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Google Search Console vs Semrush

Google Search Console VS Semrush, which one is better? I’ll be answering exactly that in this post.

I’ll be going over the 3 main elements in SEO:

  1. Keyword research
  2. On page SEO
  3. Off page SEO


And how both tools do in each of these categories.

Keyword research

Google Search Console

GSC can’t give you keyword ideas in the way traditional keyword research tools can. For example, a keyword research tool would allow you to to input a keyword and it will output different ideas.

There’s no depth to GSC’s keyword research abilities. It’s able to show what queries/keywords you appear for but it’s not able to fetch your knew ones.

Semrush

There’s a lot of depth to keyword research in Semrush. You input a topic idea and Semrush will spit out lots of keyword ideas. 

  • You can include and exclude keywords
  • Sort by volume,
  • Sort by cost per click
  • Sort by keyword difficulty
  • See how a keyword’s volume is trending
  • Filter search volume by countries
  • See who’s ranking on the search results
  • The intent behind the keyword
  • Put in your competitors domain and see what they’re ranking for

There are lots of approaches to keyword research with Semrush and it’s one of our favourite ways of helping with the keyword research process. 

Now, not all the data Semrush spits out is correct. For example, Semrush has no way of determining search volume, they do their best using their source but it won’t be 100% accurate. They rough estimates.

SEO Stoke on Trent.

When it comes to keyword difficulty, take it with a pinch of salt because Semrush is also guesstimating the difficulty of a keyword.

The same goes with the intent for a keyword. At the end of the day, it’s a machine and can’t determine the intent of a keyword like a human can. But this feature is still correct a lot of the time.

On page SEO

Google Search Console

Google Search Console has a variety of features which will improve your on page SEO. 

  • You can see what responses your page has. For example, 95% of your pages may work but the rest of your page returns a 404 error.
  • View how Google perceives your pages, if they are good pages or need to be improved. And what you need to do in order to improve those pages. 
  • Shows your core web vital scores for mobile and desktop and what you need to do to improve them.
  • Mobile usability scores. Mobile is more important than ever as Google considers the mobile version of your site as the primary because most Google users are on mobile.
  • See if you have any many penalties.
  • Look at the health of your product pages.
  • Security issues.
  • You can submit your pages to Google manually instead of waiting for them to index it.
  • And more

There’s no shortage of on page features in Google Search Console. However, even though they are on page SEO features, they’re also technical SEO features. Google Search Console doesn’t give you important information such as where to include your keyword on the page to have a greater impact on search.

Google’s on page features stretch as far as technical SEO.

Semrush

Similar to Search Console, Semrush on page SEO abilities only goes as far as technical SEO. SEMrush will highlight issues such as broken links, 404 errors, schema errors which fall under on page SEO. But it also falls under technical SEO.

Semrush doesn’t tell you important things such as making sure your target keyword is in the meta title, H1 and URL.

It’s on page SEO features are similar to Google Search Console.

Off page SEO

Google Search Console

Search Console’s off page feature only goes as far as revealing what websites are linking to your website along with a disavow tool. The disavow tool allows you to block certain links to your site.

For example, if you find a bunch of spammy links pointing to your website, you can block them.

Semrush

Semrush allows you to see which links are relevant to your website and which links are not. You can see details of the websites linking to you. Semrush also allows you to see the websites linking to your competitors.

Semrush has many more features than Search Console when it comes to off page SEO.

Conclusion

Google Search Console and Semrush should both be used together. There are features that Search Console has which Semrush doesn’t. And features that Semrush has that Search Console doesn’t.

Google Search Console is free and Semrush is $99 per month.