Give Your AI Agent Real SEO Data: Keyword Volume, Live SERPs, Backlinks and Trends Over MCP

SteadyScrape released an SEO data MCP server on the Apify Store that gives AI agents read-only access to Google search volumes, live SERPs, backlink counts, ranked keywords, Google Trends and YouTube data through the Model Context Protocol. The server runs in Apify Standby mode and answered most tool calls in 1-5 seconds during the company's tests, with top-100 SERP and Trends queries taking roughly 14-15 seconds because they are fetched live. Pricing is per successful call, starting at $0.006 per 10 SERP results, with session-level charge caps and a 60-calls-per-minute limit to contain agent loops.

Ask an AI assistant "where does my site rank for best crm for startups ?" and it will either guess or refuse. LLMs don't have search volumes, today's Google results or backlink counts. They make them up. The fix is to give the agent tools that fetch real data, and the Model Context Protocol MCP is now the standard way to plug those tools into Claude, Cursor, VS Code and agent frameworks. This post covers: | Tool | What the agent gets | |---|---| | keyword metrics | Google search volume, CPC, competition, keyword difficulty, intent and 12-month trend for up to 100 keywords | | google serp | Live Google results top 10-100 for any country and device, your domain's position, AI Overview text and sources, People Also Ask | | domain overview | Organic traffic estimate, ranked-keyword count, backlinks and referring domains for up to 100 domains | | ranked keywords | Up to 100 keywords a domain ranks for, with position, volume and URL | | backlinks | Up to 100 backlinks or referring domains for a domain or page | | google trends | Interest over time and by region for up to 5 terms | | youtube search | Ranked YouTube results with views, channel and date | | youtube video | Likes, comments, subscriber count, tags, plus the transcript if you ask | All tools are read-only. There are no logins, cookies or proxies on your side: the data comes from licensed SEO data feeds. { "mcpServers": { "seo-data": { "url": "https://steady-scrape-1--seo-data-mcp-server.apify.actor/mcp", "headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR APIFY TOKEN" } } } } That's it. The server runs in Apify Standby mode: it starts on the first request a few seconds of cold start in our tests and stays warm while you work. Then just ask: python import asyncio, os, httpx2 from mcp import ClientSession from mcp.client.streamable http import streamable http client URL = "https://steady-scrape-1--seo-data-mcp-server.apify.actor/mcp" async def main : headers = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ 'APIFY TOKEN' }"} async with httpx2.AsyncClient headers=headers, timeout=60 as hc: async with streamable http client URL, http client=hc as r, w, : async with ClientSession r, w as s: await s.initialize res = await s.call tool "google serp", {"keyword": "best crm for startups", "target domain": "hubspot.com"} print res.structured content "targetPosition" asyncio.run main In our tests most tools answered in 1-5 seconds. A top-100 SERP takes about 15 s and Google Trends about 14 s, because both are fetched live. You pay per successful call. Errors, invalid arguments and empty results are free, and there's no compute charge on top. | Session | Cost Free plan | |---|---| | Rank check: 5 keywords, top 10 each | $0.035 | | Keyword research: 100 keywords | $0.395 | | Competitor audit: 10 domains + 2 ranked-keyword lists + 1 backlink list | $0.340 | | YouTube research: 2 searches + 5 videos, 3 with transcripts | $0.161 | Per tool: $0.006 per 10 SERP results, $0.039 per 10 keywords, $0.111 per 10 domains, $0.071 per ranked-keywords call, $0.082 per backlinks call, $0.035 per Trends call, $0.006 per 20 YouTube results, $0.018 per video +$0.018 for a transcript , and $0.005 once per session. Paid Apify plans get 5-15% off the tool prices. Agents can loop, so the server has guardrails. It refuses calls that would push you past the maximum charge you set for a session, before fetching anything. It also limits a session to 60 calls a minute. Disclosure: we SteadyScrape built this server and get paid when it's used. SEO MCP Server: Keyword, SERP & Backlink Data https://apify.com/steady-scrape/seo-data-mcp-server steady-scrape/seo-data-mcp-server is on the Apify Store. Paste the config above, ask your agent an SEO question, and check the billing field in each response to see exactly what was charged. No MCP client yet? Run the Actor normally with input like {"calls": {"tool": "google serp", "arguments": {"keyword": "seo mcp server"}} } and each call becomes one dataset row. Our post-publish test of exactly that took one SERP page plus the session fee, about $0.011 .