Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR): Business Model Canvas [Dec-2025 Updated]

You're looking past the noise to see how Semrush Holdings, Inc. actually makes its money, especially now that they're pushing hard into the enterprise space with that big $1.9 billion Adobe deal. Honestly, seeing their enterprise customer base growing over 72% year-over-year, alongside an Annual Recurring Revenue of $455.4 million as of Q3 2025, tells a clear story about their strategic shift toward high-value clients and AI integration. I've mapped out their entire nine-block Business Model Canvas below-it shows exactly how they plan to turn that significant investment in R&D into sustainable, high-margin revenue streams, so you can see the mechanics behind the strong 2025 financial guidance.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Key Partnerships

You're looking at the structure of Semrush Holdings, Inc.'s external relationships as of late 2025, right before the planned closing of the Adobe transaction. These partnerships are critical for data scale, market reach, and product depth.

The most significant relationship development is the definitive acquisition agreement with Adobe, announced on November 19, 2025. This all-cash transaction values Semrush Holdings, Inc. at approximately $1.9 billion, or $12.00 per share. The deal, which has board approval and support from stockholders representing over 75% of the voting power, is targeted to close in the first half of 2026. Should Semrush terminate under certain conditions, a $63,000,000 cash termination fee is payable to Adobe.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. is actively expanding its direct market channel through strategic alliances, notably the new Enterprise Partner Program launched on October 23, 2025. This program formalizes a framework to connect marketing agencies with the company's enterprise platform capabilities, positioning certified partners to sell, service, and scale the suite. The premier launch partner for this initiative is the global marketing agency Dentsu.

Capability integration stems from recent strategic acquisitions, which bolster the platform's depth. For instance, the integration of Ryte, acquired in July 2024, enhances the Enterprise SEO Platform with advanced crawling technology, focusing on Website User Experience (WUX). Similarly, the integration following the April 2024 acquisition of Brand24 brings in social listening and brand monitoring capabilities. While the acquisition costs were undisclosed, the data sets are active; for example, the domain brand24.com recorded 294.45K visits in October 2025.

Maintaining the vast data sets requires strong data and infrastructure providers. Semrush Holdings, Inc. relies on Google Cloud, a partnership that has demonstrably cut engineering costs in half while scaling IT infrastructure globally. This infrastructure supports an industry-leading keyword database of over 27 billion keywords and simplifies database access across approximately 700 projects on Cloud SQL. The computing power has increased by three times due to this infrastructure relationship.

The partner ecosystem for marketing agencies and consultants acts as a force multiplier for enterprise reach. Semrush Holdings, Inc. reports that 10 million marketing professionals have used the platform, and 35% of Fortune 500 companies use Semrush Holdings, Inc. as their go-to marketing tool. Agencies can gain status on the Agency Partners platform by completing certification via Semrush Academy, which helps secure a higher Agency Score and greater exposure to the global community of marketers.

Here is a summary of key partnership metrics and data points as of late 2025:

The Enterprise Partner Program offers specific enablement benefits to its agency partners:

• Empowerment to sell, service, and scale with Semrush.
• White-glove onboarding for rapid time-to-value.
• Direct Product Influence via Partner Advisory Boards.
• Go-to-market resources including joint opportunities.

The infrastructure partnership with Google Cloud yielded several operational improvements:

• Engineering costs cut by half globally.
• Computing power increased by three times.
• Reduced time of delivery for a new feature by two times.

Finance: draft 13-week cash view by Friday.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Key Activities

Research and development, especially in Generative AI.

• AI portfolio Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) more than doubled from the second quarter 2025 to the third quarter 2025.

Constant data collection and maintenance for competitive intelligence.

Product innovation and expansion into new toolkits (e.g., Semrush One).

• Semrush One launched to unite traditional SEO and AI Search.
• More than 10% of customers use AI tools layered atop SEO.
• Q3 2025 Revenue: $112.1 million, up 15% year-over-year.
• Q3 2025 Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR): $455.4 million, up 14% year-over-year.

Sales-Led and Sales-Assisted motions to drive enterprise growth.

