How to Use Semrush for SEO Competitor Research (2026)

Spending hours guessing which keywords to target or which content to create is exhausting. Your competitors already tested those strategies, ranked for profitable terms, and built solid backlink profiles – basically doing the hard work for you.

Semrush makes this process simple with tools that show exactly where rivals get their organic traffic, which SERP rankings they dominate, and how their link-building actually works. Time to steal their playbook and rank higher.

Why SEO Competitor Analysis matters for your Business

Let’s understand why competitive SEO audit is crucial for your success. Your competitors are essentially doing free market research for you.

They’re testing keywords, creating content, building backlinks, and running campaigns – and you can learn from their successes and failures without spending a penny on trial and error.

Here’s what proper competitor research reveals:

By understanding what works for your competitors, you can refine your own strategy and eliminate costly trial-and-error approaches. This intelligence helps you make informed decisions that directly impact your search visibility and market positioning.

Step 1: Use Domain Overview for Quick Intelligence

Start by logging into your Semrush account and go to the Domain Overview. Enter your website’s URL and hit search. Once the report loads, click on the “Competitors” tab.

This is where the magic happens. Semrush will show you a list of websites that share the most organic keywords with your domain. These are your true SEO competitors—the sites that are competing for the same search traffic you want.

Key metrics to pay attention to:

Step 2: Organic Research for Deep Traffic Analysis

After identifying main competitors through Domain Overview, Organic Research reveals exactly how they capture organic traffic. This feature displays complete keyword portfolios, positions, estimated traffic, and ranking fluctuations.

Access Organic Research and enter competitor domains. Semrush displays full keyword breakdowns including SERP features like featured snippets, People Also Ask boxes, and local packs.

Filter keywords by:

This data becomes foundational for keyword gap analysis and content strategy. Organic Research identifies best-performing non-branded topics by traffic volume. 

When competitors generate massive traffic from specific topic clusters you’ve ignored, that signals clear content opportunities.

Step 3: Find Missing Keyword Opportunities

Semrush Keyword Gap tool is where the magic happens. This feature allows you to compare your keyword profile against up to five competitors simultaneously.

Go to ‘Keyword Gap’ in the left menu and enter your domain plus up to four competitor domains. Click ‘Compare’ to generate your analysis.

Semrush generates detailed comparisons across critical categories:

Keyword Category	What It Reveals	Strategic Value
Missing Keywords	Competitors rank but you don’t	Immediate content opportunities
Weak Keywords	Competitors rank higher than you	Optimization priorities
Strong Keywords	You rank higher than competitors	Competitive advantages to maintains
Untapped Keywords	Only one competitor ranks	Low-competition opportunities
Shared Keywords	Everyone ranks for these	Competitive battlegrounds

Focus on Missing and Weak sections representing biggest opportunities. Filter by search volume, difficulty scores, and intent to prioritize targets.

For media buyers and affiliate marketers promoting products, keyword gap analysis reveals specific long-tail keywords competitors capture whilst you miss completely. That’s revenue sitting untouched.

Keyword Gap allows subdomain and subfolder-level analysis. For large sites with multiple content sections, narrow analysis to specific areas rather than comparing entire domains, delivering laser-focused insights.

Step 4: Analyse Backlink Profiles with Backlink Gap

Links remain massive ranking factors, and understanding who links to competitors reveals outreach opportunities. Backlink Gap tool compares backlink profiles of up to five competing websites simultaneously.

Go to the Backlink Gap under the Link Building section. Enter your domain and up to four competitor domains.

View line graph showing backlink profile growth over time for all entered domains. Below that, a table lists all referring domains sending links to these sites.

Apply a quick filter to find backlinks your site is missing. These are websites linking to competitors but not you. When a site links to multiple competitors, they’re clearly interested in your niche and might be willing to link to your content too.

Backlink Analytics reveals competitor backlink profiles in detail:

This intelligence helps identify which content types earn link building success in your industry and which websites are worth pursuing for outreach.

Step 5: Traffic Analytics for Multi-Channel Insights

Traffic Analytics estimates visitor behaviour on competitor sites, revealing traffic sources, engagement patterns, and audience demographics. Open Traffic Analytics and enter a competitor domain.

Key insights include: 

If competitors receive 70% traffic from organic search whilst your site gets 35%, that’s a clear signal they’ve built stronger SERP visibility. Drilling into specific traffic sources reveals which acquisition channels deserve investment. 

Traffic Journey shows where visitors navigate after leaving competitor sites. This uncovers partnership opportunities and related websites worth analysing.

Step 6: Monitor AI Visibility and Answer Engine Optimisation

Search is changing rapidly, and AI-generated answers are eating into traditional organic traffic. Google’s AI Overviews now appear in 13.14% of queries. Brands ignoring AI visibility miss a huge piece of modern search.

Semrush’s Domain Overview now includes AI visibility metrics. You’ll see AI Visibility Score—measuring brand presence in AI-generated answers.

AI Visibility Metric	What It Measures	Why It Matters
AI Visibility Score	Percentage of prompts mentioning your brand	Shows presence in AI responses
Share of Voice	Performance versus competitors in AI results	Indicates competitive positioning
Prompt Trend	Mention changes over time	Tracks visibility momentum
Sentiment	Positive, negative, neutral mention breakdown	Reveals brand perception

AI Visibility Score shows what percentage of relevant prompts mention your brand at least once, regardless of position. A 49.6% visibility means your brand appears in nearly half of all analysed AI responses.

For deeper AI tracking, Semrush Enterprise AIO monitors brands across ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, Perplexity, and Gemini. It benchmarks visibility against competitors, flags negative sentiment, and recommends content optimisations based on what performs in AI results.

Semrush Pricing Structure for Competitor Analysis

Understanding pricing helps maximize ROI from competitive research investments.

Semrush Plan	Monthly Cost	Annual Cost (17% Off)	Best For	Key Features
Pro Plan	$139.95	$117.33	Freelancers, small teams	5 projects, 500 keywords, essential tools
Guru Plan	$249.95	$208.33	Agencies, growing businesses	15 projects, 1,500 keywords, content marketing toolkit
Business	$499.95	$416.66	Large agencies, enterprises	40 projects, 5,000 keywords, API access

Pro Plan suits solo marketers handling basic competitive SEO audits. Guru Plan provides historical data access critical for trend analysis. The Business Plan includes white-label reporting for client presentations.

Tools Integration and Workflow Optimisation

Getting the Most from Your Semrush Investment

Effective SEO competitor analysis with Semrush isn’t about copying what others do – it’s about finding opportunities they’ve missed and executing better strategies. 

Use these tools to build a sustainable competitive advantage that grows your organic traffic, improves your rankings, and ultimately increases your revenue.

Remember, you can get 17% off your Semrush subscription with our exclusive Deal, and extended 14-day free trial to test all features before committing.