SEO often sounds more complicated than it really is. As a small business owner, you can get started for free with a handful of the best tools in the industry. 

These small business SEO tools are free, beginner-friendly, and cover all your needs for DIY SEO.

Ahrefs Webmaster Tools which gives them access to Site Explorer and Site Audit.

With these tools, you can:

  • Monitor your website’s health
  • Know your backlinks
  • See what keywords give you traffic
  • Track any growth or declines in your SEO performance

If you’re working with an agency or freelancer for SEO, it’s also one of the best ways to monitor what they’re doing and verify the results they’re reporting to you.

Getting started

The easiest way to set up Ahrefs is with a Google Search Console account (more on this in a moment).

Importing a project in Ahrefs by using Google Search Console.

You can also just enter your website, press the “start for free” button, and follow the prompts to fill out the rest of your information.

Ahrefs Webmaster Tools set up process.

If you’re interested in seeing what your competitors are doing and figuring out their SEO strategy, you can also try out the Starter plan for only $29/month.

It lets you spy on your competitors and find new keywords to improve your own SEO for a low cost.

Google’s Site Kit plugin. This plugin can connect your website to the following Google properties automatically:
Google SiteKit can set up Search Console, Analytics, PageSpeed insights and AdSense.
If your site is not using WordPress, it’s just a matter of following the prompts on the GSC landing page:
Getting started with Google Search Console.

Once you click the “Start Now” button, you’ll be prompted to log in to your Google account. Then you’ll be guided on how to connect your website.

this page:
Getting started with creating a Google Business Profile.

Follow the prompts to set up your business listing. You’ll be asked to fill out information like:

  • Your business name
  • Your business category
  • Your contact details
  • Your location (for customers to visit)
  • Your address where your business is located (even if you don’t have a store)
  • Your products or services
  • Your opening hours
  • A general description of your business
  • Images of your business and its premises

Make sure you fill everything out in full. Don’t cut corners here, this is your chance to show people who search on Google everything they need to know about your business.

Google SiteKit plugin. You can set up both Google Analytics and Google Search Console at the same time.

Alternatively, you can follow the detailed steps in our guide on using Google Analytics.

OpenAI’s leadership confirmed it’s an important one:
Screenshot of Reddit AMA where OpenAi's leadership confirmed Bing is an important data source for ChatGPT's search engine.

Getting started

Thankfully, the hard work is already done. You can set up Bing Webmaster Tools by connecting it to your Google Search Console:

Setting up Bing Webmaster Tools using Google Search Console.

Otherwise, just follow the prompts. It will be a very similar process to how you set up GSC.

Ahrefs plugin is designed to help you audit and monitor your content’s performance.
Using Ahrefs' WordPress plugin to run a website content audit.

Getting started

There are many great SEO plugins and apps out there to help you improve your website’s optimization and performance in search engines.

Further reading

Check out these articles to help you discover the best ones for your site:

Final thoughts

There are many SEO tools for small businesses out there. Some are all-in-one platforms, like Ahrefs; others are specialist tools to help fulfill a specific use case.

Generally, you can DIY your SEO with nothing more than the above tools, which are both free and beginner-friendly. They’ll get you by for a long time!

If you want to improve your SEO, you can upgrade to the Ahrefs Starter plan for as little as $29/month to do more keyword and competitive research.

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