SimilarWeb is the subject of this lesson. Whether you’re a blogger, a freelancer or a web agency, you’ve probably asked yourself questions like these: how much traffic should I expect on the site? How long before I see the organic traffic I’m hoping for? What opportunities can I take in my own sector? How much traffic will I get for what I invest?
These and plenty of other questions can now be answered without turning to expensive SEO and analytics tools — simply by using SimilarWeb.
So let’s look more closely at what SimilarWeb is and exactly how it works.
If you’re new to SEO and growth hacking, it’s worth also looking at the topics on search engine rankings covered in our SEO Academy and at the earlier lessons of our Growth Hacking Academy.
But let’s get straight to it and understand what SimilarWeb is.
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What is SimilarWeb?
SimilarWeb is a web analytics, data mining and business intelligence platform delivered as a service (SaaS) by the startup of the same name.
Founded in 2009 in Tel Aviv, Israel, by Or Offer and Yossi Vardi, SimilarWeb Ltd moved its head office to London shortly afterwards and in 2013 released an advanced version of the software, SimilarWeb Pro.
Among the main clients using the platform are significant companies such as PayPal, eBay, Adidas and many others.
Image from www.similarweb.com
How does SimilarWeb work?
SimilarWeb uses specific technologies and analytical methods to gather, measure and analyse a vast quantity of information (big data), which it returns as statistics, metrics, KPIs and APIs about visitor behaviour on the web and in apps.
According to Wikipedia, the data sources are mainly:
- a network of millions of anonymous users
- global and local ISPs
- a learning set of selected sites
- a group of web crawlers scanning the web
The paid version of the tool naturally offers extended features, starting with keyword analysis and statistical work covering a period longer than the six months the free version allows.
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What is SimilarWeb for?
Like Google Analytics (go to site), SimilarWeb lets users obtain, free of charge, important information that only the paid versions of many web analytics tools otherwise provide.
That information includes: volume and origin of web traffic, referring sites, bounce rate, average visit duration, rankings broken down by country and by sector or market, and other important metrics and KPIs.
According to the company, users are therefore able to:
- benchmark themselves against competitors and their sector;
- gather valuable information about competitors’ web content and online strategies;
- use that information for SEO and for shaping their own marketing strategies;
- discover new opportunities in partners, leads or affiliations;
- identify trends and emerging players;
- understand search intent and the buying journey of users and customers.
Image from www.similarweb.com
As the image above summarises, the tool also lets SEO specialists and web marketers take informed, considered decisions across four main areas:
Marketing: the tool, particularly in the paid version, lets you discover the best SEO and content practices your competitors are using. It also promises improvements in display, paid search and affiliate strategies.
Research: understanding the market you operate in, your customers’ journey and your competitors’ strategies is fundamental. To that end the tool supports a wide range of work, from benchmarking your market to analysing trends, competitor strategies and customer behaviour.
Image from www.similarweb.com
Sales: better understanding of the sales funnel shows up as better performance. That improvement comes from a sharper ability to identify and qualify leads, and therefore to create more sales opportunities. It also comes from a greater ability, after analysing web traffic, to generate the right insights and statistics for improving customer retention.
Investment: valuing a company properly allows considered decisions about where to invest, along with discovering, monitoring and assessing new investment opportunities and mapping the market for emerging players and trends. Digital signals indicating buying, selling or holding positions are further features SimilarWeb makes available.
Image from www.similarweb.com
How to use SimilarWeb
First, go to the SimilarWeb site (go to the official site), available in four languages.
You’ll need to log in after registering for the service. The process involves entering the required details in the relevant fields, or using your Google and/or LinkedIn account. Alternatively you can request a demo in which a tutor explains how to use the tool effectively.
Image from www.similarweb.com
Once registered or logged in, you reach the main page, at the top left of which is the input field “analyze any website or app”. Enter the URL of the competitor site you want to investigate, click the button and within seconds you’ll get the feedback you were after.
How accurate is SimilarWeb?
As with other tools, plenty of people ask whether the traffic figures SimilarWeb reports are accurate, or under- or over-estimated.
On that point the well-known SEO tool Screaming Frog ran a test in 2016 whose results were published in a post on the company’s blog (here it is). The three-month test covered a sample of 25 websites and used Ahrefs and SEMrush alongside SimilarWeb. The test has its limitations, but its results showed that the tool producing the most accurate measurements compared with the figures from Google Analytics was SimilarWeb.
Which is why we can treat SimilarWeb as a precise and dependable tool.
SimilarWeb: the alternatives
Beyond SimilarWeb the market offers various alternatives, among them:
- SEMrush: the most widely used professional SEO toolkit and the one digital marketers and SEO professionals prefer. Its high cost makes it best suited to professional use. The Digital Merchant, a blog, has compared SimilarWeb against SEMrush (read more).
- Ahrefs: like the first, a paid SEO toolkit, but best known for being particularly suited to link building. It also gives a complete overview of the impact SEO strategies have on given sites, audiences or products.
- Moz Local: another well-regarded tool recommended as an alternative to SimilarWeb. A simple interface that’s easy to understand and use makes it popular with small and medium-sized businesses.
- Alexa: among the best known and most appreciated SEO and competitor analysis tools. The toolkit offers everything needed to improve SEO and PPC strategy and grow web traffic.
- Quantcast: an American company founded in 2006 offering digital advertising and ratings based on direct measurement rather than on a panel, as Nielsen previously did.
Conclusion
In this lesson of your favourite Growth Hacking Academy we’ve covered SimilarWeb, an SEO tool and rather more besides. You now have what you need to understand exactly what it is, how it works and how to use it professionally to analyse your site, your competitors and your business in general.
But is this tool enough to improve your search rankings and increase sales? Sadly not…
Tools serve those who have the skill and ability to use them. Using them wrongly can produce inaccurate results, and judgements built on those results lead to decisions that can hurt a company’s visibility and sales.
So read the earlier lessons of the SEO Academy and the Growth Hacking Academy and keep following us. In the lessons ahead we’ll cover plenty more interesting territory…
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