Out of the total 1+ billion pages on the internet, only 9.37% get traffic. And the rest? They’re lost in the vast galaxy of the internet. So why do only a handful of pages rank even though most pages have great content, some even possibly AI generated? It all boils down to content analysis.
Content analysis is arguably more important than content creation itself. Making your well-crafted content piece go through content analysis boosts its ranking higher on Google, more effectively than simply relying on the writer’s craftsmanship. The content analysis exposes details that even the finest writers may have missed — relevant keywords, images, videos, alt texts, internal and external linking, and other entities.
A good content analysis tool can make a huge difference if you want to beat your competitors in the war on organic traffic. Even the best chefs know how adding the missing ingredient can change everything.
Of course, the ingredients for writers are slightly different than what’s in a kitchen. So, you might be wondering…
What should you consider when using a tool? And how can you tell which tool is best for your on-page SEO? This guide will give you the full breakdown.
Disclaimer: This blog was created by the team at Outranking, a trusted content analysis tool for digital marketers. In this review, our team analyzed eight tools, some of which are competitors with Outranking.
For your content analysis needs, we’ve researched and compiled a list of the top 8 tools for on-page SEO analysis tools and their features.
Outranking is an on-page SEO tool that offers features for content analysis and takes it a step further to help with content creation. It’s an advanced SEO Optimization tool that integrates SERP analysis data with an AI-assisted writing tool.
Outranking offers the following features:
Outranking provides more than other SEO tools on the market by integrating and automating your content creation process. From content briefs and outlines to titles and content itself, this tool is a time and money saver for business owners and writers.
Outranking is among the few AI tools that deliver engaging and usable content straight from your draft. As one satisfied Capterra reviewer put it:
Beyond the AI, Outranking includes a built-in SEO workflow tool, letting you track articles, who is in charge of them, and what stage they are in regards to workflow. These writers can also leverage the built-in keyword clustering tool to help identify semantic terms related to your target keyword.
In one example, the marketer of an AI-driven influencer platform won many new clients using Outranking’s toolset.
The only hiccup with Outranking was the interface. However, the V13 release brought a significant overhaul to the interface, making it more user-friendly. Try Outranking today and experience the difference.
| Pros | Cons |
| Offers the most comprehensive on-page optimization | Doesn’t include features for keyword research |
| Includes downloadable on-page audit reports | Doesn’t provide technical SEO recommendations like page speed improvements |
| Suggests internal links using your sitemap | |
| Suggests semantic terms | |
| Analyzes and scores unique factors like uniqueness and comprehensiveness | |
| Integrates with WordPress, Grammarly, and Google Docs |
As your WordPress website grows, it could be overwhelming to keep every page optimized. Say outdated content starts to slip in rankings, broken links pile up, and you’re constantly switching between tools to fix one issue after another.
AIOSEO (All in One SEO) helps you keep your site healthy with a real-time action list and smart recommendations that highlight what needs fixing. The tool gives you control over all on-page factors, from structured data and meta tags to readability and link opportunities right inside WordPress.
The AI features are new additions: a writing assistant for keyword optimization, a content decay tracker that flags pages losing rankings, and a link suggester for internal linking. These aren’t revolutionary, but they save time if you’re managing dozens of pages.
AIOSEO is built exclusively for WordPress, so it’s only relevant if that’s your platform. The interface can feel overwhelming at first, there are a lot of options visible from the start, but once you know which settings matter for your site, it becomes easier to navigate.
The tool shines for site maintenance rather than content strategy. It won’t replace your research process, but it keeps existing pages healthy without requiring you to be a technical expert. If you’re running a WordPress site and need consistent optimization across all your pages, AIOSEO handles that job well.
AIOSEO offers a free version with basic features and paid plans starting at $49.60 per year for one site. Pricing varies depending on how many sites you manage and which tools you need. For example, the Pro plan adds advanced redirect management and local SEO, while the Elite plan includes full schema automation and multi-site support.
| Pros | Cons |
| User-friendly design makes managing on-page SEO straightforward for all skill levels | Works exclusively with WordPress sites |
| Real-time SEO checklist highlights issues and suggests improvements | Access to certain advanced features requires paid plans |
| Offers a range of AI-powered tools for writing, link building, and content updates | The interface can feel overwhelming at first for beginners |
| Scalability with plan options for multiple sites | |
| Integrates with major WordPress plugins like Woo, MemberPress, and Elementor |
SurferSEO is a simple and easy-to-use on-page SEO analysis tool that uses keyword density and coverage as the driving factors for content optimization.