Enterprise segment growth metrics as of Q3 2025:

• Enterprise ARR growth: +33% year-over-year.
• Customers paying more than $10,000 annually grew 30% year-over-year.
• Customers paying over $50,000 annually grew over 72% year-over-year.
• Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) increased 17% to approximately $4K.
• Q1 2025: Customers paying over $50,000 increased 86% year-over-year to 388.

Operational efficiency numbers:

Integrating acquired technologies and content platforms.

• Adobe announced definitive agreement to acquire Semrush Holdings, Inc. on November 19, 2025.
• Acquisition price per share: $12.00 cash.
• Total equity value of the transaction: approximately $1.9 billion.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Key Resources

Proprietary, large-scale online visibility data set.

AI-powered SaaS platform and interconnected tool hubs.

• Total Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) as of September 30, 2025: $455.4 million.
• AI portfolio ARR expected to approach $30 million by year-end 2025.
• AI products added $10 million in ARR during Q3 2025.
• More than 10% of Semrush customers were using at least one AI product as of Q3 2025.
• The platform offers around 50 tools.

Strong intellectual property in SEO and digital marketing tools.

The value of the IP is reflected in customer spending metrics and platform scale.

Cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments of $275.7 million (Q3 2025).

Skilled R&D team focused on AI and enterprise solutions.

• Total employees as of 2024: Approximately 1,600.
• Another report indicates approximately 1,390 employees in 2025.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Value Propositions

You're looking at the core reasons why customers choose Semrush Holdings, Inc. over the competition right now, late in 2025. It's about consolidation and advanced intelligence, not just point solutions anymore.

The primary value is unified online visibility management across search engine optimization (SEO), advertising, content, social media, and competitive research. This platform aims to be the single source for understanding and executing digital marketing campaigns globally. You see this reflected in their overall platform strength, which Forrester named them a Leader in for SEO Solutions.

The shift toward advanced intelligence is a major draw. Semrush Holdings, Inc. is heavily investing in AI-driven insights to make content creation and marketing efforts much more efficient. This isn't just talk; the AI portfolio's Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) more than doubled from the second quarter of 2025 to the third quarter of 2025, adding $10 million in ARR during Q3 alone. Customers who have adopted at least one of these AI solutions show net revenue retention approaching 150%, which tells you the value realization is significant.

For those needing to see what rivals are doing, the platform delivers comprehensive competitive research and market analysis tools. This capability is crucial for upmarket clients. For instance, the Enterprise SEO solution, which offers faster and more customized insights, saw its average ARR per customer hit approximately $60,000.

The solutions are definitely scalable. While the total number of paying customers was approximately 114,000 as of September 30, 2025, the growth story is in the high-value segments. The number of customers paying over $50,000 annually grew by over 72% year-over-year as of Q3 2025, showing the platform successfully moves upmarket from smaller businesses to global enterprise clients.

Honestly, the best proof of value is what existing customers are doing. The overall dollar-based net revenue retention (DBNRR) held steady at 105% as of September 30, 2025. That means, even excluding new customers, the revenue from the existing base grew by 5% year-over-year. For the Enterprise segment specifically, that retention rate strengthened to 125%. Here's a quick look at how the high-value segments are performing:

The platform helps you consolidate tools, which is a huge efficiency play for larger organizations. For example, management expected the Enterprise SEO solution ARR to grow from $11 million in Q1 2025 to $30 million by the end of 2025, implying customer count growth from nearly 200 to over 500. This focus on high-value accounts, even if it slightly reduced the total customer count to 114,000, is driving better per-customer value, evidenced by the average ARR per customer increasing by 17% year-over-year in Q3.

The value propositions boil down to these key areas of customer benefit:

• Unified management across all digital visibility channels.
• Accelerated marketing efficiency via Generative AI tools.
• Deep competitive intelligence for strategic planning.
• Proven scalability demonstrated by 72% growth in $50k+ customers.
• Strong existing customer value capture, shown by the 105% DBNRR.

If onboarding takes 14+ days, churn risk rises, so speed of value realization with these new AI features is defintely key to maintaining that high Enterprise NRR of 125%.

Finance: draft 13-week cash view by Friday.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Customer Relationships

You're looking at how Semrush Holdings, Inc. manages its vast user base, which spans from casual users to the largest corporations. It's a multi-pronged approach, blending free access with high-touch enterprise sales.

