Best SEO Tools For A Membership Website In 2024
Discover the ultimate SEO plugins & services for membership websites in 2024. Elevate your site’s ranking and drive more traffic now with regular special co-host Haroon Q. Raja.
Uncover the top SEO plugins and services tailored specifically for membership websites in 2024. Learn how to optimize your site for search engines and attract more members with these cutting-edge tools. Stay ahead of the competition and boost your website’s visibility with our expert recommendations. Don’t miss out on this essential guide.
This Week Show’s Sponsors
LifterLMS: LifterLMS
Convesio: Convesio
Omnisend: Omnisend
#1 – Yoast SEO
https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/
Prices Free | Premium $99
#2 – RankMath
Prices Free | Pro $6.99 | Business $20.99
#3 – SEOPress
Prices Free | Pro $149
#4 AIOSEO – (All in One SEO)
Prices Free | Basic $49.60 per year | Plus $99.60 | Pro $199.60
#5 – Broken Link Checker
Price Free
#6 – Redirection
Price Free
#7 – LinkWhisper
Prices 1 Site License $67
#8 – KWFinder
https://mangools.com/kwfinder/
Prices Entry $19.90 per month | Basic $29.90 per month | Premium $44.99 per month
#9 – Ahrefs
Prices $129 | Standard $249 | Advance $449 per month
#10 – SEMRUSH
Prices Pro $139 | Guru $249 | Business $499
The Show’s Main Transcript
[00:00:00.000] – Jonathan Denwood
Welcome back, folks, to another Membership Machine Show. I’m just going to go straight into it. It’s a great subject. I’ve got my regular co-host, Haroon, with me. He’s rested. He’s had a bit of a sleep. So 3, 2, 1. Welcome back, folks, to the Membership Machine Show. This is episode 83. In this episode, we’re going to be discussing the best SEO tools for a Membership website in 2024. It’s a really important subject, especially if you’re using WordPress, and we all recommend that you do that. I’ve got my regular co-host, Harun, with me on these shows. Harun, would you like to introduce yourself to the new listeners and viewers?
[00:00:52.840] – Haroon Q. Raja
Certainly. Thank you, Jonathan. Hi, everyone. This is Harun. I’ve been working with WordPress for quite a long time now, a decade and a half, and in the tech industry in general for two and a half decades. Over the years, one of the things that I’ve been doing pretty much throughout my career is SEO because I used to work in the field of content for many years, wrote for some technology tools, and then took care of their content strategy. Everything about that was built all around SEO. That’s why today’s session is much more special to me.
[00:01:31.990] – Jonathan Denwood
He’s a man of many talents. There we go. In this show, we’re going to be talking about some of the best WordPress SEO plugins, some of the best SaaS software as a service, Service tools, subscription tools, and some of the up-and-coming AI tools. It’s going to be a fantastic discussion. I’m sure you’re going to get some value. But before we go into the meat and potatoes of this great show. I’ve got a couple of messages from our major sponsors. We will be back in a few moments, folks. Three, two, one. We’re coming back, folks. I want to point out that we’ve got a great course that shows you how to build a membership website in 2024 on WordPress from the beginning to the end. It usually’s It’s only around $49, but if you go to this URL, you get a coupon code and you can get it for half price, plus a created list of the best WordPress plugins and services, plus some special offers from the sponsors, what more could you ask for? And you get all these goodies by going over to wp-tonic. Com/deals, wp-tonic. Com. Com/deals, and you find all the goodies there.
[00:03:04.670] – Jonathan Denwood
What more could you ask for? Probably a lot more, but that’s all you’re going to get from that page. I’m sorry to disappoint. I’ve made a career of it. There we go. Yeah, it should have got a grin. It’s got a grin for Haroon. He’s used to my disaster. Haroon, what do you think… I think we need the intro. We got a list of about four or five of the best WordPress SEO plugins, and then we got some other tools. I’ve mashed it all up, but I think it’s an exciting list. So how would you introduce this conversation? Harrod?
[00:03:47.020] – Haroon Q. Raja
Well, when it comes to SEO, using a CMS like WordPress shines because with anything else, with most other methods of putting your website out there, especially custom-coded ones, you have to implement everything related to SEO manually using a custom… Am I still here?
[00:04:15.220] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, you can just come back. You froze for a couple of seconds. Oh, okay.
[00:04:19.260] – Haroon Q. Raja
Sorry about that. Let me switch to the…
[00:04:22.400] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, he’s going to hopefully come back, folks. He’s frozen. He needs to put money in the meter, folks, before he comes on podcast.
[00:04:31.500] – Haroon Q. Raja
I’ve got two internet connections at times. One doesn’t work that well, so I switched to the other one. Is it better now?
[00:04:38.100] – Jonathan Denwood
Yes, it’s superb. So off you go.
[00:04:40.680] – Haroon Q. Raja
Okay. Without a CMS like WordPress, if it’s a custom build, especially in something like Laravel or not using a mainstream CMS, you’re stuck with very limited options. In SEO, you’ve got to do it all in code. With WordPress, and to some extent, other CMSes like Joomla and Drupal as well, you get way better control over SEO compared to fully custom-coded solutions. But even among CMSes, WordPress is way ahead in terms of the options you have for SEO. You install a plugin.
[00:05:15.520] – Jonathan Denwood
How would you compare it to something like Kajabi or Teachable or Finkific, three? How would you compare where WordPress is with SEO compared to those three leading membership platforms or something like Mighty Networks as well?
[00:05:37.010] – Haroon Q. Raja
Those SaaS platforms, while they do have some built-in SEO controls, mostly because, hey, you can’t do without them, But in terms of flexibility and full control, they don’t come anywhere near the options you have in the world of WordPress.
[00:05:54.040] – Jonathan Denwood
I think the other thing we got to clear up is that we’re going to, at the start, look at about four or five of the leading WordPress plugins, and some of them are excellent. But just installing a WordPress SEO plugin is about, in my opinion, like one of what you really got to understand and what you got to do. It fundamentally, it’s a tool, but it fundamentally won’t do SEO. And I think for a lot of people at the beginning of their journey around this subject, they really don’t understand that. I think one or two of the plugins actually promote this confusion in a way. Would you agree with that statement?
