SEO Software Comparison of WebCEO™
versus WebPosition®4

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SEO Software - WebCEO or Web Position 4 – do you really even need either one for website promotion Internet?

SEO software, in my opinion, is absolutely essential to professional SEO. But before we even get into this comparison of WebCEO and Web Position, you may be wondering if you even need either one of these SEO software packages for search engine optimization, and if so, why?

If you are doing SEO, I hope you realize that SEO is not a one shot deal. You need to regularly monitor your web site or your client’s web sites so you know where they sit for the various pages you’ve SEO’d for the search engines.

Google especially likes to constantly change and improve their algorithms they use to decide who sits on top, who is second, who is third, etc. For this reason, you need to stay on top of where you or your clients sit in the search engine standings. And whether any changes have affected their place in the SEO standings.

Can’t you just manually check your SEO standings?

Of course, you can manually check the placement of every page you’ve optimized in every important search engine without SEO software but the work (and the hours) involved would be horrendous.

Take it from a guy who was doing SEO before a couple of geniuses thought to create these SEO packages (I only wish I’d been the genius – I’d be retired right now). And the more clients you take on without SEO software, the worse the job becomes. So it’s important to have an automated SEO software package to do the grunt work of SEO for you. But this returns us to the original question: Which SEO software package, Web Position or WebCEO?

Which SEO software is right for you: Web Position 4 or WebCEO?

Okay, we’ve established that you need SEO software. But which SEO software is right for you? First, let’s look at WebCEO.

WebCEO SEO software box

An SEO professional looks at the SEO software package WebCEO

WebCEO comes in three software versions. Free, Small Business and Professional. You can start out by downloading the free version. This is actually the best way to go if you are a business owner or the employee at a business and you just want some software to SEO your own site and aren’t concerned about getting first page on Google.

Yes, with the free SEO software, you come up short in some respects. Take for instance Keyword Evaluation. You can only get 5 keywords or keyword phrases at a time. This makes SEO keyword analysis a bit tedious. However, it’s still doable.

One nice thing about WebCEO’s SEO software is their “plain English” advice on compliance with the SEO requirements of general search engines. And if you upgrade to one of the paid versions, you get SEO advice geared toward each of the major search engines. I think for SEO beginners or those just starting out, this is a very valuable tool.

I’ll admit. I don’t use that tool any more because, frankly, I don’t always agree with what it tells me. But for an SEO beginner, who doesn’t have their own store of hard-won SEO knowledge, it’s a great place to start.

WebCEO also offers Keyword Density Analysis which is extremely important to search engine optimization. Without this, you are wasting your time trying to SEO your website. The analysis for the free version is only aimed at search engines in general. SEO needs to be specific.

With the paid software versions, you get Keyword Density Analysis aimed at specific search engines. This is a must if you want your SEO to get you first page in Google for your keyword phrases or you are doing SEO professionally.

Here’s a screenshot of one of the SEO reports:

WebCEO


The other report the WebCEO SEO software offers you is incredibly important, especially for the SEO professional. It’s the Analysis Report comparing your SEO’d pages to the Top Ten Pages in the search engines.
Unfortunately, this is only available in the Professional Edition of WebCEO’s SEO software. But as a SEO professional myself, I consider this absolutely essential to getting my clients first page results in the search engines. And that should be your only desire for doing SEO.

Some other important aspects of WebCEO’s SEO software is their:

  • XML site map generator software (essential for every website to keep Google happy)
  • WYSIWYG editor (so you can edit the web site on the fly)
  • Easy access to your meta tags for SEO editing
  • Manual submission emulation software (fools the search engines into believing you are manually submitting web pages to them. This is important since most search engines will reject automated submission and hand submission can take hours if not days; another real good reason to get one of these SEO software packages.)

Three versions of the SEO software WebCEO

WebCEO’s SEO software comes in three versions:

Unless you are a seasoned professional in SEO, I highly recommend you start out with the free SEO software from WebCEO. This gives you a chance to go through the manual and really learn what WebCEO can do and what the free SEO edition can’t do.

From there, you can decide whether to upgrade to the Small Business edition or the Professional edition. But before you go ahead and get the free version of WebCEO, let’s take a look at the SEO software called Web Position 4.