Product-Led Growth (PLG) for initial user adoption and scale

The initial hook is the free tier, driving massive top-of-funnel volume. As of December 2024, Semrush Holdings, Inc. had 1,166,000 active users worldwide. The split shows the scale of the PLG motion: 1,049,000 active free customers, representing approximately 90% of the total active base. This base grew by 10.37% from 2023 to 2024. The conversion to paid is the key metric here; as of December 2024, there were 117,000 paying customers, an 8.33% increase year-over-year. By June 30, 2025, the paying customer count was approximately 116,000, with Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) at $435.3 million.

• Total Registered Accounts Since Launch: Over 10 million users.
• Total Active Users (Dec 2024): 1,166,000.
• Paying Customers (Dec 2024): 117,000.

Dedicated Sales-Led motion for high-value enterprise accounts

For the largest accounts, the relationship shifts to a dedicated sales effort. Semrush Holdings, Inc. has 8,500 customers within its base that qualify as enterprise users, though only 5.1% of the total customer base are companies with over 500 employees. The focus on this segment is clear from the growth in high-value contracts. Customers paying more than $50,000 annually increased by 83% year-over-year as of Q2 2025. The Enterprise SEO segment specifically targeted growth from 200 customers in Q1 2025 to over 500 by the end of 2025, aiming for an Enterprise SEO ARR exit of $30 million, up from $11 million in Q1 2025. Also, 40% of all Fortune 500 companies are clients.

Self-service model for smaller customers via subscription tiers

The bulk of the paying base operates on self-service subscription tiers. The average revenue generated per paying customer in 2024 was approximately $3,125 per year. Forecasts suggest the total number of paying users could reach around 135,000 in 2025. The platform itself has expanded its offering from 2 tools in 2008 to over 55 tools by 2025, supporting a wider range of self-service needs.

Customer support and real-time feedback loop for platform optimization

Retention metrics show the health of these relationships. Dollar-based net revenue retention (DBNRR) stood at 106% in Q1 2025, dipping slightly to 105% as of June 30, 2025. This means that even with macro headwinds, the existing customer base is still expanding its spend by 5% to 6% annually. The platform uses customer feedback to continuously improve its machine learning models. On review platforms, Semrush Holdings, Inc. holds an average rating of 4.6 out of 5 from over 2,200 users on Capterra and 4.5 out of 5 from over 2,500 users on G2.

Enterprise Partner Program for managed service relationships

The focus on enterprise adoption is also supported by partner channels. The AI product suite, which is integrated into the platform, was already generating over $4 million in ARR, with expectations to reach close to 5% of total ARR by the end of 2025. This indicates a growing ecosystem where partners may be reselling or integrating these advanced solutions.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Channels

You're looking at how Semrush Holdings, Inc. gets its product into the hands of its customers as of late 2025. It's a multi-pronged approach, moving upmarket while still relying on the massive top-of-funnel awareness built over years.

Direct-to-customer through the Semrush SaaS platform and website

The core channel is direct, meaning customers sign up and use the platform via the Semrush website. This self-service model is key for the volume of users they manage. As of the end of Q3 2025, Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) stood at $455.4 million, up 14% year-over-year from Q3 2024. The total paying customer count was approximately 118,000 at the end of Q1 2025, though this figure saw a slight sequential decrease to approximately 116,000 by the end of Q2 2025, which management attributed to softness in the freelancer segment. The platform maintains a very large top-of-funnel, with 1,166,000 total active users (free and paid) as of December 2024. The Average ARR Per Paying Customer was over $3,600 as of Q1 2025, showing growth of more than 14% year-over-year, which is a direct reflection of successful upselling within this direct channel.

Here's a quick look at the scale of the direct customer base:

Global sales team focused on the growing Enterprise segment

The push upmarket is heavily reliant on a dedicated global sales team targeting larger organizations. This focus is showing results, as the Enterprise SEO Solution had nearly 200 paying customers by the end of Q1 2025, with an average ARR per customer of approximately $60,000. The ARR specifically for this Enterprise SEO Solution stood at $11 million at the end of Q1 2025, with management expecting it to reach $30 million by the end of 2025. The broader cohort of high-value customers is also expanding rapidly; customers paying over $50,000 ARR increased 86% year-over-year to 388 as of Q1 2025. By Q3 2025, the enterprise customer segment drove 33% year-over-year Annual Recurring Revenue growth, validating this channel strategy.