[00:06:45.630] – Haroon Q. Raja
I agree because, again, as you pointed out, it’s just a tool. Just the way WordPress is a tool, it won’t build your site for you. You’ve got to build the site yourself. Similarly, SEO plugin is a tool. It won’t do SEO for you. You’ve got to use it to do the SEO yourself. So having the concepts cleared is a great first start. In fact, in addition to this session, we’d probably do another session on SEO where we’ll talk specifically about the concepts rather than the tools.
[00:07:18.480] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, so I think that probably next time you’re on the show, we do that. Actually, that’s a great idea, actually, Aru. Because I think in some ways we’re talking about tools, but maybe we should have done the concept first.
[00:07:32.730] – Haroon Q. Raja
But I think- Actually, come to think of it, if you don’t mind, we can go ahead with the concepts today and do the tools in the next one. What do you say about that?
[00:07:40.950] – Jonathan Denwood
No, in a preferred way, I think that getting people I think this title and talking about these tools, I think it gets them interested, and then I think we can then explain why the concept element is also so important I think if you’ve done the concept first, it’s understandable, but I think people, they might switch off first. I’m not explaining it very well, but I think you understand, don’t you? I understand.
[00:08:17.170] – Haroon Q. Raja
I’m good about that.
[00:08:18.300] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah. So let’s start. But it won’t be next week, folks, but the following week we’ll do about the more broader concepts. So you really want to listen to both these shows, folks, to get a really understanding. I think you’ll find it very useful. So let’s jump in into the most popular, still in the WordPress space, but funny enough, the one that I don’t use myself anymore. Likewise. And I definitely wouldn’t recommend anybody to use it. So that’s Yoast SEO. So can you give a quick outline of what it is and why you agree that you don’t use it and why you don’t recommend it?
[00:09:11.410] – Haroon Q. Raja
Well, frankly speaking, because there are better products out there that cost less and are less intrusive in their advertising in the back-end of getting you to not just upgrade to the Pro version, but also buy all of the premium extensions in addition to So, yeah, Yoast is the old big one that was pretty much de facto SEO plugin in the WordPress ecosystem for several years back in the day until other options started to surface and really get their market share. It does the job. It’s not particularly impressive in that you just install and it gives you the entire set of tools that you need in one package, no. Or even as a free version, giving enough to not need the Pro version for many small business sites. Gets the job done at a basic level. That’s pretty much about it. For anything really advanced, you need its Pro version. And if you are going to invest money into it, then there are way, way, way better options out there that are not intrusive in terms of taking over the back-end admin dashboard with upsells and whatnot.
[00:10:27.360] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, my position on this is the free version. I would never, never recommend anybody to pay for the premium version of this plugin. I think it’s a little bit of a rip-off. The free version, my understanding from my developer team is that it does really odd things with 404 redirects and other things that can really drive my development team to literally drink and despair, basically. Has that also been something that you found?
[00:11:03.380] – Haroon Q. Raja
I haven’t used it in at least half a decade ever since I switched to better options. But yes, back in the day, it had its quirks. One thing or the other would mess up often with some update.
[00:11:15.560] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, so we don’t recommend. If we got a client that’s hosting with us and they’re using it, we don’t say, Don’t use it, because it’s not a security or a dreadful performance issue. But on the other hand, if they ask for advice or if it’s a new website, we definitely do not use it. And we would recommend that you don’t. They’re much better free and premium solutions that we’re just about to talk about. So let’s talk about one of them. It’s not one that I would recommend, but it’s not one I know too much about, but I do know a lot of people do like it, and that’s Rank Math. So what’s your thoughts about Rank Math, and what do you see as quickly, some of its strengths and weaknesses?
[00:12:10.080] – Haroon Q. Raja
Well, it’s a great plugin to start with. The free version gives you plenty of good options. It’s captured a lot of market share in a very small time compared to many old ones that have been around. And performance-wise, too, it’s I found it to be better than Yoast. It’s not my first choice. I’d probably call it my second or third choice. We’re going to come to my first choice. You can’t really go wrong with it if you are using it. If you are using it, if you’re using Yoast, I would probably recommend you to switch to a better option. But if you’re using Rank Math, I wouldn’t exactly be like, Hey, you need to switch to a better one. It works. It’s a good plugin. I haven’t used their Pro version, but But I’ve heard mixed results from people who have used the Pro version. I didn’t have the occasion to use it. But for me, on some sites where I tried the free version, it got the job done well.
[00:13:14.460] – Jonathan Denwood
I’ve chosen about four here. There’s a lot more out there, but I think these are the four main players. Would you agree with the four? Or do you think that…
[00:13:26.340] – Haroon Q. Raja
Go on, sorry. I’ve added a couple to the list. Just right about now. I’m just going to briefly talk about those two as well because I think they’re very good.
[00:13:35.430] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, I’ll leave those to the end. Surprise me because I haven’t looked at your updated list. He’s trying to surprise me, listeners and viewers. I’m too old for that. Let’s talk about another one which I think I’ve utilized, and I think the free version is quite excellent. I think a lot of people are using it, and that’s SEO Press. What’s your thoughts, its strengths and weaknesses, and your general thoughts about this one?
[00:14:07.380] – Haroon Q. Raja
Since around 2018, was it late ’17 or early ’18, I switched to SEO Press, and I’ve never looked back at anything else as my primary tool. All of the other ones that I’ve mentioned that I’ve tried in these years, ever since I bought SEO Press, if I’ve tried them, it has been on another client site that I already had it installed. But whenever I’ve installed one, it’s been SEO Press reason. It does every single thing I need an SEO plugin to do. It does it without hampering other functionality of the site. It does it Intrusively, I have the Pro version. I got the Lifetime Pro license when it was, I think, under a hundred dollars.
[00:14:51.770] – Jonathan Denwood
He likes his lifetime deals, folks.
[00:14:54.580] – Haroon Q. Raja
Yeah, I got it like unlimited sites, lifetime license for under a hundred bucks back in the day. It’s worth every single penny. It’s got excellent schema implementation. It’s got excellent redirection. It’s got pretty much any and everything that you’d need from a premium SEO plugin. I’ve never felt the need to even look into other options for my primary use across a lot of sites of my own as well as my clients. You just can’t go wrong with it. This is my top choice.