☝️ Note: Keyword density is an outdated way of optimizing on-page. Read what John Muller has to say about it.
SurferSEO also uses headings, word count, number of passages, and images as scoring factors. Still, it’s not as comprehensive as Outranking, which also includes information about links, statistics, and where you can find various keywords.
In an attempt to compete with AI-powered tools, SurferSEO has introduced Surfer AI, which lets its users leverage a built-in AI tool. Though the tool is fine at producing content, it doesn’t provide as many opportunities to customize instructions.
Cost is a notable drawback, with a rate of $29 per article for AI-generated content. Alternative tools, like Outranking, are much more inexpensive. Some have also expressed concern with Surfer’s unusual SEO suggestions, leading people to rely more on the company’s free Chrome extension:
SurferSEO is one of the most recognizable NLP content tools on the market. However, due to its reliance on keyword stuffing, many writers dislike how it might encourage unnatural writing.
| Pros | Cons |
| Easy to use | Scores are largely driven by keyword density, encouraging keyword stuffing |
| Scores more than NLP | Lacks advanced team management features |
| Has built-in AI tools | AI tools cost $29 per article |
| Comes with a suite of tools for keyword research | These tools add to the cost of surfer as add-ons |
| Built-in plagiarism detector | Plagiarism checking system costs additional credits |
Marketmuse is a content analysis and planning tool focusing on scanning pages and extracting NLP terms. Like SurferSEO, it has a strong emphasis only on NLP terms for scoring. It isn’t an on-page content optimization tool per se, but it performs content analysis as part of its on-page SEO analysis.
Marketmuse is no different than Outranking or SurferSEO in entity extraction, but it shows unfiltered entities that make the list big and disconnected. While looking at so much data sounds great, it can be overwhelming.
MarketMuse is much more useful as a research tool. It offers options like the SERP Xray to delve into the top results of a keyword, a topic navigator that does something similar, a topical heatmap to review the number of times something is mentioned, and a “connect” feature that gives you information about internal website links.
Like many of these tools, it’s also incredibly expensive:
Marketmuse also incorporates AI features, though their reliability has been inconsistent, partly relying on ChatGPT. Recent accuracy concerns have raised flags, with a significant drop from 97.6% to 2.4% using prime numbers as a measuring device. So, it helps to have AI systems that offer more options.
| Pros | Cons |
| Easy to use because it only analyzes NLP | Doesn’t receive frequent updates |
| Focuses on keyword coverage more than keyword density | Expensive |
| Integrates with ChatGPT | No other integrations |
| Lacks advanced team or document management features | |
| Great research features | Better as a research tool than an on-page optimization tool |
Clearscope, much like Marketmuse, specializes in content analysis. However, Clearscope doesn’t perform complete on-page analysis like Outranking.
Clearscope’s ideology is to optimize content based on keyword density and keyword coverage (by keywords, we mean NLP terms). It also scores partially for word count, readability, and images.
Clearscope’s core features include:
The focus on readability is most striking, as it grades you in a way similar to Hemingway. But instead of offering information as to why you failed readability, it gives you a letter grade and leaves you guessing.
The tool is ideal for simple content-related processes, but it’s by no means sufficient for complete on-page content optimization.
Clearscope is a huge name in the content optimization field. Despite this, it appears to have some bugs in its briefing system. It’s also incredibly expensive, which you can see below:
Clearscope’s pricing is baffling given the lack of features. If you’re looking for something a bit more cost-effective, look elsewhere.
| Pros | Cons |
| Easy to use | Relies on NLP that promotes bad keyword stuffing habits |
| Uses IBM Watson for NLP analysis (they claim this is better, but provide no evidence to support their claim) | Doesn’t offer semantic search terms |
| Great at measuring readability | Not suitable for small and medium-sized businesses |
| Expensive |
SEMrush likes to insert itself into all things SEO. While primarily a keyword research tool, SEMrush offers a basic content optimization tool (NOT on-page). While SEMRush is full of overwhelming amounts of data for technical and on-page optimization, it’s lacking when it comes to content optimization (a vital aspect of improvement).
SEMRush’s editor scores similarly to Clearscope and MarketMuse, providing a comparable evaluation of content optimization. It also measures your tone of voice and provides some information on keywords. However, its nine target keywords don’t tell you whether you’ve addressed your topic thoroughly.