Digital marketing and content channels (e.g., acquired Third Door Media)

Semrush Holdings, Inc. uses its own expertise in digital marketing and content to drive awareness, which feeds the direct channel. The company's vast database, including over 26.5 billion keywords and 43 trillion backlinks (as of 2024/predicted 2025), is a direct result of the product development that fuels content marketing efforts. While specific revenue attribution for the acquisition of Third Door Media isn't broken out in the latest reports, the overall strategy relies on thought leadership and organic visibility, which is supported by the fact that the company's database crawls 10 billion URLs on a daily basis.

The reach through content and organic search is massive:

• Total active users (free and paid) as of December 2024: 1,166,000.
• Active free customers as of December 2024: 1,049,000.
• The platform offers over 55 tools.

Affiliate and referral programs for lead generation

Affiliate and referral programs act as a performance-based extension of the marketing channel. Semrush Holdings, Inc. runs a generous program that rewards partners for driving both trials and purchases. Affiliates can earn up to $450 per sale, plus $10 for each trial activation, depending on the partner tier and product promoted. The program supports promotion across various toolkits, including Semrush One and AI Visibility. The cookie length for referrals is noted as 120-day in some partner materials, which is quite long for the industry.

App integrations and API access for platform partners

The API channel allows platform partners to embed Semrush data into their own systems, creating a distribution and usage multiplier effect. The Semrush API provides access to the core data assets, which include:

• Keyword database size: Over 26.5 billion keywords.
• Backlink database size: Over 43 trillion backlinks.
• Daily URL crawl rate: 10 billion URLs.

This integration capability is crucial for enterprise adoption, allowing large organizations to automate data retrieval and build custom dashboards, effectively turning partners into channel extensions.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Customer Segments

You're looking at how Semrush Holdings, Inc. segments its users to drive its platform's growth, especially as the market shifts toward AI-driven search. It's clear the strategy is heavily weighted toward upmarket expansion, but the lower end still matters, even with recent softness.

The customer base is broad, ranging from individual specialists to large corporations. As of the third quarter of 2025, the total number of paying customers was not explicitly stated for that period, but the count was approximately 116,000 as of June 30, 2025, down sequentially from approximately 118,000 on March 31, 2025.

The focus on higher-value customers is evident in the growth rates for the top tiers. For instance, customers paying over $50,000 annually-the core Enterprise segment-grew by over 72% year-over-year in the third quarter of 2025. This upmarket push is also reflected in the overall average revenue per customer, which reached $3,756 as of June 30, 2025, representing growth of more than 15% compared to the same quarter last year.

Here's a breakdown of the key statistical data points for these segments as of late 2025:

The customer base is clearly stratified, with different segments showing different health indicators. The company launched the Semrush Enterprise Partner Program to expand its enterprise footprint and create new growth opportunities for marketing agencies and their clients.

The composition of the customer base includes:

• Enterprise customers (>$50k ARR): This group is the primary driver of upmarket expansion, with the Enterprise SEO solution reaching 260 customers in Q2 2025, averaging approximately $60,000 in ARR per customer.
• Marketing agencies and consultants with extensive client portfolios: Targeted for growth via the new Enterprise Partner Program.
• Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs) using lower-tier subscription plans: This segment is experiencing softness, which contributed to the full-year 2025 revenue outlook revision due to an increase in paid-search cost per click.
• Individual marketing professionals and SEO specialists: This group, which includes freelancers, showed sequential softness in customer count between Q1 and Q2 2025.

The overall stickiness across the base, as measured by Dollar-based Net Revenue Retention, was 105% as of September 30, 2025.

Finance: draft 13-week cash view by Friday.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Cost Structure

You're looking at the major drains on Semrush Holdings, Inc.'s bottom line as of late 2025. The cost structure reflects a company heavily prioritizing future growth through technology and market penetration, which naturally means high operating expenses right now.