[00:15:27.810] – Jonathan Denwood
I think a lot of people have what you’ve just said. It’s everything that Yoast SEO should have been, and they just couldn’t be bothered to get off their lazy back somewhere.
[00:15:38.350] – Haroon Q. Raja
One more thing that I really like about it compared to Yoast is in Yoast, you start with the free version, then you feel the need for a few premium features, you buy the premium one, then you, let’s say you’re working on a publication site, you feel the need to install a video site map or new site map, and then you have to purchase other add-ons that are not part of their program Pro version. For local business, you have to add another install, purchase another paid add-on. With SEOpress, all of the Pro tools are part of the single Pro license. That’s it. You buy the Pro version, you get every single thing, and it’s very reasonably priced for that as well.
[00:16:18.860] – Jonathan Denwood
It is. It’s a fair price. I think it is $149. I think that’s a year for the Pro version.
[00:16:29.510] – Haroon Q. Raja
For unlimited For a limited site. For a single site, it’s just 99. Oh, right.
[00:16:33.370] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah.
[00:16:35.950] – Haroon Q. Raja
I’m not sure, actually.
[00:16:36.840] – Jonathan Denwood
On to the one that I use on- Actually, sorry.
[00:16:40.810] – Haroon Q. Raja
It’s 49 for five sites. So the entry-level plan, $49 for five sites is per year, it’s as good as it gets in terms of price.
[00:16:50.230] – Jonathan Denwood
I have to check this because I got the free… I have to check on that. On to the one that I use on my own properties, and it’s all in on the SEO. Before I ask Harun, I just want to make a couple observations of this plugin. I only use the free version, and the pro-version isn’t as bad in their business structure as Yose, but it is a little bit complicated. But I think the free version for what it does, and the other factor is not a SEO factor, the reason why I moved to use to lies in the free version. I also use it because you can select the image That will be shown in social media, in Facebook, in Twitter. And it’s one of the few SEO tools that offer that functionality in their free product. Free version, yeah. That’s one of the other main reasons, because otherwise it will choose normally your feature image. If your feature image is not what you want your social media feeds to utilize, that’s pragmatic. Like I say, but in its pure SEO terms, the free version, I found it what I want from it. The free version totally works for me.
[00:18:33.230] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t know if you agree with what I say or if you got a different opinion. What’s your thoughts, Harun?
[00:18:39.900] – Haroon Q. Raja
This was the primary reason why I had started using it instead of Yoast before switching to SEO press. There was a time after Yoast before SEO press, that I also used all in one SEO. But the UX and the upselling in the free version, the entire free version’s back-end dashboard was complete It felt like something taken from some other system and put into WordPress. It looked nothing like WordPress back-end. I also have that gripe with the host. It didn’t feel native, and the UX was… Well, I felt it was atrocious, so I didn’t like it much.
[00:19:17.500] – Jonathan Denwood
But in terms of features- It’s got a little bit better, but I think you’re still on the right.
[00:19:24.730] – Haroon Q. Raja
In terms of features, it was good.
[00:19:27.900] – Jonathan Denwood
I I don’t recommend somebody to buy the Pro version. Would you be in this?
[00:19:33.530] – Haroon Q. Raja
There are better options. There are better options. I wouldn’t recommend they go with the Pro version of this one. Now I’m going to discuss a couple more options that you didn’t have on your list. You’re going to surprise me.
[00:19:42.020] – Jonathan Denwood
There we go.
[00:19:44.490] – Haroon Q. Raja
One is the SEO framework. In terms of UX, in terms of sheer UX alone, this has probably got to be the best of the bunch. The UX feels as natively WordPress as it gets, and it’s modular. They’ve got extensions that add different features. But the core plugin is fully functional. If you just want a free core solution for SEO, it’s probably one of the really good options to consider. I probably wouldn’t buy the SEO Frameworks Pro version, but then the next one, the last one on the list is slim SEO. It’s a relatively new player. They’ve got a fully function traditional plugin in the free version that contains pro features of most of the other plugins. That’s one major benefit it has. In terms of performance, in terms of size, it’s probably the leanest. Along with the SEO framework, this has to be one of the leanest plugins out there in SEO. You get a lot of features for free. If you want full control over schema, schema metadata and different schema types, then you can purchase the slim SEO schema add-on. In terms of the number of schemas supported, it’s got the widest range among all SEO plugins.
[00:21:16.290] – Haroon Q. Raja
In fact, I’ve been considering getting this schema add-on for some odd schemas that are not available in SEO press schema. Seo press supports, I think, 30, 40 different schemas, and this probably supports something like 60, 70 different schemas. Most of them are covered by SEO press, but you come across some odd use case where it’s an obscure site that needs a specific type of schema that you need to manually implement in case of SEO press. But slim SEO schema has it all.
[00:21:45.930] – Jonathan Denwood
And then they’ve got another- I was really hot. I was really interrupted you. You got another one.
[00:21:51.060] – Haroon Q. Raja
Sorry, my fault. So the same one, they have just two paid around. One is for schema and the other is link manager. So that helps you build internal It suggests links. When you’re writing a post, it will suggest related links to include in that article. That’s going to help you with internal linking and keep visitors on site and increased page views of related articles. Because someone is reading an article and they come across a highly relevant link, it’s likely that they’ll click through. That helps with the SEO as well. That also includes link updater and broken link checker and orphan pages and all of such reports. That’s a useful tool. These two tools, you can purchase separately, and they’re rather reasonably priced as well. They also have lifetime licenses available. It’s a good option to consider.
[00:22:44.200] – Jonathan Denwood
We’re going to be discussing some of those issues and plugins. I got to say, Harun, that I’m very conservative when it comes to SEO plugins. I want to see a consistent track record. I’ve been tempted myself with lifetime deals, and I think when you’re trying to start a plugin and get cash flow, it’s totally okay to offer a lifetime deal. But I’ve made the choice in this particular thing that I’m not really interested in trying something new. I want to see a track record before I go down that road. But we all make different choices services. The schema thing, I was really hot on that, and I utilize… I think it’s schema Pro, and I think it’s from brainstorm the Astera people. I use that. I totally don’t bother anymore now. I don’t bother with it. It’s one of these… But everybody’s got their own different… But I’ve got a strange attitude about Google. I I don’t really trust anything they say. It goes in one year. I do register it, and it’s in my memory banks. I don’t totally… There’s this whole group of WordPress people, and it goes in one ear, and it goes out the next, and it doesn’t even register.
