Let’s face it- you are stuck in a traffic generation-treadmill and failed to gain an impressive ranking for your site in search engines.
Well, I am not surprised to know about this failure!
Because it’s absolutely not your mistake! It’s totally getting out of hands, and the reason is, SEO landscape is transforming rapidly and breaking down several trends and strategies to win the market and outranking the big boys in the industry.
If you remember, like just a few years ago, SEO experts wouldn’t say boo to a goose because things were simple and they don’t feel the need to start an uphill battle to compete with others in the market.
Unlike 10 years ago, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has now become nightmarishly hard, especially for people who are not relying on any of the reliable SEO tools that can help monitor local listings, perform an audit, discover competitors, and assist in ongoing optimization and testing.
So, when it comes to choosing the best SEO tools that can dominate the SEO landscape even after 5 more years, I think SEMrush and Ahrefs are the ones that top the list by receiving more votes and appreciation from the people like you and me.
These two are the first tools I fell in love with, and I think I should better call them a ‘swiss army knife’ in the world of SEO tools.
Yes, it makes sense! Because the tools are constantly fighting and competing with each other to hit the top spot on your list.
Here I am breaking down each tool and comparing the features that can help achieve you Guaranteed SEO Results, and ditch all the terrors by being an ‘all-in-one marketing solution’.
Let’s do it!
SEMrush and Ahrefs- introducing the two big fighters!
Did you know Ahrefs was first introduced as the best backlink analysis tool?
Well, over the past few years, they have further introduced a ton of dazzling features. For example
- Give lots of keyword ideas
- Check new keywords to target every month
- Analyze traffic estimates for all webpages ranked in top 10 positions
- Discover the ranking history
Due to all such features introduced in the market, Ahrefs became the stiffest competitor to SEMrush.
Now if I talk about the brilliance of SEMrush, you would be surprised to know that SEMrush was first introduced as the best keyword research tool, which later becomes a killer tool that helps spy on your competitor’s keywords and its rankings.
Do you know what the best part is? You don’t need to sit down every night and brainstorm for new keywords. You can simply pop up the competitor site into the relevant tab, and find a list of multiple keywords they are trying to target.
Well, the point of concern for SEMrush is, Ahrefs has also introduced the same feature- which further created a spark in their fight!
After that, SEMrush updated its feature game to stay one step ahead of Ahrefs.
In fact, they offered features like
- Content optimization for SEO
- Competitor’s analysis for PPC campaigns
- Analyzation of log files
- And lots more…
After introducing these features, it was quite challenging for Ahrefs to beat the heat. However, they did their best by offering in-depth competition analysis and handling off-page technicalities.
SEMrush even tried to start with a link analysis game and beat Ahrefs to came out on top.
So, the bottom line is, both of the tools share the same set of features which makes it hard to answer the question, which is the best tool? Ahrefs or SEMrush?
Let’s scroll down further to find your answer!
SEMrush vs Ahrefs: Which is the best keyword research tool?
Today, more and more people tend to invest in paid SEO tools such as Ahrefs or SEMrush so they can find a list of some profitable keywords for their SEO campaign.
But do you know which of these tools is more capable of finding the best keyword ideas?
SEMrush for keyword research!
Well, let’s begin with SEMrush.
The tool offers an incredible ‘keyword magic tool’ option which is known as the biggest keyword database and helps you discover more than 20 billion competitive keywords.
This tool gives you a chance to discover comprehensive data for the majority of competitive keywords. So, from checking search volume to answering queries regarding keywords, Keyword Magic Tool provides the ultimate solutions for all problems.
You can mine hundreds of other keywords by using one parent keyword, for example, the parent keyword is, ‘best SEO company’, and the suggestions you might receive, ‘top SEO agency’, ‘professional SEO company’ and many more.
If you want to explore multiple niche topics as well as find semantically related long-tail keywords then Keyword Magic Tool also suits well for your targeted needs.
SEMrush keyword research tool offers
- Information about monthly searches
- Total number of searches
- CPC distribution
- Trends in keywords
- Keyword suggestions
Ahrefs for keyword research
Like the keyword magic tool in SEMrush, Ahrefs also offers a separate tool called, “Keywords Explorer” searching competitive keywords.
With the Keywords Explorer tool, it’s easy to find thousands of keyword ideas that are relevant to your searches and offer the exact Search volume as well as Keyword difficulty score. Above all, you can also check advanced metrics such as clicks, impressions, and return rates.
The best part is, you can even pick your desired location and press the search button to find location-based keywords.
I remember when I first used this tool, I got confused because it was too much like SEMrush and I was unable to feel any difference as this tool also offers
- Keyword difficult score
- Search volume
- Organic clicks for a specific keyword
- CPC value of that keyword
Verdict
I am not surprised to say that SEMrush is the best keyword research tool.
It has the biggest database of keywords and offers a lot of amazing variations.
Whereas, Ahrefs offers the best help regarding organic content research and clickstream analysis.
SEMrush vs Ahrefs: Which is best for backlink analysis?
Now let’s dive in and discover which is the best tool that offers more comprehensive backlink analysis?
SEMrush for backlink analysis
SEMrush provides an outstanding backlink analysis tool and covers all the aspects of link building.
With SEMrush, you can avail the tool named Backlink Analytics through which you can easily find a list of backlinks of any site in the world.
You can simply enter any competitor URL in that backlink analytics tab and get a detailed analysis of a particular website.
The thing that draws me towards SEMrush is, I can easily find a lot of backlink information and data which includes
- Total number of backlinks
- Referring IPs and domains
- Domain authority score
- And the list of new all new and lost backlinks
When you press the ‘backlinks’ tabs of your competitors, you can easily get an overview of all the backlink sources.