Significant investment in Research and Development for AI and product innovation is a clear cost driver. While specific R&D dollar amounts for 2025 aren't cleanly isolated across all reports, the strategic focus is evident. For instance, the AI portfolio's Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) more than doubled from Q2 2025 to Q3 2025, signaling substantial, ongoing investment in engineering and product development to maintain that momentum. This investment is key to capturing the upmarket shift.

Sales and Marketing expenses are also substantial, necessary to drive the observed enterprise and upmarket traction. Analysts noted in Q2 2025 that GAAP operating expenses, specifically Research and Development and Sales and Marketing, rose faster than GAAP revenue. This spend is fueling the growth in higher-value customers; customers paying more than $50,000 annually increased by a massive 83% year-over-year as of Q2 2025, and customers paying over $10,000 annually grew 30% year-over-year as of Q3 2025.

The direct costs associated with running the platform are itemized below. Cost of Revenue, which includes data center and third-party service costs, hit $45.0 million in Q2 2025, up from $41.3 million in Q1 2025. This is a significant component of the overall cost base.

Personnel costs, which include customer support and the teams driving R&D and Sales, are a major factor, especially when factoring in equity. In Q2 2025, stock-based compensation expense nearly doubled compared to the prior year, indicating a significant non-cash component within the overall personnel spend for both product development and customer-facing roles.

The impact of global operations shows up in currency headwinds. For Q2 2025, the Non-GAAP operating margin of 11.0% was down approximately two forty basis points year over year, driven almost entirely by a weaker U.S. Dollar. Furthermore, the company noted a foreign currency fluctuation expense headwind of approximately $10 million impacting results.

Key cost structure observations include:

• Gross profit margin remained strong at 82.15% in Q2 2025.
• Cash flow from operations was tight in Q2 2025 at $0.7 million, representing a margin of 0.6%.
• The full-year 2025 non-GAAP operating margin guidance was set at approximately 12%.
• The company is prioritizing high-value customers, as those paying over $50,000 annually grew 83% year-over-year in Q2 2025.

Finance: draft 13-week cash view by Friday.

Semrush Holdings, Inc. (SEMR) - Canvas Business Model: Revenue Streams

You're looking at how Semrush Holdings, Inc. actually brings in the money, which is key for any financial model you're building. Honestly, it's all about that recurring software-as-a-service (SaaS) income, but the growth drivers are shifting.

The core of the revenue stream is subscription fees from a tiered SaaS model. Semrush Holdings, Inc. structures this for different user needs, typically segmented into Pro, Guru, and Business tiers. This structure is designed to capture value as a customer's needs scale up, moving them from individual use to larger team or enterprise requirements.

Looking at the near-term outlook, the company has provided guidance for the full fiscal year 2025. For the full year 2025, Semrush Holdings, Inc. expects revenue in the range of $443.5 million and $445.5 million. This represents about 18% growth at the midpoint year-over-year.

The most immediate measure of subscription health is the Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR). As of September 30, 2025, the Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) was $455.4 million. This figure is important because it was up 14% year-over-year as of that date and saw a sequential increase of $20 million from the prior quarter.

Here's a quick look at some key metrics around that Q3 2025 ARR base:

Beyond the core subscriptions, Semrush Holdings, Inc. is seeing significant traction from new product categories, which fall under add-on product revenue. While specific dollar amounts for every add-on aren't always broken out, the focus is clearly on upmarket offerings and new technology integration. For instance, the Enterprise segment showed strong adoption, with ARR growing 33% year-over-year.

The most dynamic area of revenue expansion is definitely revenue from the rapidly expanding AI portfolio. The company is making a concerted push here. In the third quarter of 2025 alone, the AI search products added $10 million in ARR, which more than doubled the ARR from that portfolio compared to the second quarter of 2025. Management is projecting this momentum will continue, with AI-driven ARR expected to hit $30 million by the end of 2025.

You should track these specific revenue drivers:

• Subscription fees from Pro, Guru, and Business tiers.
• Revenue from the Enterprise customer segment.
• Revenue generated by new AI-focused product offerings.
• Revenue from specific toolkits like the Local Toolkit.

The shift in customer mix is also a revenue story; the number of customers spending over $50,000 annually increased 72% year-over-year as of September 30, 2025. That's where the high-value subscription revenue is really accelerating.

Finance: draft 13-week cash view by Friday.