Given that you end up paying at least $130 per month for SEMRush, you’d expect a more comprehensive service. In fact, SEMRush just raised its pricing by 8% in July 2023, sparking debate within the SEO community:
| Pros | Cons |
| A comprehensive set of marketing and page tools | Similar tools are available for free on Google Search Console and Analytics |
| Solid guidance on technical SEO aspects | Non-existent guidance for improving content |
| Marketing tools include market research, advertising, and social media tools |
RankMath is a WordPress SEO tool. While it’s quite comprehensive and covers many bases, it offers services you can find for free elsewhere all in one place. For example, it gathers data on your site from Google Analytics and Search Console. It also helps you control your XML sitemap and create structured data through Google’s Schema system.
The catch: since it only works with WordPress, it’s not useful for everyone. Also, its main features aren’t always reliable:
| Pros | Cons |
| Affordable | Lacks quality data |
| Beginner-friendly | Tries to do too much at once |
| Offers a suite of SEO features | Slows down WordPress |
| Covers many aspects of on-page optimization |
Frase is a content analysis tool that reads your content and compares it to others based on the top SERP results you choose. It concentrates on SEO research but has put more money into its AI-driven system.
Frase core features include:
On paper, Frase seems like what you need to optimize your content. But in practice, its AI-driven systems aren’t great at following orders. After providing instructions, the AI writer seems to do its own thing.
Frase also has issues with its AI writer copying content:
| Pros | Cons |
| Offers many utilities for writing and research purposes | Has a cluttered User Interface |
| Integrates with Google doc through a plugin | Considers SEO as an afterthought—you’ll need to purchase an SEO addon |
| Great research features | Lacks comprehensive on-page factor analysis |
| Google Doc integration doesn’t function well |
Moz on-page optimizer does exactly what it says it does. Their grader will check any webpage for on-page SEO best practices. It can score for 27 factors just like Outranking can. Where it lags is NLP terms — even the Moz Pro won’t suggest keywords you’ve missed.
Moz Pro also misses out on topic coverage. Unless you’re using multiple tools, Moz Pro isn’t the all-in-one tool for on-page optimization like Outranking.
The tool comes with the following features:
| Pros | Cons |
| Generates in-depth SEO performance reports | Can be an expensive add-on if you’re using keyword research too |
| Keyword rank tracking can fit nicely into on-page optimization suggestions | Doesn’t score on-page for NLP terms |
Because the market is flooded with all sorts of analysis tools, you can’t just choose one at random. You need to carefully sift through the options to find the right match for your content strategy. Below are 12 factors you should think about before investing in a tool:
A competitive analysis will help you research and identify the top-ranking brands and websites in your niche. For teams that need location-specific SERP checks at scale, a residential proxy can help you view results as real users see them in different regions and avoid misleading personalization. You can then evaluate and compare their SEO with yours and analyze what makes them rank on search engines. With this information, you’ll boost your website’s rankings on the SERPs (search engine results pages).
Effective competitor analysis requires an on-page SEO tool that delivers high-quality, in-depth, detailed insights. So when choosing a tool, consider the level of data it provides around the competitive analysis.
How in-depth do they look at the competition data? 10 pages, 20 pages? What data do they collect? Just NLP? Or do they go above that and give you word count, common and unique entities, PA, scores, and other matrices necessary to ensure you can predictably rank?
Real-time On-Page SEO scoring helps you see the real-time influence of SEO elements on the overall score. You can practically see the SEO score improving (or getting worse) as you add and remove elements to your content.
Most tools will perform real-time scoring against NLP terms, which is good to ensure you have the right coverage for these terms. But good on-page SEO scoring needs to be more thorough than that.
This will help you see how several elements affect your score, giving you a more comprehensive approach to SEO content creation. For example, in the image below, you can see many factors to benchmark the content, like title, description, outline, content, media, and links.
You’ll find many tools that offer in-depth SEO scoring, like Yoast, AIO SEO, Surfer SEO, Outranking, RankMath, Frase, etc. But you should prioritize getting a tool that works the best with your website while delivering accurate and optimized results.
Most on-page SEO tools can show you what’s wrong with your content, and that’s good. But it’s even better when your tool can tell you how to fix what’s wrong with your content. On-page SEO tools perform a detailed content audit of a draft, identify the weak points, and provide solutions for fixing those areas in your content.