[00:24:21.540] – Jonathan Denwood
But I do allow it to register, but I don’t really believe anything that Google says, really. I’ve got to be honest about it. I don’t know what your attitude is, but that schema thing. So you still… I think it depends on how competitive and other variables, isn’t it?
[00:24:45.140] – Haroon Q. Raja
Case-to-case basis, yes. Every site’s SEO needs to be dealt with on a case-to-case basis. In some industries, in some locales, having the right schema implemented really make the difference. But in other industries, other locales, it may not even matter at all.
[00:25:07.290] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah. And just to give some background to the listeners and viewers, this schema theme was something introduced by Google, and it said that if you utilize a set morphology and gave information to Google in a certain structure form, that you would be blessed a little bit more with the Google pixel dust, as I call it. Your website would be the two fairies and the unicorns of Google would look more kindly on your website.
[00:25:44.170] – Haroon Q. Raja
It’s not just Google.
[00:25:45.780] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, it’s true.
[00:25:46.880] – Haroon Q. Raja
It’s like a consortium of companies and nonprofit organizations that came up with schemas to basically identify the type of data that is present on a website in cases and on a web page in other cases. So trying to make sense of data in a structured manner.
[00:26:06.310] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, it’s got more credibility because what was that other really very focused, which didn’t have other players, it was really just pushed by Google. It was a way… I forgot what it was called. It was like plain pages that didn’t have any images. They were pushing that. Can you explain? Because I think they’ve even dropped that, haven’t they? Yeah, they haven’t been doing much of this. Can you quickly explain what that was and what happened to it?
[00:26:39.010] – Haroon Q. Raja
Sure thing. So Google basically took your site, if you opted in, and If you did a bit of a setup, it took your site’s articles, posts, whatever, and stripped out a lot of unnecessary stuff from it and presented it as a page hosted on their cache, just a cache Cache, just a cached version, on their cache without any dynamic functionality in it. If it’s a membership site, you can’t really log in through AMP. But the static pages. They presented them in a way that they were faster, leaner, and served more quickly from their global in the end. That was AMP, Accelerated Mobile Pages. The primary purpose was to give people a faster experience of browsing content on mobile phones because often mobile phones didn’t have a lot of high-speed connectivity back in the day. But now, mobile It sounds pretty much everywhere, in every major city, major town, they’ve got 50 Mbps plus connectivity, usually with 4G. Having accelerated content available is not much of a concern. Google is also trying to not pay much attention to it. I don’t think they’ve officially dropped it, but it’s no longer their priority. It was one of those projects they did, which they then pretty much put on the side.
[00:27:54.670] – Jonathan Denwood
I thought it was a crappy idea from the beginning, but there we go. It was one of Google’s ideas that slide- The idea was good for content, especially for areas where bandwidth was not readily available or not cheap.
[00:28:10.070] – Haroon Q. Raja
For content consumption, it was good. But for any functionality, Cart. It didn’t have that in the first place. You can’t have an AMP site entirely that’s like a membership or e-commerce site. Only the product page would probably be on AMP. Then when you add to Cart, you have to go to the regular page because Cart functionality cannot be handled by AMP.
[00:28:30.020] – Jonathan Denwood
I thought it was worth talking about listeners and viewers because it’s just a clear example that you can’t listen to everything Google says. And if you… You got to have your critical faculties at play with anything that Google says. Obviously, you do have to listen because they dominate search. But don’t take it as gospel, anything that comes out of their mouth.
[00:29:01.200] – Haroon Q. Raja
Always take it with a grain of salt and always consider that they might drop support next year for something that they’re really promoting this year. It’s the end of the world if you don’t do it. Next year, they might drop support entirely. So yeah, always keep that in mind.
[00:29:14.860] – Jonathan Denwood
All right, we’re going to go for our break, folks. We got a list of other great plugins and resources. Great value. We will be back in a few moments after a couple of quick messages from some other sponsors. Three, two, one. We’re coming back, folks. I just want to point out we’ve got a great Facebook group, the Membership Machine Show. If you go over to Facebook, you do a search Membership Machine Show. It’s a great group. It’s got a group of great WordPress developers, people like you trying to build a WordPress business, a membership business, a community. It’s a great resource Why don’t you join? It’s totally free. We love you to be part of the ongoing discussion. So on we go. Link checkers. I just got this. I don’t know if it’s the best, the worst, the indifferent. It’s a free one. I don’t use it. I use another one. I think I use one. I use something else, actually, but I can’t remember. But maybe you can quickly explain because I think it’s useful because it does affect your SO if you’ve got a load of broken links and you’ve got a load of 404 messages.
[00:30:38.370] – Jonathan Denwood
I think I use something from TenUp, actually. I think I use theirs, and I’ve been using it for donkey’s years when I want to do redirections. So maybe you can give a brief outline what the hell we’re talking about to our learners and intermediates and what you think Where has this been on the list.
[00:31:02.440] – Haroon Q. Raja
Yes, if you’re using a free SEO plugin, it’s extremely likely that it doesn’t come with a broken link checker. Paid ones, many do, not all, but many do. Many of the good premium ones, they do come with a way to scan for broken links on your site, and many even help you fix them. But for those using free ones, you usually have to deploy a third-party plugin for checking for broken links.
[00:31:32.120] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, because I’ve got two here. I’ve got broken link check and I’ve got the redirection.
[00:31:37.780] – Haroon Q. Raja
Yeah, they’re different.
[00:31:39.350] – Jonathan Denwood
And they’re different. And if you’re not using one of these paid SEO Plugins apart from Yoast, because they probably charge you extra for every single bit of functionality with a add-on. But that’s the main thing that you don’t get with the free versions, because almost all these SEO plugins offer a good functioning free version, but you don’t get all these extra services. I’m sorry to interrupt, but I thought that was something we had to point out.
[00:32:13.890] – Haroon Q. Raja
It’s a good one, and it can help you. Basically, it does one simple job. It helps you find broken links on your site, gives you a list of them so that you can fix them. You can either redirect them or you can point them to the homepage if needed, but at least make sure that they’re no longer broken.