With the backlink analysis tool, I have also found an incredible number of relevant backlinks that were right according to my niche.
One more reason to love SEMrush is, you can easily find the list of toxic links for your site. Sadly, you cannot discover toxic links with Ahrefs.
I am curious to know what step would they take next to outperform SEMrush!
Ahrefs for backlink analysis
Ahrefs also offers one tool for backlink analysis called ‘site explorer’. It helps you analyze backlinks of any website you enter- just like SEMrush.
You will find an incredible number of data and backlink information, such as
- Ahrefs rank
- Total backlinks
- Referring domains
- Organic keywords
- Traffic value
- Organic traffic results for entered URL
- Total Edu links
- Total Gov links
- And much more
You can also discover backlink sources by pressing the ‘backlinks’ button in Ahrefs.
You can even choose filters like ‘do follow’ links, which help you find do-follow links of your competitor’s site.
Verdict
When we talk about backlink analysis, we find that both SEMrush and Ahrefs tools are excellent and helpful in finding in-depth details.
But here SEMrush stands out in the competition, because it gives an exclusive backlink analysis tool, whereas Ahrefs has still not launched any backlink research tool. It only has one in-built Site Explorer tool.
SEMrush vs Ahrefs: Which is best for competitor’s research?
So far, I have discussed keyword research and backlink analysis using Ahrefs and SEMrush. Now I will help you explain which of these tools is best for performing competitor’s analysis.
SEMrush for competitor’s analysis
SEMrush provides a great exclusive tool known as ‘competitive research’ that helps you analyze all the competitors in the world.
Just enter your favorite domain like https://hukumat.com/ and start analyzing
- Total number of backlinks
- Organic search traffic
- Authority score
- Paid search traffic
- Displays ads and much more
The thing that drew my attention is, you can find keywords by country and discover your competitor’s top-performing keywords.
It’s also possible to discover top organic keywords and the main organic competitors.
Ahrefs for competitor’s analysis
Ahrefs provide a ‘site explorer’ tool for the competitor’s analysis.
You can enter any domain and start analyzing different metrics.
From checking backlinks to display search ads, you can get each detail about your competitor.
The best part is, you can also check organic competitor search results with this tool.
If you want to run your PPC campaign accurately, Ahrefs competitor’s analysis tool is the best. It helps you analyze several elements like the PPC expenditure of your competitors as well as marketing techniques for successful ranking.
With Ahrefs, you can easily check out the amount splurged by your competitors and see how much traffic they received from PPC. You can get a clear picture before spending anything on your website.
Verdict
You must be confused after analyzing all the features of these tools.
Well, the fact is, Ahrefs is a great option when it comes to competitor analysis.
You can get detailed competitive analysis as it gives you a slight edge to steal your competitors that are performing well on competitive keywords.
So, if you want to estimate the traffic of any domain and check the performance of organic and search ads, then no other tool can beat the excellence of Ahrefs.
SEMrush vs Ahrefs: Which tool has the best pricing plans?
Pricing is the most critical thing for every business owner because nobody wants to overplay the budget especially when they need to invest in SEO tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush.
SEMrush has three plans
- Pro plan = $99.95 per month
- Guru plan = $199.95 per month
- Business plan = $399.95 per month
- Enterprise- quote-based
The interesting part is, you can get a 16% discount on yearly subscriptions on all the plans.
The pro and Guru plans are available with a free subscription feature.
Good news for business owners who want to choose SEMrush for business! You can get more than 50,000 results for every report.
But pro and guru plan only offers 10,000 and 30, 000 results for each report.
So, if you want to estimate the traffic of any domain and check the performance of organic and search ads, then no other tool can beat the excellence of Ahrefs.
Ahrefs pricing includes four plans
Now let me give you a glimpse about Ahrefs pricing plans.
- Lite plan = $99 per month
- Standard plan = $179 per month
- Advanced plan = $399 per month
- Agency plan = $999 per month
Their Lite and Standard plan provide a 7-day trial for only $7.
With Lite and Standard plans, you can only facilitate 1 user. But Advanced and Agency plan helps access 3 and 5 users.
Their plans offer standard features which include, domain comparison, batch analysis, monthly new keywords, and new and lost keywords.
Verdict
After analyzing all the best features and the offer of a 7-day trial for $7, Ahrefs is the winner.
We can try the plans for 7 days, perform all the organic searches, and can even cancel before making the first payment.
Final thoughts
When we are searching for the most reliable SEO tools, its important to make sure that we pick the best tools that provide all the necessary features.
I personally do not believe in using lots of SEO tools, because the more you use tools, the more you get confused about the results.
So, I always prefer to choose one or two tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush that have all the features for Guaranteed SEO Results for my website. Both of these tools come into handy as I can manage keyword research, competitor analysis, site audits, and much more in one place.
If you want to find good analytical stats, fast crawl time, and detailed keyword research, then SEMrush is the best tool to consider.
But if you are looking for in-depth competitor’s analysis and managing off-page technical stuff along with cost-effective plans that are available with only a $7 trial fee, then Ahrefs is definitely good to go.
As a SEMrush tool user, maybe I am a bit biased in favor of this tool.
But I can’t help it out. This is a complete all-in-one marketing solution for my website and seems to be more superior than all the other tools.
With that being said, I would urge you to use both of these tools if you have the budget, but meanwhile, if you can only afford one tool for your website, then I would recommend SEMrush as its more comprehensive, user friendly, and offer more bang for your bucks.
Now, it’s your turn, what do you think which is the best SEO tool in terms of both features and pricing?
