Semrush uses its own machine-learning algorithms and trusted data providers to present the data in our databases. There are different methods for gathering different types of information but the high standard of quality across our databases remains the same.
We only use the most up-to-date data sources and we always clean the data through our proprietary methods in order to present the most trusted solution on the market.
Search Engine Data: Domain Rankings and Keywords
Semrush reports provide our customers with a wealth of information about domains, subdomains, and URLs. The more domains available to research, the more you can learn about what works and what doesn’t in a particular industry.
In addition to being able to pull large reports, Semrush also offers Gap Analysis tools to cross-examine and compare the strengths of multiple domains at once.
The more keywords available for your keyword research, the more ideas you can get to enrich your SEO and PPC campaigns. We have a powerful keyword database—you can check the total number of keywords in our software suite here.
Semrush users can segment their keyword research by using the Keyword Magic Tool and perform a detailed analysis of large keyword lists to pick the best ones for their campaigns.
What is more, the Keyword Strategy Builder tool has clusters–collections of closely related keywords focused on a single topic. They are automatically generated and sorted by the most important metrics–high Search Volume and low Keyword Difficulty. Clusters can help you to boost your SEO with more quality content on a relevant topic.
Data Collection
For search engine rankings and keyword analytics, we use third-party data providers to collect Google’s actual search results pages for the hundreds of millions of most popular keywords. Then, we collect information about the websites that are listed in the top 100 positions. We study both organic search results as well as paid search results to give you a complete picture of any website’s visibility on Google.
Analysis & Presentation
From these keywords and domains, we examine live data and historical data about position changes and domains' ranking in organic and paid search positions to create our suite of reports that show a website’s changes in positions, every keyword’s search volume, cost-per-click, and more insights that are useful to marketers.
Update Cycle
The exact method in which Semrush collects and analyzes search engine results pages (SERPs) information uses our proprietary algorithm that has been developed and optimized over the years. The keywords in each of our global databases are scheduled for a refresh on its rankings data every month.
This way, you know that the information you take from Semrush is based on the actual standings of Google’s most recent results pages.
Please check out this article to learn more about our data-collection method for domain and keyword analytics.
Traffic & Market Analytics
Semrush also has the power to estimate monthly and daily traffic and on-site behavior of any website on the Internet.
Our website traffic database powers our most valuable assets available to our customers through Traffic & Market dashboards.
This toolkit includes multiple dashboards that allow you to analyze any market, identify emerging trends, uncover competitor traffic stats, benchmark against the competition, conduct audience research, automate competitive tracking, and more.
The data in these tools comes from our unique panel of over 200 million real but anonymized Internet users in over 190 countries and regions.
Data Collection
The Semrush Traffic & Market panel is the result of our hundreds of partnerships with clickstream data providers. This panel is responsible for over 2 million events each minute (billions of events per month) on the Internet which are recorded and anonymized to preserve user privacy. From this clickstream data, we run our Neural Network algorithm to come up with a realistic estimation based on statistical sampling and error testing.
Neural Network Algorithm
To ensure the highest level of accuracy, Semrush uses its Neural Network—a combined algorithm that references various sources of data and recognizes patterns in the same way the human brain understands patterns.
The data sources in our network include clickstream data in addition to our own database of backlinks and organic search engine positions. After all sources are collected we run everything through thorough error testing and cleaning.
This method allows Semrush to understand the audience’s behavior in the most balanced and accurate way possible.
Backlinks Data
Semrush provides a clear picture of any website’s backlink profile, perfect for analyzing your own site or a competitor's. We use our own database containing trillions of backlinks to spot any and all domains that are referring to a website. The amount and depth of information offered in this database make it easy to identify new SEO opportunities for a website in any niche.
Semrush Backlink Crawler
To collect backlinks, our backlink crawler combs around 10 billion pages of the web on a daily basis and adds the new links that it finds to our database.
Online Advertising Data
Semrush has extensive databases to show everything about advertisers that use Google Ads and Google Shopping.
By the Numbers
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Over 1B Google Ads
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Historical data dating back to January 2012
Advertising Data Collection
Google Ads (PPC ads in search results) and Google Shopping ads (also known as Product Listing Ads) are taken into account when we collect search engine results pages for our main search engine databases.
With this research, marketers can create strategic advertising campaigns, outperform competitors, raise awareness of their brand, and know that their money is being spent wisely.
Social Media Data
Semrush offers tools for you to track the performance and engagement of social media profiles on Facebook, X (Twitter), Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, and LinkedIn (please kindly note that LinkedIn cannot be connected to Social Tracker).
To attain this information, Semrush uses the public APIs of these social media networks and never collects or uses any personal data without consent. The only time we’ll collect personal data is if you connect a personal account to automate your content calendar and view your page’s internal analytics with our Social Poster. This information will only be available to you, and never made available to the public.
Analysis & Presentation
We collect public information such as likes, number of followers, retweets, hashtags, video views, number of comments, and more from the pages that you choose to track. Then, we collect and organize the data to present dashboards and reports about each social profile’s audience, engagement, and growth rates.
Everything presented in Semrush’s Social Tracker is a collection of public information.
AI Visibility
The Semrush AI Toolkit collects commonly used queries from AI platforms like ChatGPT, SearchGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity, covering topics related to your brand and competitors.
It runs these queries through various large language models to observe how different AI systems present your brand. By analyzing the responses, the toolkit reveals how your brand is positioned, compares mentions against competitors, identifies tone and key descriptors, and surfaces emerging topics. This insight is then used to deliver actionable recommendations for improving brand messaging, positioning, and product alignment with consumer interests.