[00:32:39.230] – Jonathan Denwood
Because I really think it’s not going to make an enormous difference, But these little things do add up.
[00:32:47.650] – Haroon Q. Raja
Every single thing on its own may not make an enormous difference, yes, but all of them combined, yes.
[00:32:53.990] – Jonathan Denwood
I really don’t think Google… It’s a bad sign to Google if you got a site that’s got a load of broken links. I just don’t think they like it, do they?
[00:33:02.800] – Haroon Q. Raja
No one likes it because even for people, for humans, it gives a bad user experience, and Google takes user experience into account as a major factor of SEO. If people are going to get a bad experience on your site, they’re going to drop off, and Google is going to use it as a ranking factor. It’s going to rank you low.
[00:33:19.970] – Jonathan Denwood
I think we’re going to go delve into this in the next show. But I think the two main things, and you might totally disagree with me, But I think the two main things… Well, there’s probably a third. The third is domain authority, but we’re delving that in the next show. But when it comes to on-site, I think it’s external links that link to your site, and I think it’s the actual user experience, the amount of time they spend on the website. I personally feel those two factors with some other factors are the main drivers of how Google sees your site, really, don’t they? Oh, yes.
[00:34:07.070] – Haroon Q. Raja
These two are the primary factors agreed.
[00:34:09.860] – Jonathan Denwood
I’m doing well. When I’m listening to you, he normally says I’m talking a load of crap, but there we go. But he’s not the only one. I think most of the WordPress community says that Jonathan talks a load of crap. I’m so old, folks, I don’t bloody care. So on we go. On to something that was recommended to me by a very well-known SEO and social media expert who actually… Unfortunately, I’ve forgotten his name, but I will have it in the show notes. He’s been on my show for interview, my other podcast, the WP Tonic Show. Really, a lot of these SEO and social media people are a bit iffy. This guy’s rock solid. I wish I could remember his name, but he recommended this to me, and I’ve been using it for a couple of years now, and I think it’s made a difference, and it’s not ridiculously priced, and it’s reasonably easy to use. It’s basically internal links, linking content that has some relevance through keywords is important to Google. And a lot of people fail to link internal pages that have value around certain subjects together. And I think it’s another factor, not a massive factor, but it’s not a lower factor either.
[00:35:48.990] – Jonathan Denwood
I really think Google likes it, and a lot of people don’t do it. And I think doing it manually would be the best way of doing it, but it’s such a bind. So it’s this plugin, it’s called Link Whisper. What’s your thoughts? What have I basically said? Is it basically got any credibility, what I’ve just said? And Suck me, what do you think of Link Whisper?
[00:36:16.010] – Haroon Q. Raja
Oh, yes. Link Whisper is a pretty good option when it comes to… Again, as I was pointing out a little while back when discussing another one of the plugins, when I was discussing, slim SEO Link Manager add-on. So Link Whisper does the same thing. When you’re composing an article, you want to make sure that you link it to other relevant content on your site. The reason is if someone is on that page reading that article, they are probably already interested in that subject. Seeing other relevant information from your site is only going to help them browse more of your site, spend more time on your site, and learn more from your site, which is going It’s not going to benefit you in terms of user experience because the user had a great experience learning from your site, and they’re not dropping off early. They’re actually spending time on your site, and that’s going to boost your SEO because it’s taken as a SEO ranking factor, time on site. They’re not going to hit back button. You don’t want them to hit the back button to go back to the Google page. You want them to then go forward on your site.
[00:37:21.390] – Haroon Q. Raja
For that, there are two options. One is when writing an article, you remember what other related articles were already there on that website.
[00:37:30.090] – Jonathan Denwood
I remember the next day. Yeah.
[00:37:32.890] – Haroon Q. Raja
That’s not the easiest thing to do. I mean, if it’s a site with a big team and with one team member responsible for one particular niche of content on that site, then that person would probably remember that, Hey, I wrote about this yesterday. I wrote about this six months ago. But if that’s not the case, it’s not easy. For that, something that automates the process as you’re typing content, it’s suggesting you links based on the content that you’ve written. That’s like a godsend for any content.
[00:38:01.100] – Jonathan Denwood
One tip, folks, it will give you a list. If it’s got over 50 internal links, it’ll come up with a warning. But even if it’s not 50, don’t except to all their suggestions because you end up with a page we’ve covered with bloody links.
[00:38:23.050] – Haroon Q. Raja
I was going to come to that because that’s something that you really have to avoid. Because if you do that, if you link to pretty much every remotely relevant piece of content that you’ve written on your site, then Google is going to see your site not as an information-heavy site, but rather a site that’s meant to make people click on as many things as possible to get the maximum number of page views. You don’t want to send that signal. Keep it max, depending on the length of the article. If it’s a, let’s say, 1,000-word article, keep the internal links max within 5-10. If it’s a mega 5 For a 3,000-word article, then you can probably get away with even 20, 30. But for a 3, 400-word article, you probably want to stay under 5 internal links within the content of the article. And make sure they’re as relevant as they get.
[00:39:14.480] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, Just listen to Harun about that because it suggests a lot. And then it’s just let it suggest and you click insert. You definitely don’t want to do that.
[00:39:28.470] – Haroon Q. Raja
The best thing to do is to determine what are the primary keywords of that page and then insert the links that are the most closely related to those primary keywords, and keep the number reasonable, as I mentioned. Yeah.
[00:39:44.890] – Jonathan Denwood
On to some more professional-focused SEO.
[00:39:49.810] – Haroon Q. Raja
We missed one thing. We didn’t specifically discuss redirection plugin.
[00:39:54.660] – Jonathan Denwood
All right, sorry.
[00:39:55.710] – Haroon Q. Raja
We just discussed it in passing while discussing broken link checker. But I think Any redirection is worth a mention, especially for those using free SEO plugins, because it lets you redirect any link on your site to any other link, be it on your site or be it off your site, which is very, very important for broken links as well as There are more articles that you may want to repurpose. Let’s say something is no longer relevant, but it’s a page where you wrote something about a tool, like a review you wrote a couple of years ago, and now you’re writing an entirely new review. If the previous one is getting traffic, you don’t want to get rid of that traffic. You can redirect that one to the new review you’ve written. That way, any traffic that lands on that previous link is going to simply get redirected to the new article. For this and for other purposes, this is a godsend, and it’s completely free, which is a great thing. For users of premium SEO plugins like SEO Press Pro or Rank Math Premium and all, redirection is often included in those premium ones. But for free SEO plugin users, this is a godsend.
