Beginners should start out with Market Samurai I think.
It puts everything in an easy interface.

use the free google keyword tool and dont forget google trends!

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I'm presuming you meant offpage SEO and not offline SEO. Basically link building?

I think people put too much thought on "Software" and not enough on "Advice." There isn't ANY software that Google "supports." Software will always be handicapped sooner or later by Google because it isn't natural or organic.

If you want to do well with ranking your websites, look for good advice, not software. This is where I would normally go on a rant about getting High PR backlinks manually and beating out all the software newbies but I'll just say this instead:

Invest in BMR. (Build My Rank) If you want good results for little work, that's as far as I go. You still have to create unique,, quality content so it's still not the "something for nothing." that it sounds like you're looking for.

How quickly do the backlinks built by BMR do you any good? I have built about 100 links by blog posting, forum posting etc over the last 3 weeks and I have yet to find one link that has shown up on Alexa or seoquake (should I be looking somewhere else?) and I am nowhere to be found (at least the top 500 sites) for the keyword I was targeting.
Thanks

Thanks for the response. Are the links you get from BMR the type that will show up on SEOquake? If not, how do you know that google has taken notice of them (other than a climb up the SERPS). Sorry if that is a dumb question but I feel like I am beaing my head against the wall. I try to follow all the advice I get on this forum but I am just not seeing any results.

The best SEO software is your brain. You want to use tools that help you work smarter without crossing any lines. I cant find it but there was an article a while back from search engine land that talked about some of the most popular/helpful SEO tools. On my list that I use on a daily basis:

Screaming Frog
Google Keyword Tool
Open Site Explorer
Excel
Raven SEO
MySeoTool

There are lots of others but mostly because I like testing them out to see if they help ...

As it's not that clear what the OP meant, what can one recommend? :confused:

Anyhow, fmnely1, if you are looking for a link building tool, try

SEO SpyGlass Backlink Checker Software: X-Ray Your Competition

it gets backlink data from Google as well, among other sources.

For doing off page activities don't use the automatic software tool because it is not recommended by search engines.

You can try Google webmaster tool, Google adword keyword research tools, Google insight, Google analytic etc. These are the best seo tools.

Market samurai, Forum poster, press release bot-incansoft will do winders for you!!

We need more details as to what you want to use the software for.