I Built an Open-Source Alternative to Ahrefs & Surfer SEO (Costs $0.01/Article)

Source: Dev.to

Introduction

SEO tools are absurdly expensive.

• Ahrefs: $99‑999/month
• Surfer SEO: $89‑299/month
• Jasper AI: $49‑125/month
• Semrush: $139‑499/month

For indie developers and small teams, that’s a lot of money for tools you might use only a few times a week.

I built SEOBot — an open‑source AI SEO toolkit that does about 80 % of what these tools do, for essentially free.

What It Does

1. Keyword Research (Free, No API Key)

• Enter a seed keyword.
• SEOBot recursively expands it via Google’s Suggest API (2 levels deep).
• Results are clustered by semantic similarity.
• No external API needed; works instantly.
• Export to CSV for further analysis.

2. AI Content Generation (~$0.01/Article)

A 3‑step workflow:

1. Enter target keyword.
2. Review AI‑generated outline (3 title options).
3. Generate full SEO‑optimized article.

Features

• Built‑in SEO scoring (keyword density, heading structure, content length, readability).
• Supports English and Chinese.
• Uses OpenAI’s GPT‑4o‑mini – about $0.01 per 2 000‑word article.

3. Technical SEO Audit (18‑Point Check)

Enter any URL and receive an instant analysis across five categories:

• Meta Tags: title, description, OG tags, Twitter card, canonical, robots, structured data.
• Content: H1, word count, heading hierarchy, image alt text, links.
• Security: HTTPS, mixed content.
• Mobile: viewport, language attribute.
• Performance: load time, page size.

Results include a visual score (0‑100) with per‑category breakdowns.

4. One‑Click Publishing

Publish generated content directly to:

• Dev.to (draft or published)
• WordPress (any self‑hosted site)
• Twitter/X (share summaries)
• Markdown export (for Hugo, Astro, Jekyll, etc.)

Cost Breakdown

Compare that to a minimum of $99/month for Ahrefs.

Tech Stack

• Next.js 14 (App Router)
• TypeScript + Tailwind CSS + shadcn/ui
• OpenAI GPT‑4o‑mini (content generation only)

Try It

git clone https://github.com/George3307/seobot.git
cd seobot
npm install
export OPENAI_API_KEY=your_key
npm run dev

Keyword research and SEO audit work without any API key.

Repository

If you find this useful, star the repo ⭐

Questions? Open an issue or drop a comment below.