[00:41:04.400] – Haroon Q. Raja
Now, let’s move on to the next one. Yeah.
[00:41:07.600] – Jonathan Denwood
These are quasiment more professional tools. They also tend to be SaaS, software as a service. You tend to have to pay monthly or yearly. Well, you have to pay yearly with the WordPress plugins, but they tend to be a lot more… They tend to be monthly subscription models where you get a 20, 25% reduction if you pay yearly. The tools here are gradually going to be more and more expensive that we are discussing. One that I’ve been using for years, and I think even though… I wouldn’t say it’s cheap because a one-site license starts at $20, but I think you would be best with the second one up, which is basic, which is the $30 option, the one that I have, but I pay yearly, and these are the monthly prices, is KWP Finder. I was introduced this by… It used to be the content manager and director for Kinster, Brian. Brian, I forgot his second name, Jackson. Brian Jackson. Brian Jackson. He’s a friend of mine, and he’s a fantastic content writer and a real SEO expert, which through his efforts, he really helped Kinster build up their business. And he recommended and introduced me a few years ago to kWFinder.
[00:42:47.200] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s part of a suite of tools. I only use kWFinder, and it really shows… You put in a title of article that you’re thinking and writing, and it really shows you how competitive that particular term generally is going to be. This is the art, but I normally find that It also gives you a list of competitive websites that are showing up for that particular term. And it gives you a score, and the score shows you how competitive and much search volume there is for that particular term. I found it invaluable because it’s reasonably accurate. It’s not always, but normally it is. And for the price, compared to some of the other tools, I think it’s really good value, and it’s really helped me. It’s not the only tool. I have a whole suite of tools that I use. But I really think… And look, some of these other tools on the market, and that come on the market, they’re okay, but they can be a bit iffy. I think WP And I think that’s a pretty solid product.
[00:44:19.660] – Haroon Q. Raja
What’s your own- KWP Finder.
[00:44:21.040] – Jonathan Denwood
Finder, yes. So what do you think of this one?
[00:44:25.740] – Haroon Q. Raja
I’ve been using it for quite a while myself, and it’s great. Because keyword research is one of the core parts of your content strategy, which is a core factor in your SEO strategy. So if you don’t know what to write about and how to phrase it in a way that people are actually looking for what you’re writing about, then you’re not going to go a very long way in the content industry. You need to know what people are searching And Google gives you very limited access to that data. And previously, it used to give more access to that data to everyone. Now, over the years, they’ve pretty much locked it down more and more to advertisers only. So unless you are an advertiser on Google, you’d have a hard time seeing what people are searching for.
[00:45:20.790] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t trust them anyway. I mean, Google, I really don’t trust them.
[00:45:28.220] – Haroon Q. Raja
So this This tool gives you the ability to search for keywords and see what people are actually searching for. You basically It’s going to give it your keywords, and it’s going to suggest you how to actually title your articles based on related searches data that it has from over the internet. Now, how it captures all of that data and to what But still, can it capture all that data because it’s, Hey, it’s no Google, and it doesn’t have access to Google’s back end to really know exactly what people are searching for. But in my experience, it’s been fairly accurate.
[00:46:12.920] – Jonathan Denwood
You don’t really tell, did I? Because when it comes to a couple of the other tools, I think they offer Google, they offer Chrome or Firefox extensions, and that’s where they’re getting the data. But I don’t think KW Finders ever really explains where they get the data from, have they? You would agree with that, would you?
[00:46:40.400] – Haroon Q. Raja
That would probably be their industry secret. They wouldn’t want to reveal. If I were them, I wouldn’t want to reveal that to my competitors because, hey, that’s the service I’m providing. They’ve got a bunch of really nice tools. Overall, the site called Mangleels. So kWFinder is one of their tools, and other ones include site Profiler, which lets you do site audit. And SCRP Watcher tracks your rank. Scrp Checker, it does your search result analysis.
[00:47:13.700] – Jonathan Denwood
The reason why I use one of the other tools that we’re going to discuss for that. So let’s move on. But I highly recommend it. If you really want to move this to the next level, and it’s really a tool that really help you.
[00:47:31.870] – Haroon Q. Raja
Especially considering the price point because keyword research tools are going to be available in the next few options we discuss as well, but those are not affordable for everyone. Actually, those are more accurate than kWFinder because they have way more data. But this one has relatively less data. But the difference in price is substantial. And what you get, the value you get for that price, it means a lot to small businesses who cannot afford to pay hundreds of dollars for a tool like that?
[00:48:00.890] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, I still use it, even though I’ve got access. I use one of these other tools that we’re going to discuss. I still use it because I just find the interface really easy to use. I find some of these other professionals, especially the one that I use, it’s really good, but its interface is crap, in my opinion.
[00:48:23.410] – Haroon Q. Raja
Actually, before we move on to those, I’d add another one over here as well, a surprise. There’s one called SERPSTAT, S-E-R-P-S-T-A-T. That’s something that I’ve been using for quite a while as well, and I’ve got pretty good success with that. It’s also very reasonably priced, and it’s also a bunch of tools. I’ve got that.
[00:48:47.350] – Jonathan Denwood
I bought the lifetime deal, but they didn’t exactly Welsh on it, but they’ve kept the lifetime deal, but they’ve just added a load of additional tools that they don’t offer the lifetime deal. I think they’re based in one of the Laffia or Estonia. I think they’re one of the- Eastern Europe.
[00:49:05.550] – Haroon Q. Raja
I just took a look at their pricing, and it’s actually a lot now. Back in the day, when I got the lifetime deal, it was dirt cheap. Now, it’s like the entry The high-level individual plan is $600 a year. But over the years, they’ve added a lot more features as well. So it’s only improved over time. And you get not just keyword research, you get a suite of tools. The features are like Keyword research, AI content generation, a very good site audit, I’d add over here, and competitor’s analysis, which is a very valuable tool. I would also consider a CRP stat.
