incredible customer service – and more importantly, has a push button Wordpress Installer that is second to none. You can’t beat $4/month for high-quality hosting.

Lastly, you want to makes sure that you get active in Google Webmaster Tools – it’s great intelligence for further optimization, and is a huge benefit in getting your entire site indexed.

(disclosure – I should tell you that if you purchase any of these products, I’ll be paid a small affiliate fee.  If you’re not cool with that, just take the affiliate code out of the link…I’d recommend them anyway, because we’re friends)