What Are On Page Optimization Tools?
On-page search engine optimization tools analyze the top search results to give you a quick outline of the factors or optimization points that should be included in your page in order to compete and rank in the top ten results. Most of them use correlation data to help point out which adjustments could have the most impact on ranking. If this is your first time using a tool like this, sign up for SERPWoo so you can test out their free plan (no credit card required).
After this page is indexed, I’ll run it through each of the following tools and add in screenshots of the reports to help you choose which will suit your needs best. Like many other things in SEO, the best one will depend on your budget, tactics, and whether you dig deep when optimizing a page or rather work fast and use something similar to the 80/20 rule to get a good ROI with less time invested.
Surfer SEO
Surfer SEO is the first on page SEO tool we’ll cover. Its a web app that analyzes more than 500 on page signals and then uses correlation data to give you a step by step “recipe” for ranking on the first page of Google’s search results. It analyzes the top 100 SERP results to calculate this data and then provide it in multiple easy to use forms like graphs.
Surfer analyzes 500+ on-page signals in one sweep
You can individually look at a graph for each factor to see how your site compares to the top competitors. This makes it easy to see if you are within the average range for a given factor or too high or too low. Some of the factors I commonly check are word count, # of exact keywords, exact keyword density, partial keyword density, etc.
Features
- SERP Analyzer & Correlation
- On & Off Page Analysis
- Content Editor
- SEO Audits
- NLP Analysis
- Keyword Research & Clustering
Pricing
Surfer uses a freemium pricing model. The free plan gives you 3 free credits to use with the SERP analyzer each day. It does have a free 7 day trial for the paid plans. After that, they start at $29 per month.
The only downside is that Surfer does provide a large amount of data and it can be overwhelming to new users. If you have experience with other on page tools you should pick it up and start seeing results right away. However, as soon as you are used to it, its some of the most actionable data you can get.
SERPWoo
SERPWoo is much more than just an on page SEO software. It started out as a SERP tracking tool that tracks the top 100 results for your keywords. This is much more useful than normal rank trackers, but we’ll cover that in depth in another post. Their SERP analysis tool, named ZORA, is a web app that analyzes the top 100 results for variety of signals and highlights which factors correlate with higher rankings.
Features
- SERP Analyzer & Correlation
- SERP Tracker
- Keyword Research
I really like their filtering feature since it allows you to quickly narrow down the list to only the factors that correlate highly and should have the most impact on your rankings. If I make changes, I want to get the maximum impact out of the time invested and SERPWoo has been the best tool I’ve found for that. I occasionally use Surfer if I need to dig deeper, but SERPWoo is the first option I always start with.
If you can avoid using a more in depth tool like Surfer or Cora its well worth the time savings, however I have listed SERPWoo second because it currently doesn’t let you dig into the individual factors quite as much as some of the other options. They were really open to suggestions and will be adding more features in the near future, so I am hoping they can come up with something amazing that both makes it easy to use and analyze in depth.
SERPWoo is one of my favorite all in one SEO tools. Their paid plans start at $49 per month, but they do have the free plan that does not require a credit card. It gives you the ability to track not only your own rankings but also your competitors, analyze the SERP results and highlight actionable data, perform keyword research, and monitor mentions of your brand or keywords (great for staying alert to relevant conversations across the web that you can jump into and pull traffic from). Its the one software that I use daily for my SEO projects.
Page Optimizer Pro
Page Optimizer Pro (aka POP) is slightly different than the other tools mentioned since it helps you optimize your page based on pages you input. It was created by Kyle Roof who is well known in the SEO testing community. When starting a page, you can enter the top ten results to get your page on par with theirs. After that you could select the top two or three results to get your page dialed in close to theirs. This does allow for some fine tuning based your decisions on which pages to target. For example, some people remove pages that are nothing like their page.
One example would be a local business that is competing against other local businesses but also directory sites like Yelp, etc. You have the choice to include the directories or leave them out. Some people remove them because it won’t make sense to have your page optimized the same as theirs. Other people leave them in since it is one of the top results, removing it could throw off the averages you are optimizing for. I usually checked it out both ways and started with whichever seemed more natural, but made more adjustments later if needed.
Features
- You Select The Target Pages To Optimize For
- Uses Key Optimization Points The Creator Found From SEO Tests
- Less Data – Makes It The Fastest To Use And Very Actionable
- Lowest Price
Pricing
Page Optimizer Pro offers a 7 day free trial. Their paid plans start at $20 per month and include 12 reports each month.
Overall I really liked Page Optimizer Pro. I’ve had really good results with it in the past, but have since started using tools that allow me to dig deeper because I feel I can get a better overview of any specific optimizations (or lack thereof) that Google seems to be rewarding.
Cora SEO
Cora is one of the most in depth analysis tools we cover on this page. It was created by Ted Kubaitis who is very knowledgeable and well known when it comes to SEO and SEO testing. It can measure over 2,000 factors across the top 100 search results and help you identify which will impact your page the most. One major difference between Cora and its alternatives is that it needs to be downloaded and run from your computer or a VPS. This can be better for keeping you niche private, but it can also lead to your computer running slow. You shouldn’t need proxies unless you are an very heavy user.
Cora SEO Software is an expert level SEO Diagnostics tool that measures up to 2040 ranking factors and identifies the strongest ones and tells you exactly how much of each one your page needs!
It is a great tool for analyzing Google updates since it can measure the differntial between reports from before and after the update. Showing you any factors that were strongly correlated with high rankings before the update that are now less important. It can also highlight any new factors that are strongly correlated with high rankings, possibly indicating what Google is now favoring.
Ted has done a great job turning the crazy amount of data that Cora outputs into something actionable in his SEO Roadmap. See the example roadmap below. He also has detailed documentation that explains each of the individual factors so there is no confusion.
Features
- SEO Roadmap
- Over 2000 Factors (some are optional)
- On & Off Page Factors
- 12 Reports In Total
- Unlimited Keywords and Websites
Pricing
Cora is the most expensive tool on this list at $250 per month. However they do have a Cora Lite version that can measure up to 550 factors for $125 per month. There are people who sell Cora reports on marketplaces like Fiverr. This is what I typically use when I run into tough keywords and get to the point where updates are barely moving the needle.
Cora is better suited for expert level SEO’s since it gives you a boatload of data to act upon. It will show you exactly how your page differs from the top search results in terms both on page and off page.
Cora Lite
Cora Lite is similar to Cora, but was designed to be much easier to use. It measures up to 556 on page factors.
Features
- Up To 556 On Page Factors
- Unlimited Keywords And Websites
- Brandable Reports
Cora Lite is priced at $125 per month. This makes it closer to being in line with the other software listed, but even then its still the more expensive than all of the alternatives.
