Free SEO Tools for Local Businesses, Rated by What They Do

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By Brandon Aubey

In short: Honest ratings for the free SEO tools we use with home service clients. Which ones earn a spot, which to skip, and what each is for.

You run a crew. You do not have time to test 20 SEO tools. SEO means showing up on Google. Most of the tools that help with it are free. Here is what we use, what we skip, and why.

The ratings

I have tested all of these on real client sites. Scores are out of 10.

• Google Search Console, 10. Free, straight from Google, and it is your own data. Everyone should use it. You can get a lot done with only this.
• Google Analytics, underrated. It is free and it shows who visits your site. It seems like nobody opens it. Open it.
• Bing Webmaster Tools, 8. Nobody uses it. But it shows if AI tools are recommending you. Many AI tools pull from Bing, not Google.
• PlePer, 9. Like GMB Everywhere but deeper. It shows every platform a competitor has claimed. Best free Maps tool we have found.
• GMB Everywhere, 7. Instantly shows a competitor’s Google Business Profile categories. Very useful. But that is all it does.
• GMB Spy, decent. Same idea, less detail. Fine if the other two are not working for you.
• Ubersuggest, 6. Useful for checking competitors. The free version is limited.
• AnswerThePublic, 5. Great blog ideas. You only get a couple of free searches a day. Good place to start if you are new.
• AnswerSocrates, my favorite. Same kind of question data. Free, with no daily wall.
• AlsoAsked. Shows the questions people ask after their first search. Good for planning pages.
• Semrush, overrated. It is a great tool. It is also too expensive unless you are an agency.
• Yoast, overrated. If a green light was all it took to rank, we would all be rich. It checks a page. It does not rank it.
• PageSpeed Insights. Free from Google. Tells you if your site is slow and why.
• Ahrefs. Strong for site health and AI visibility. The free parts are thin. Still worth a look.

Citations

A citation is a listing of your name, address, and phone on another site. Three tools handle these.

• Yext. You are renting your listings. Stop paying and they can go away.
• Whitespark. Does the job.
• BrightLocal. The best one of the three.

Pick by job

Do not download all of these. Pick the one that matches the thing you want to fix.

• Google Maps. GMB Spy is decent. GMB Everywhere is good. PlePer is the best.
• Keywords. Ubersuggest is good for spying on competitors. Semrush is better but costs money. Search Console is best for most El Paso businesses. It is your real data, and it is free.
• Blog ideas. Ubersuggest does the job. AnswerThePublic is better. AnswerSocrates is my favorite. Google Autocomplete works too. Type your service and read the suggestions.
• Competitor research. GMB Everywhere, PlePer, and Ubersuggest.
• Site health. Search Console, PageSpeed Insights, and Ahrefs.
• AI visibility. Asking ChatGPT about yourself is not reliable. Perplexity is better. Bing Webmaster Tools is the best. Google Analytics and Ahrefs help too.

Say you run an HVAC company in El Paso. You want more Maps calls. Open PlePer and look up the top three HVAC shops near you. Copy the categories you are missing. That is one job, one tool, done.

Chrome extensions

These are free add-ons for Chrome. Each does one small thing well.

1. Keyword Surfer. Shows search volume right in your Google results. You see what people actually search.
2. Google Search Results Display Enhancer. Shows the number you are ranked. Simple and nice.
3. Wappalyzer. Click it on any competitor’s site. It shows what the site is built on.
4. SEO Search Simulator. Shows how you rank in different locations. Good for a quick look at the cities you show up in.
5. Redirect Path. Flags broken redirects and errors on any page. A redirect sends one web address to another. Very handy when fixing a site.
6. Detailed SEO. Shows the key facts about a competitor’s page. Borrow what is working.
7. Heading Tag Markup. One click shows every heading on a page.
8. SEO Meta in 1 Click. Shows the title, the meta description, and the keywords a page targets. The meta description is the short text under a result on Google.

Stop paying for tools you do not need

Here is the thing. Most owners pay for Semrush or Yext and never log in. Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools, and a few extensions cover almost every job. Start free. Pay only when a free tool stops answering your question.

Would you rather hand this off? Look at our SEO services, or book a strategy call.

We can do this for you

You can do everything above yourself. Most owners do not have the hours. Dead River Management builds and runs it for home service businesses. We work in El Paso and across the country. You keep running jobs. We handle the search work. You judge us on booked jobs, not reports. See SEO services, read about the Demand Flow guarantee, or book a strategy call.

Questions