Web Position 4

An SEO professional looks at Web Position 4

Web Position 4 SEO software comes in two versions:

  • Web Position 4 Standard Edition $149
  • Web Position 4 Professional Edition $389

The Professional Edition price looks a bit familiar doesn’t it? These two companies really do go head to head because they are the two premium SEO software packages available (again, in my humble opinion).

Keep in mind that Web Position 4 does offer a 30 day free trial for their SEO package. If you get WebCEO for free and get the Web Position 4 free trial for 30 days, it will give you a chance to do your own compare and contrast of these search engine optimization software packages.

Web Position 4 – What does it offer for SEO?

Okay, let’s look at what SEO software package Web Position 4 has to offer. Web Position 4 has:

  • A summary dashboard
  • Trend graphs
  • Off-site metrics (link popularity and search engine saturation reporting)
  • And they’ve recently added over 200 search engines (which I think is pointless because I only care about the top 4 search engines, Google, MSN, Yahoo, Ask, and some of their international permutations)

Just like WebCEO, Web Position allows you to analyze your SEO keywords and keyword phrases. It also offers to track your Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns, which is a nice feature if you run PPC campaigns for yourself or for clients in addition to SEO (WebCEO also does this).

One thing that bothers me as a SEO professional is that with the Standard Edition of Web Position 4, you can’t private label your reports to clients. This doesn’t matter if you are just doing SEO for yourself or your employer.

However, if you plan to do this as a SEO professional, I highly recommend you get the professional version of this SEO software so you can private label your reports to clients. It may seem like a small thing but I’ve found it makes a big branding difference if your reports come with your logo on them.

How about features in the SEO software Web Position 4?

Web Position 4 also offers many of the same features as WebCEO including:

  • Search engine compliance advice
  • Keyword density analysis
  • XML site map generator
  • Competitor analysis
  • A WYSIWYG editor and easy modification of your meta tags

I prefer the Professional Edition of Web Position 4 over the Standard Edition. However, one advantage that the Standard Edition of Web Position 4 offers over WebCEO Small Business is that you can analyze an unlimited number of keywords where the WebCEO Small Business Edition limits you to five per basket. As far as I’m concerned, that keyword analysis limit puts the Small Business Edition of WebCEO out of contention as far as SEO software packages is concerned.

Another problem with the Standard Edition for SEO professionals is that you can only run reports on 5 web sites. Again, if you are just doing SEO for yourself or your employer, it’s a moot point. (Unless you have a lot of web sites of your own to SEO). However, I have over 40 SEO clients I have to run monthly reports for so I had no choice but to get the Professional Edition of Web Position 4.

I suppose that last statement might lead you to believe I have Web Position 4. As a matter of fact, I do. However, I also have WebCEO. I like both SEO software packages for different SEO tasks. And the cost of buying both Professional Editions is less than I made on my first professional search engine optimization job.

One service that’s unique to Web Position 4 Professional is the ability to analyze your keyword ranking to conversion through WebTrends integration. Of course, you have to buy Web Trends separately but it’s a very useful SEO tool if you need help with conversions. They also offer the ability to track ranking information for your competitors. This is really important. You don’t do SEO in a vacuum. You have to know how your client’s competitors are doing.

One last great feature is their ability to integrate reports into Microsoft Excel. This makes them downloadable and configurable for your clients. See for yourself…

Web Position reports image

Suffice it to say that they really are almost identical as far as what they do. They both offer pretty much the same services. However, I prefer to run SEO reports with WebCEO. For whatever reason, Web Position 4 seems to take way longer to generate their reports.

But I prefer the Keyword Analysis tool in Web Position 4. I think it’s easier and faster than the Keyword Analysis tool in WebCEO. By having both, I can pick and choose the services that each is best at (in my humble opinion). I also have a preference for the SEO advice that WebCEO offers and their forum is extremely helpful. Their manual is also much better.

Final conclusion for these two SEO software packages?

So it’s really up to you. I recommend you:

Evaluate both SEO software packages and either do like I did and just get the Professional Editions of both to use as you see fit or pick the one that feels most intuitive to you. Because in the end, you’re the one who is going to be spending hours working with them and you should own the SEO software you’re most comfortable with.

Other useful SEO software reviews, SEO tools, SEO tricks and SEO books:

If you'd like to have my experience and knowledge and “all my SEO tricks” applied to your website, don't hesitate to call me at 612-226-7667 or send me an email at bob@wordsmithbob.com .

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