[00:49:43.570] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s not cheap, but compared to the next two tools we’re going to discuss, it’s something you can definitely look at. They’re a pretty credible company as well, aren’t they?
[00:49:54.800] – Haroon Q. Raja
Actually, in X3, you added Ahrefs and a CMRush, but you left out Maus. We can’t have a discussion on this here without Maus either.
[00:50:05.420] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, let’s head back to the end. Let’s go on to the Ahrefs. Ahrefs is the other tool that I use regularly. It’s a bit of a monster. It’s got awful dated UX design, in my opinion. It’s something out of the ’90s, but it does the job. I’ve been I’ve been using it for the past four or five years, so I’m grandfathered in. When I did the research, I was quite amazed how much they’ve bund the prices up. Compared to our SE Rush, it’s a little bit cheaper, but I think our SE Rush has got a more modern interface, and they offer more functionality, but that functionality, I’m not too sure about some of the added functionality that they add. But Aref, I think in general, AREF, the hard core SEO professionals tend to still use AREF, but I don’t know what your thoughts on that. But I use it for competitive research, for ideas about which topics it shows the most the posts and articles that your competition are ranking for. It shows keyword. You can really go in into a lot of time. I only use about 30 % of its functionality because I’m not prepared to spend hours and hours on this.
[00:51:44.700] – Jonathan Denwood
I’ve got it to a level because I produce the articles, I produce the videos, I do everything myself, and I spend almost four days every week on SEO as it I have become an expert over the years, not because I wanted to, because I’ve had to.
[00:52:12.390] – Haroon Q. Raja
A lot of us start in SEO that way because we find ourselves in a position where we have to learn SEO, and then over time, we find ourselves as SEO experts.
[00:52:23.080] – Jonathan Denwood
It is a monster. The other factor is, folks, they do offer a lot of YouTube and and post-training. The problem with their host of their YouTube channel and a lot of their written training, it does do the job, but it’s written in a way that I just don’t think in educational ease of absorbment, there’s something about it. I can’t put it in words, really, but I find it… I tend to watch other people’s stuff than their stuff to explain their products and their concepts of using the interface, because I just don’t find their content that useful. That’s a bizarre statement. It starts at $129. That’s month to month, you will get 2-3 months off if you pay yearly. This is a $1,000 plus a year tool, so it’s definitely not for the light-hearted. I pay it because my business is one of the main building blocks of how I’ve built my own business up. If you’re going down that road, you will end up spending that money on SEO tools. I made some statements here. What’s your own thoughts about AARF then, Haru?
[00:53:49.350] – Haroon Q. Raja
Worth every single penny. If you’re in a position where your organization needs some serious hard core SEO work and the ROI of investing in serious hard core SEO work is worth it, then this is probably one of the tools to go for. And then you don’t need to use many of the other smaller ones we mentioned. You don’t need to use kWFinder, you don’t need to use Ubersuggest, you don’t need to use, what was the third one? Serpstat. Ubersuggest is also a good keyword research tool by Neil Patel, but I’d go for a KWFinder over it. But yeah, Ahrefs has Site Auditor, it has competitor analysis tools.
[00:54:33.920] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, the amazing thing is, though, even if you start with the 129, you don’t get access to all their tools. You got to go up to standard or advanced. The standard monthly is 250, and the advanced is 450. But it’s still worthwhile, isn’t it?
[00:54:57.260] – Haroon Q. Raja
Still worthwhile because they run Their own crawlers. Just the way Google’s SEO Crawler is their crawling websites and indexing all of the content, they don’t rely on any third party to provide them with index data. They run their own crawlers, which takes a lot of expense because it’s bots that are constantly updating a gigantic database of all the sites on the internet that are public, and then maintaining the storage alone of that database. That costs probably millions of dollars a year in storage and processing charges. Infrastructure costs are huge, but then You get some of the most accurate data, you get some of the most accurate keyword research. You get some of the most accurate competitor analysis. You get some of the most accurate content ideas and opportunities. That’s a great feature because, hey, you’re stuck with… You don’t know what to produce. You do some research in it, and it’s going to suggest you what to produce based on what people are searching, based on what your site is about, and also keeping a track of your rank. So you simply can’t go wrong with it. For several serious SEO professionals, this is the first tool they’re going to have in their arsenal.
[00:56:05.910] – Haroon Q. Raja
The next one is very similar.
[00:56:08.030] – Jonathan Denwood
Let’s talk about RE-Rush.
[00:56:12.050] – Haroon Q. Raja
Sem-rush.
[00:56:12.570] – Jonathan Denwood
Se-rush, sorry. Going to be a little bit controversial here. Surprise, surprise. Really powerful tool. It’s actually in UX design and usability. I think it’s more modern in look. Their educational materials, I actually think are a little bit better, but I still keep using AREF because I just think the data is better with AREF, to be truthful. But SE Rush, it’s even more expensive. Their Pro version, which is their starter, month to month, it’s almost $140. They do have extra functionality, but I’m not sure that the extra functionality is worth the extra price, be quite true. What they’re really good at is offering affiliate deals, and their ability to get a hold I mean, army of affiliate marketers to work for them has been amazing. And they’ve built up one of the most profitable online businesses, the growth. We’re talking about tens of millions of dollars a year of revenue that’s poured into this company with a growth rate of 40 % per year. It’s been one of the most profitable businesses in the last 10 years, but they really do know how to utilize affiliate marketing and YouTube in general, and utilizing their affiliates to plug it.
[00:57:58.040] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s a great product, but Personally, if you’re going down this route, I would still recommend Aref. What’s your own thoughts on this, Aarun?
[00:58:09.530] – Haroon Q. Raja
By you, I don’t just mean you as an individual, because At this stage, we’re talking organizations rather than individuals, agencies. If you’re an agency or if you’re an in-house team of a major organization that needs tools like this, and if your concern is solely Working on SEO alone, then Ahrefs is a better option, yes. But if you are dealing with both SEO and marketing, advertising campaigns and whatnot, then Semrush in a single provider with a single set of tools, cohesively working with each other, it’s going to provide you with more value because they’ve got some market research and advertising and social media tools that are superior to what Ahrefs has to offer. They’ve got this whole dedicated advertising toolkit, which is focused not on those growing organic traffic, but also on those running PPC campaigns. Then you monitor competitors’ ad copies, competitors’ landing pages, and optimize your advertising spend, and analyze Google Shops, Google Shopping Ad campaigns, and whatnot. It’s a better fit if your agency is offering both organic SEO and paid advertising as a package, be it to your clients or be it if your department is responsible for both of these things for your own organization.
