Semrush: Ultimate Guide to the Platform’s Killer Features

If you’re an avid reader of our blog, you must’ve seen our guest writers and us mentioning one powerful toolkit — Semrush.

It comes up when we talk about traffic estimators, metatags, site errors, keyword research, and many more aspects of digital marketing, so you might wonder what toolkit has a say in all of those.

Therefore, we’ve decided to do a thorough run-through of Semrush, a platform we use day-to-day and something we believe any digital marketer can barely survive without.

What is Semrush?

Power-packed with 50 tools that cover every thinkable and unthinkable aspect of online visibility, Semrush is essentially a source of intel on all things online marketing.

Consisting of five toolkits, the platform covers:

• SEO;
• Digital advertising;
• Market research and competitive analysis;
• Content marketing; and
• Social media management.

Essentially, Semrush provides you with the data and insights necessary to make the right calls when it comes to digital marketing — from the high-level decisions to enter new markets or launch new products/services to more granular and technical things like running site audits and keeping watch on your ranks.

Semrush Review, or the Platform’s Most Prominent Features

As you can tell, Semrush is, for the lack of a better word, huge!

So it’s impossible to squeeze a review of the entire platform in a single post — 10,000 words would barely suffice here.

Instead, we’ve decided to focus on some of the most impressive features of the toolkit, highlighting some of the most unique and one-of-a-king know-hows Semrush is filled with.

Semrush = Keyword Intel

Semrush has always been renowned within the industry for its keyword research and analysis strengths.

In fact, today, the platform has the largest (and, what’s more important, the most up-to-date) keyword database in the market.

Every time we check Semrush’s stats page, we see a bigger number, so the pace of growth is simply astonishing.

Yet it’s not just about raw keyword data. The platform has a way of transforming keyword intel into actionable insights, helping you to pinpoint things like:

• Global and local search volume (how many users Google this or that search term a month) along with a list of semantically related keywords;
• Keyword intent (with an increasing Google’s emphasis on user intent, this one-of-a-kind Semrush feature can help you go more targeted about keywords and streamline your content efforts);
• Keyword difficulty (how hard it is to rank for a given keyword based on the competition and other factors like backlinks, SERP features, etc.) relevant to each geo;
• Competition (you get a list of sites that rank for a given keyword, which helps to understand who and what you’re competing against);
• SERP features (which SERP features a given keyword triggers, hence you can compete for).

All these insights come with a handy keyword management ecosystem — you can separate keywords by geo, language, and other criteria and create actionable master lists.

Rank Tracking Made Easy

With mobile data available to all users regardless of their plan, this is most important when it comes to rank tracking — while things may look promising on desktop, you might be losing your position on mobile.

So, Semrush’s Position Tracking tool has everything you need to keep an eye on your daily ranks and spot any shift before it causes real trouble.

Yet on top of mere rank tracking, the tool offers even more:

• Share of voice and visibility benchmarks vs. the competition;
• Daily data updates;
• Multi-tracking capabilities where you can monitor your rank across devices and locations (down to the ZIP level);
• SERP feature coverage that (unique!) includes local 3-pack tracking and a lot of languages; and
• Next-level reporting features that even let you use a Google Data Studio connector (especially important if you’re tailoring to clients).

This rank tracker will even detect pages that cause self-competition (Cannibalization report).

A Really Powerful Site Audit

While we will dig into particular features, the key thing that makes a powerful site audit tool is its relevancy and ability to go hand in hand with industry shifts. And Semrush’s Site Audit tool does an impressive job going toe to toe with Google’s updates.

Once Google announced the release of the Page Experience Update, Semrush launched its Core Web Vitals (CWV) report within the Site Audit tool. It’s a super unique feature that characterizes the speed of change within both the industry and the tool.

With over 140 checks, the tool essentially assesses your site’s performance against the key site health indicators that span across:

• Technical (e.g., crawlability, HTTPS, AMP, and performance) issues;
• On-page and structured data issues;
• Markup checker;
• International SEO issues; and
• Internal linking issues.

If you connect your GA account, the tool will prioritize the detected issues by spotting pages that get more page views. Plus, your GA data will add two more checks into the mix — orphaned pages and pages that take too long to load (a ranking factor).

What stands out is that Site Audit doesn’t only detect site issues; it actually gives handy advice on how to go about fixing them.

On-Page SEO Checker and Backlink Audit – Tools That Are Unique to the Market

We’d consider Site Audit quite unique to the market, given its power, audit depth, and pace of updates. Yet other platforms also have site audits. But Semrush has two truly one-of-a-kind tools — On-Page SEO Checker and Backlink Audit.

On-Page SEO Checker (OPSC)

This is one of the most intuitive and on-target ways to perfect the performance of your pages.

Just specify your target keyword, and OPSC will collect valuable page and content improvement ideas based on competitive insights. From technical SEO, link-building, and SERP features to UX and semantics, you’ll get recommendations across every page aspect that can impact your rankings for a target keyword.

What’s more, the tool will identify pages that need more urgent attention based on ease of fixes and impact on the page’s performance.

Backlink tools

Semrush’s Backlink Audit features 50 unique toxicity markers that help pinpoint backlinks that harm your profile and, hence, performance.

But there’s more to the platform’s backlink capabilities. With an over 43-billion backlink database, Semrush’s Backlink Analytics tool has access to the largest (and freshest) backlink database on the market, which makes it probably the strongest solution for taking a sneak peek at competitors’ backlink portfolios and getting ideas for your own link-building efforts.

And the Link Building tool will help you streamline and manage the entire outreach process.

Content Marketing Workflow Coverage

All your site polishing, backlink outreach, competitive analysis, and other efforts don’t cost a dime without high-quality content. And Semrush features a few tools that essentially cover the content marketing workflow — and we mean, in full.

From brief creation to analyzing content performance, they have  a tool for pretty much all things content:

• The Topic Research tool is built for the content ideation stage, helping you choose the most trendy and resonating topic for future content down to the local level based on your target geo.
• SEO Content Template analyzes the top content pieces for your target keywords and automatically creates a brief (with SEO, readability, text length, semantics, and backlink ideas) for your writers. And SEO Writing Assistant add-on helps make sure your text meets the best practices of the top-performing content of your rivals.
• Content Analyzer monitors the performance of your content, and if you see it lagging, run the page through the On-Page SEO Checker and get actionable improvement recommendations.

Pricing: Probably the Best Semrush Feature

Typically, pricing is the most intimidating part of every solution, especially as comprehensive as Semrush. Yet the folks there seem to be quite modest.

For all the intel you get, and the quality of data and insights, Semrush’s pricing is as affordable as it gets, especially if you’re ready to use the platform’s full power:

Of course, if you opt-in for an annual plan, the prices drop even further, and the PRO subscription becomes a $99.95/mo deal.

And for this price, you have the intel and capabilities of over 50 tools — to have an integrated, intertwined, and smooth management of your entire online visibility process.

Closing Remarks 👈

Of course, our Semrush coverage has only scratched the platform’s surface. We haven’t even gotten into the depth of its advertising, social media management, reporting, and other capabilities.

Yet our quick run-up has highlighted some of the most exciting features of the platform you won’t find anywhere else. So hopefully, you now have a better idea of how much your digital marketing job can get easier and smarter if you choose to arm yourself with the power of the platform.

And, as our reader, you have a unique chance to experience the toolkit’s strengths to yourself with a 14-day free Semrush trial.