The Top 6 SEO Resources for Bloggers

This guest post is by Matt Beswick.

For anyone involved in SEO, staying on top of the game is a difficult task thanks to the unpredictable nature of the business.

As a blogger, however, it’s almost impossible—all you want to be doing is writing great content and generating traffic, right? Just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, things change in the blink of an eye, so keeping tabs on the latest SEO witchcraft inevitably demands a lot of research off the clock.

The following websites are the best references on the web for anyone who wants to keep up with what’s happening, and make sure that their site isn’t doing anything that risks putting them out of favour with the big G!

SEOmoz

Since 2004, SEOmoz has been one of the most highly respected sites online when it comes to providing top-notch SEO analysis, advice and knowledge.

Their accumulated SEO wisdom is practical and credible, thanks to their renowned staff of expert authors. With plenty of general articles and loads of quick, helpful tidbits, SEOmoz istheultimate SEO destination for many in the industry.

Search Engine Roundtable

Maintaining one’s relevance in an industry that changes as quickly as SEO is a challenge. That’s where Search Engine Roundtable comes in.

Like the Slashdot of SEO forums, it reports on the best writing in the field and compiles it into a running commentary on the state of the industry. Featuring some of the most insightful analysis of the Search Engine Marketing world available, Search Engine Roundtable is a must-read.

Search Engine Land

Covering literally every aspect of SEO and online marketing under the sun, Search Engine Land is a favourite among SEOs in every niche.

Boasting regular full-length articles by some of the most recognised names in the business, it’s practically a necessity for those who wish to stay ahead of the curve on SEO matters.

Whether you’re after how-to tutorials, buyers’ guides, or white papers from the web’s biggest tech companies, Search Engine Land has it all.

State of Search

A relative newcomer to the scene, State of Search is nevertheless one of the most reliable sources for SEO news and views that you can find.

In addition to their in-depth coverage and superb articles, they also boast a newsletter, weekly podcasts on Webmaster Radio, and a whole lot more.

Bolstered by a loyal and growing fan base of SEO professionals, amateurs and freelancers, State of Search is one site that shouldn’t be ignored.

Search Engine Journal

Taking the traditional SEO journal format and spicing it up with some extra goodness, Search Engine Journal delivers the goods on a consistent basis.

The forums are a veritable Algonquin Round Table of SEO discourse and are a terrific resource in and of themselves. On top of stellar articles and opinion pieces, this site also claims some of the best SEO link-building tools out there.

Google Webmaster Central

Google dominates so much of our online lives that it’s no wonder we spend so much time and effort optimising pages for their algorithms. When in doubt, going straight to the source for the best information on optimising for those algorithms is a pretty smart move.

Google Webmaster Central is the official SEO blog for the world’s biggest search engine company. To get the sanctioned party line from Google’s top brass and read helpful, informative posts by the likes of Matt Cutts, head here first.

Over and Out

The moral of the story is that the laws of entropy apply to SEO just as they do to the rest of the universe: without a constant input of effort, it’s easy to fall out of the loop and lose your handle on what’s hot in the ever-exciting world of SEO.

Fortunately, it’s quite easy to stay on top of current developments by checking these sites regularly—they’re quite simply the best of the best when it comes to doing your industry homework. If you can recommend others, though, let us know about them in the comments.

Matt Beswick is a digital consultant based in the UK, specialising in SEO, and also runs Pet365. Find him on Twitter @mattbeswick.