How to Create a Suitable Pricing Model for a Business
Determining a pricing model for your business can be a challenge. Let's take a closer look at pricing models and how you can find the one that serves you...
SEO can take a lot of time and you may be too busy to check out all the different tools that help you improve your ranking. Fortunately, there are a couple of extensions offered in Google Chrome that let you keep an eye on your SEO scores and give you tips on how to boost your SEO strength.
Google's browser has quite a lot of extensions, but which ones work best for your website? In our article, we'll introduce you to five free SEO Chrome extensions that help you improve your website’s ranking in Google!
When browsing through all the extensions that Google Chrome offers, you’ll find there are many for SEO purposes. More than hundreds of extensions are reviewed, but which ones are really useful for online shop owners and website operators? Let’s take a look at some extensions that are reviewed with 4 stars or more and at least 100 reviews.
Recommended Reading:
6 Essential Chrome Extensions for E‑commerce Merchants
The criteria we examine for each of the SEO tools are:
- General information about the tool
- How it works
- Features
- Loading speed
- Usability
In this article, we'll review the freemium versions of these extensions, many of which can be upgraded to a premium version.
(Please note that all information in this article is current at the time of writing. When you look for yourself, the numbers, features and other details may vary.)
1. SEO Minion
General information
443 reviews and a score of 5 stars
100,000+ users
Available in 6 languages
Completely free of charge
How does it work?
When using SEO Minion, you need to go to the page you want to view for SEO and then click on the extension in your toolbar. A menu on the page itself will show up, displaying a couple of features.
If you click on a particular feature, you also remain on your website and only continue in the tool’s menu. Only the features that allow you to view the location of SERPs will take you to another website.
Features
With this extension, you can keep track of general things concerning SEO. For example, titles, links, headers and so on. You can also see where the links on your page are, if there are any broken links and if they are redirects, for example. These kinds of issues can cost you a good ranking!
In addition, you also have the possibility to check what language is used in your coding, the hreflang. This language can be especially helpful for visually impaired users because the reading software picks it up.
There is also the option to see how your website will appear in Google's search results (SERPs) and you can see how certain keywords look in different countries and languages. You can even compare two countries/languages. This is particularly useful if you sell your products in different markets.
Recommended Reading:
Internationalisation: Localise Your Website to Sell Abroad
Loading speed
In general, this tool loads instantly, which means you can see all the information straight away. Only the link checker feature needs a few seconds to load.
Usability
This tool is very user-friendly because you can easily see everything you need. An additional advantage is that the tool displays very little information that you don't need.
The only downside to this tool is that it doesn't show your page loading speed or your domain authority.
It also comes in quite handy that almost everything can be seen while being on your own website, meaning that you don’t need to switch between multiple tabs in your browser.
2. Checkbot: SEO, Web Speed & Security Tester
General information
688 reviews and a score of 5 stars
40,000+ users
Only available in English
Free: 100 links; for more, an upgrade is needed (from €10-15 per month)
How does it work?
To use this the Checkbot extension, you will be redirected to a new tab. Even if you click on the extension via your website, you still have to enter the URL yourself.
In the free version, it doesn't seem to review a specific page, but crawls your entire website. The freemium version will only check out 100 links, meaning that it might not review your entire website. If you pay for the upgrade, this will of course not be an issue.
Features
This tool is very comprehensive.
It looks at links (broken links), but also at your titles, headers, etc. and gives tips on how to improve them. Checkbot also takes in the descriptions of pages and the ALT-texts of images and gives tips for improvements.
There is also a 'speed' button that looks at the loading time of your website and how you can improve this.
Finally, the tool offers you a security check-up for your website and how you can improve it.
Recommended Reading:
Tips for Protecting Your Online Shop from Hacker Attacks
Loading speed
Checkbot will take a few seconds to crawl your page.
Usability
Compared to other extensions, you need to take a few extra steps to have your website’s data shown. It's also confusing that the home screen provides a lot of information that is of little use (especially if you don't pay for it).
