You’ve created a project in SEMRush, linked it to your website, and now you’re receiving tons of data about your website's performance.

Of course, your SEMRush data is eye-opening and valuable, but without a dashboard to manage it all in one place, it becomes overwhelmingly discouraging to analyze and utilize for SEO progress.

That’s why you need an SEO Dashboard that’ll help you:

• Save time sifting through data
• Effectively monitor the metrics that are germane to your SEO goals
• Clearly and effortlessly spot the key insights in your SEO data
• Easily share and present these insights
• Update the figures and metrics automatically

In this blog, we’ll hold your hands and walk you through the process of creating such SEO Dashboards with your SEMrush data.

Table of Contents:

• Step-by-step process of creating a SEMRush SEO dashboard in Looker Studio
• Best practices for effective SEO dashboard
• Sample of our custom SEMRush dashboards

Step-by-Step Process of Creating a SEMRush SEO Dashboard in Looker Studio

STEP 0: This assumes that you’ve set up a SEMrush project with the applicable SEMrush tools to gather data on the SEO metrics you want to track on your website (e.g., organic traffic, keyword rankings, backlinks)

STEP 1: Sign in to Looker Studio with your Google Account. Once you sign in, you’ll be directed to the home page where you can customize templates or create a report from scratch.

STEP 2: Create a new project in Looker Studio by clicking the tile with a plus sign. This will take you to a blank report page. A tab will come up prompting you to select a data source.

STEP 3: Search for SEMrush or scroll through the partner connectors list and select one of the available SEMrush connectors.

There are three standard Semrush connectors in Looker Studio and you can use either or all of them in the same report depending on the metrics you want to track.

• Semrush Domain Analytics: Tracks metrics like backlinks, authority score, etc.
• Semrush Position Tracking: Tracks metrics related to organic visibility
• Semrush Site Audit: Tracks metrics like crawlability, site performance, HTTPS (security), etc.

STEP 4: Once you select a SEMrush connector, you’ll see a section asking you to authorize the SEMrush-Looker Studio connection using your Google credentials. Click on ‘authorize’ to do this.

STEP 5: Next, the data source tab will disappear and you’ll see only a blank report page with two panes on the side – the chart pane and the data pane. You can optionally add another SEMrush data source/ connector by clicking ‘add data’ under the data pane. Drag and drop data visualizations (charts, graphs) from the chart pane to build your dashboard. You can add as many pages as you need. Customize the visualizations to display the chosen SEMrush data.

Best Practices for Effective SEO Dashboard

An SEO dashboard/report is more or less a central hub that gives you a unified and organized view of all the SEO metrics, KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), and data available to you.

Conveniently, SEMrush provides SEO report templates to kick things off but the pre-set metrics in these templates might not be the most impactful for your website.

So, it’s always a good idea to build a custom SEO dashboard to avoid focusing on the wrong things andmissing out on what truly matters to your specific SEO goals.

But you see, the thing is building a customized SEO Dashboard can be a double-edged sword. While it offers lots of benefits, if not done properly, it can be counter-effective for your SEO strategy.

That’s why we’ve come up with some best practices for building effective customized SEO dashboards/ reports for your business.

Here at Vidi, we help you make the most of your SEO data using these best practices:

• Start with a website assessment: Conduct an SEO audit or website analysis to identify your current SEO health, target audience, and business goals. This will help you determine the key metrics most relevant to track on your dashboard.
• Focus on KPIs, not vanity metrics: Don't get bogged down by every data point. Your dashboard should reflect your overall marketing strategy. Track metrics/ KPIs that directly contribute to achieving your specific business goals, whether it's brand awareness, lead generation, or e-commerce sales.
• The actionable insights should be clear: Your dashboard shouldn't just display data; it should tell a story and provide clear insights you can use to optimize your SEO strategy. It should highlight trends, areas for improvement, and so on.
• Keep it visually appealing: You can’t make sense of a dashboard that’s hurtful to the visual senses. Use simple and intuitive visualizations to make the data easily digestible. Customize your dashboard layout to highlight the most critical insights. Group related metrics together for a more cohesive and scannable experience.
• Track progress over time: A good dashboard allows you to monitor your progress over time. See how your SEO efforts are impacting your KPIs and identify areas that need ongoing attention. Use comparative data to track progress over time.

Other best practices include:

• Incorporating automated alerts for significant changes in key metrics.
• Tailoring the dashboard to its intended audience. i.e. more in-depth data for technical SEO professionals, a high-level overview of key metrics for executives, etc.

Sample of Our Custom SEMRush Dashboards

The dashboard above gives you a central view of your website’s keyword performance.

Among other metrics, it tells you in real-time, how many impressions and clicks your website has gotten based on any date/period/ country of your choice and even indicates if there’s been an overall increase or decrease. These are key indicators of your website’s keyword performance.

At one glance, you can see whether your CTR and SERP ranking are improving or declining over time. You can also see the keywords that are driving the most traffic to your website.

This dashboard gives you insights on another important aspect that can make or break your SEO strategy – site health and broken links. It lets you track KPIs like your site’s loading speed, ‘page not found’ errors, overall site health, and so on. With it, you can know what issues to fix on your website to improve your SEO.

The Competitor Dashboard allows you to compare your SEO progress with that of your competitors. Getting ahead of your competitors in terms of SEO is a great sign that your SEO efforts are working.

The dashboards above are only examples of what we’ve done at Vidi. Our team of professionals can work with you to build a bespoke SEO dashboard or report with SEMrush data that laser-targets your unique business goals and delivers real results.

Vidi completes your winning SEO Strategy.Yes, we don't just build dashboards, we build lasting success.

Ready to see the difference our customized SEO dashboard can make?