Let’s say your content is missing more engagement. Any tool could tell you you need more words. But how many images and videos should you add? And how many tables, list items, and statistics do you need to include to be an authority? Only the crème de la crème tools can tell you. 🍒
On-page SEO analysis tools shouldn’t just analyze your content’s quality. They should give you insights into the quality of the data and other sources you use in your content.
You should choose a tool that provides the following elements of data:
🤫 Hint: Choose a tool whose founders have SEO knowledge. They’ll know how important these elements are, so they won’t skip them in the tool.
As with everything else, it’s important to balance comprehensive features with simplicity. But on-page SEO isn’t exactly easy. Some writers will look for easy-to-use tools that only have NLP scoring, so they can focus on finishing the blog on time.
However, SEO tools have a different perspective. Their KPIs depend on ranking, revenue, and leads, so they can’t afford to write content that won’t rank. So, they look for a tool that leaves no stone unturned.
Find a tool that gives you the best of both worlds — simple enough to use but comprehensive enough to help you predictably rank. But keep in mind that, no matter what tool you choose, you’ll still need some form of training.
Outranking’s V13 update gave the user interface a complete makeover. So, if your tool doesn’t get it at first, maybe they will after a few frank discussions.
Most self-service tools come with YouTube videos, documentation, and chat support, and a few of them hold webinars quite often. Assess the level of support you need to succeed, and choose the product accordingly.
The best most can hope for is to have chat support built into your tool. That way, you can ask questions as they come up. And if the chat connects to the knowledge base (or you can find a link), you’re covered regardless of who is available.
Most tools out there, except for a handful, suggest you optimize content using keyword density. But even Google’s John Muller has said time and time again — this isn’t a ranking factor.
Although you should get a tool to give you in-depth NLP data, stay away from tools that equate content quality to keyword density. That’s counterproductive.
Instead, focus on tools that offer topical clusters, which tend to focus more on relevance. It’s not about the exact words or phrases you mention. Instead, it’s more about ensuring you’re talking about things important to people searching on Google. Semantic keywords heavily connect with being relevant.
On-page SEO analysis tools shouldn’t stop at keyword density. It should also give you insights about the semantic keywords to use. Semantic keywords are the ones related to your primary keyword. If you have “SEO” as your primary keyword, the related terms would be SERP, digital marketing, etc.
Having information about semantic keywords will help you cover the topics more comprehensively. It’ll also help you rank for more keywords. So choose a proper on-page SEO analysis tool that gives you information about the semantic keywords for your content.
After the competitor analysis, your tool should tell you how many internal links you should aim to use. It should also give you a list of all the links on your page you can link to, with the best anchor text for them.
But what if the tool suggests a broken link from your website, and you use it? Your rankings will tank. So look for a tool to analyze your sitemap, find broken links, and not recommend them.
Imagine you write your content using Google Docs—when you’re deciding between two content analysis tools, which will it be? The one with a Google Docs integration or the one without? The answer is clear.
One of the many must-haves for an on-page SEO analysis tool is its connectivity and support for plugins. Connectivity and plugins enable you to use the tool with other sites and apps, making the tool more efficient and effective.
When choosing an on-page SEO analysis tool, don’t forget the importance of workflow. The tool should follow clear, logical steps, to make the content analysis process seamless.
Choose a tool that offers content research first, then optimization, and analysis last. This ensures all tasks are done in a timely manner, with no need for do-overs or repetitions and back and forth.
If you’re working solo, you can skip this. But, if you’re working as a team where someone builds the briefs, someone writes, and someone optimizes content, you’ll need a tool that can be used in a team environment. Eg. Being able to share documents, organize documents, and assign tasks and comments for team members to follow up on.
If you work with an external board, you might have to manually move these tasks to those boards. Otherwise, you might have to ask if that software integrates with other boards.
Content analysis is the secret key to getting you high on that SERP. But you can’t choose a tool willy-nilly and call it a day. You need to carefully shop around for the best on-page SEO tool with content analysis.
Your tool shouldn’t just stop at the basic SEO elements. It should offer proper insights into the problems your content has — and how to fix them. It should also guide you to create the best possible content with high-quality, comprehensive competitor analysis.
Out of the 8 tools we’ve analyzed, Outranking outranks the others (pun intended). It offers a whole host of features and tools to assist you through every step of the content creation process — from brief creation to publishing.
Curious about what Outranking can do for you? Join Outranking today!