Furthermore, the tool is very extensive, making it unsuitable for beginners.
If you're already quite familiar with SEO, this tool can indeed be very useful, especially if you use the paid version, which offers a lot of useful information.
The free version also lacks information about your domain authority, so you won’t find out what the overall score of your website is.
3. SEO META in 1 CLICK
General information
693 reviews and a score of 5 stars
100,000+ users
Only available in English
Free of charge
How does it work?
When you are on your website, you just need to click on the extension in your toolbar. SEO META in 1 CLICK will then open a pop-up window on the page itself.
Features
The features are very clear when it comes to SEO META in 1 Click. You can see a general overview of the features provided: headers, images (including if they have a title and ALT text) and links (also which title the link has). There is also an option to see how your page will look via social media and suggested tools to learn more about the SEO of your website.
Loading speed
The information loads in an instant, allowing you to quickly access all the valuable insights.
Usability
A disadvantage of this tool is that if you quickly switch to another program or tab in Chrome, the pop-up window will be closed. So you have to constantly reload the information when you go back to that window.
Furthermore, the tool provides a lot of information that may not be easy to understand for SEO beginners. However, there are question marks everywhere that you can click to get access to more information.
The different tabs give you a good overview of your data.
It’s a pity that this tool also lacks an overall score so once again you cannot see how your website is doing overall.
Recommended Reading:
What is Your Net Promoter Score (NPS)?
4. Serpstat Website SEO Checker
General information
191 reviews and a score of 4.9
20,000+ users
Available in English, Russian and Ukrainian
Free limited version or upgrade from $55 to $499 per year
How does it work?
If you go to the page you want to review and click on the Serpstat Website SEO Checker extension, a pop-up will open on the page itself. The disadvantage here is that it closes again and again when you switch to another tab within the browser or to another program.
Features
shutterstock.com/EtiAmmos
This tool gives the option to view titles and so on as well, but the interesting thing is that the size of images is also taken into account. Page speed is very important for SEO, so images that are only a few KBs in size are important.
In terms of speed, the tool distinguishes between desktop and mobile and gives a value to the results. This way, you quickly know how to do it.
Loading speed
The page should load after a couple of seconds.
Usability
Serpstat Website SEO Checker is not very extensive, but it is a very user-friendly tool. A disadvantage of this tool is that it always closes so you have to click on the extension again and again. This may not be the most convenient thing depending on your work habits.
Also, the free version lacks some options and is quite limited.
5. SEO Search Simulator by Nightwatch
General information
789 reviews and a score of 4.8
20,000+ users
Only available in English
Free of charge
How does it work?
The SEO Search Simulator by Nightwatch tool is pretty simple: when it opens, a new screen that looks like Google's search engine pops up and an additional menu is displayed on the right of your screen.
Features
The only feature this tool offers is to see how your URL ranks in the search results of different countries and languages.
Loading speed
The tool doesn’t take much time to load.
Usability
Even though the tool is very limited, it still is very handy. You enter a search term, your link and which country and language you want to view, and the SEO Search Simulator immediately looks up where the link ranks. This is quite useful for reports, but also to help you constantly optimise your page.
The only drawback is that the tool can only do this very thing and doesn’t offer any specific SEO tips.
Internal linking is important in order for you to boost your website’s SEO. Read our whitepaper in which we give you tips and ideas on how to improve your internal linking.
In short
There are all sorts of free SEO tools available as extensions for Google Chrome. What we have to keep in mind is that there isn’t really any particular tool that is free and helps solve all your SEO problems. Unfortunately, you have to use several tools for that. However, the tools we reviewed in this article are quite handy and have also received positive feedback from other website operators who have tried them.
It is a matter of taste which one will work best for you. That's why we recommend you try out different tools to figure out which ones suit your needs and help you improve your SEO best!
This article was originally published on our Dutch blog: 5 gratis SEO-tools via Chrome-extensies
02/07/21
