Do a search for “SEO software” and you’ll find the same site that’s been number one for just about forever… SEO Elite – http://www.seoelite.com.

You’d think that because they’ve ranked #1 for as long as I can remember (and I’m pretty old), that it would without a doubt be the best software available.

Think again.

Digging Into the Guts of SEO Elite

In its prime (4-5 years ago), this software was definitely at the top of the heap. Of the three major categories of SEO software (analyze your site, improve your ranking, and competitive/historical analysis), this one fits into categories two and three.

SEO Elite is primarily designed to help you improve your search engine ranking. In fact, if you go to their web site, their headline says, “Who else wants to get a #1 Google Ranking in as little as 7 days?”

When this software was first distributed, they had a shot at fulfilling their promise. Not anymore. The whole fabric of space and time in the search engines has changed, and the software hasn’t changed with it.

What SEO Elite Does

SEO Elite has eight functions:

1. Analyze blinks using a specified search engine (Google, Yahoo!, AltaVista, AllTheWeb and MSN).  [Right there you can see how they date themselves...]
2. Get Links to your web site. [You give it a list of web sites, it tries to find the email address and name of the owner, and lets you send an email requesting a "link exchange"]
3. Analyze AllInAnchor, AllInTitle, or AllInText. [You provide a keyword phrase, and it gives you a list of the top 10 web sites with that keyword phrase in one of the three categories. These, presumably, would be sites to which you'd request a link exchange.]
4. Verify that link partners are still linking back. [Self-explanatory]
5. Find where your site is ranked for a given keyword. [They maintain a database of past results so that you can see your progress (or regression) over time for each keyword phrase - in my opinion, the only reason to buy this tool]
6. Find out how many pages are indexed of your site.
7. Find possible authority sites. [By keyword phrase on Google, Yahoo!, MSN]
8. Submit your articles to article directories. [Very rudimentary, not updated, and subject to duplicate content.]

Their primary claim to fame is the semi-automated link exchange system. They’ll help you find high PR (Page Rank) sites and give you a semi-automated way to send the site owner an email to request a link exchange.

Perhaps you’ve seen these emails. My response used to be “Please send me a quality article to post and I’ll be happy to include a link to your site.”  Now my response is to hit the Delete key.

What SEO Elite is Good For

Bear in mind that this is my personal opinion. I don’t believe that SEO elite does anything useful that you can’t also do with free programs or tools.

Perhaps the most useful feature is the ability to track your ranking for a given keyword over time, but as you’ll see there are other tools that do the same thing, and perhaps do it better.

Should You Buy SEO Elite?

Short answer: No.

Longer answer:  There are other tools that do far much more for the same price or less. The only real advantage of SEO Elite is that it’s a one-time price (no recurring monthly fee), but in this day and age, I’m not so sure that’s an advantage.

I do have an affiliate link, and if I were smart I’d share it with you, give the software a rave review, and hope that you still like me when it’s all said and done.

I’d rather tell you what I think, even if it ticks off the creators of the software.

While some folks will still do link exchanges, they’re old school. Yes, you can request link exchanges, and if it’s with a high PR site, it may do you some good. But the truth is that you’ll get far more out of social media syndication, article syndication (without duplicate content), video syndication, and other “content” syndication techniques.

Share on Facebook

More from Internet Marketing

• B2B Copywriting - How to Guarantee a Sale
• SEO Software Reviews: Setting the Stage
• How to NOT SEO Optimize Your Web Site