[00:59:39.360] – Haroon Q. Raja
So this could be a better investment in that regard.
[00:59:42.220] – Jonathan Denwood
That’s the main difference. You put that really fantastic. Thanks for that, Haroon. You’re spot on with that. I didn’t realize that. I did say the extra tools, but it’s when you’re doing the paid advertising, they’ve got a hole, which Arefs doesn’t. Arefs really just focus on the SEO organic, doesn’t it? Now, you want to talk about Moss as well. Now, Moss, folks, the former joint founder, I think he founded it with his mother, the joint founder and used to be the SEO of the company, a gentleman called Fishkin. He’s the granddaddy of SEO. I’ve actually interviewed him twice on my other podcast. Really nice guy. He’s moved on to another product, which is more understanding your audience in a broader picture. But he was the founder of Moss. So you still want to talk… Personally, myself, apart from their Moss local offering, I think they’re still going, it’s still very popular, but I think losing He had a bit of a bust up with some of his investors, and I think he was asked to go, basically. But I think they’ve really suffered in some ways in losing this figurehead, but that’s my opinion. You still want to talk about Moss.
[01:01:24.110] – Jonathan Denwood
What do you want to say about Moss?
[01:01:26.680] – Haroon Q. Raja
One of the reasons was their focus on their local local business marketing aspect. So they’re really strong in that. And I’d say they’re more in a league of SEMrush. They are more of an SEMrush competitor than an Ahrefs competitor because they also cover not just organic, but also content marketing and digital PR and whatnot. And then one thing where they shine, in my opinion, is custom integrations that you want to build because they give you lots of API points, and they’re They’re way more developer friendly than any of the tools. You have your own internal systems that you want to integrate and automate data flow between the two, then yes, Moz is a very high value tool. That’s not a use case for a vast majority of people, but when you need it, it really shines. And although I haven’t tried it, but the AI, I’ve heard good things about it from a few.
[01:02:26.160] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, he introduced this whole concept of white ball Fridays. I used to watch them. Funny enough, I loved the guy, but he would totally lose me about a third into the White Fridays. He would do it on Zoom, whatever platform, and he would go on for quite a while, and he would lose me quite quickly. I’m not the sharpest, but I’m not the bluntest. And that was the whole problem. But I would still watch it because I found it, for some reason, it would be in the background, and I got some knowledge from But you would lose me because you can take this subject to a very high level. In some ways, I think too high. I think you get 80% of the return from 20% of the knowledge from SEO. Then it’s like a Bell’s Curve. You can get a little bit of return, but it’s only worth that effort if you’re being paid really big bucks and you’re in a very competitive sector. Absolutely. Then it’s worth concentrating on the smaller parts of the Bell’s Curve. Is that making any sense, Haru?
[01:03:43.080] – Haroon Q. Raja
It does. I’d like to add another tool as well before we sign off.
[01:03:48.700] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, before we sign off. Go on, then.
[01:03:51.020] – Haroon Q. Raja
No session like this that discusses SEO tools will be complete without this tool. So far, we’ve discussed two types of tools. One has been for WordPress as plugins, and the other has been for SaaS products. But this is a desktop tool available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It’s called Screaming Frog.
[01:04:12.290] – Jonathan Denwood
Oh, yeah, Screaming Frog. It’s free, but it’s got a pro-version as well, isn’t it? Yeah.
[01:04:18.230] – Haroon Q. Raja
The free version has a limit of 500 crawlers. Any site can crawl up to 500 links for free. But beyond 500 URLs for a site, you need to remove that restriction and get some other really useful features as well. It can find and fix broken links. It can audit your entire site, analyze page titles and metadata, discover duplicate content, generate XML site maps, integrate with Google Analytics and whatnot, and even crawl JavaScript websites. It will give you a visualization of the entire site structure. A lot. It does a lot for a desktop- The other thing we never mentioned is Google, not Google Analytics; it used to be Google Webmaster.
[01:05:08.110] – Jonathan Denwood
They’re constantly renaming it. What do they call it now?
[01:05:11.670] – Haroon Q. Raja
Search Console.
[01:05:13.330] – Jonathan Denwood
Search Console. It used to be called SEO Webmaster Tools. It’s called Search Console. It’s a totally free product. You need to link your website to that. And it’s not like Google… It’s a little bit like Google Analytics, but it’s cut down. With a little research, and looking at specific YouTube videos, you can get the hang of it. It’s totally free, and you must link your WordPress website to it because it will tell you if your site has been indexed correctly by Google. I thought we had to quickly mention that because I think- And not just indexing.
[01:05:56.630] – Haroon Q. Raja
It also lets you see if there have been any strikes by Google on any pages, if there are issues in pages that are causing those pages to not be indexed, or if the site to not indexed. And that’s very valuable information because you need to know what’s wrong before fixing it. So yeah, Google Search Console is one of the first tools you should implement.
[01:06:16.830] – Jonathan Denwood
Right. I think we’ve offered a lot of value in this study. What’s the best way for people to find out more about you and your knowledge, Harry?
[01:06:27.510] – Haroon Q. Raja
They can reach out to me via my website, Which is Haroon Q. Raja
. H for Harun, Q, my middle initial, and Haroon Q. Raja
. Reach out via the contact form on my website.
[01:06:41.250] – Jonathan Denwood
You find the link to Harun and a complete set of show notes with all the links in your find it. If you’re watching this on YouTube or listening to, all the links will be in the show notes and the link to a full article with with all the links and the link to Haroon; you’ll find it all there, folks. We will be back, not next week, but the week after where we will do a deeper dive on SEO and the general principles. I think by listening to this show and the next show, you’re going to get a very comprehensive dive into SEO. I think we’ve offered, with Haroon’s help, really provided some great value in this show. Give us some feedback. We love that. We’ll see you soon, folks. Bye.
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