When it comes to websites, rankings are very important. You need to know how well your website is preforming in terms of the search engine rankings on Google and Bing for example. When someone types in a keyword or a phrase for a product or service you offer you want to appear as close to the top of the search results as possible. The further down the pages you appear, the less likely you are to receive a click through to your site. You can manually type in your phrases and see where you appear, but this can not only be time consuming but also not accurate as Google may show you different results to the general public as often it promotes sites you have visited on your personalised search results. There is software out there that will find this information for you. Depending on how many terms you want to track and how in depth of an analysis you want should influence your choice on which software to go with. The cost of the software varied quite a bit and it is worth asking to see if they will give you a free trial before you commit to an on going subscription.
Some great marketing companies have even created their own ranking software that often works better than many off the shelf ones and allows them the control to add in additional features if there is the call for it.