Understanding SEO in 2025 with Semrush Financial Results

Let me start things off by saying I’m a big fan of Glen Allsopp and his detailed.com reports. This post is clearly inspired by Glen’s research as I remember reading some of his content where he looked at the trends of SEO through Semrush's publicly available reports.

What is happening with Semrush is likely reflective of what is happening in affiliate marketing. 

The thought here also coincides with the book called The Payout Mafia created by Niels Zee and James Dooley.

Special shoutout to StatsDrone and FTDx and [insert_your_company_here] for supporting the newsletter.

The premise of the book? Niels believes there are less affiliates around but the ones that are smart and work hard are getting all the rewards. 

In iGaming affiliation, there’s been a lot of talk of less affiliates showing up to conferences but the ones that are there are making more money. It isn’t that they are just growing, they are also being acquired.

So let’s look at Semrush numbers at a glance and try to understand what is happening in the world of SEO. 

• Second quarter revenue of $108.9 million, up 20% year-over-year 

• Customers paying more than $50,000 annually increased 83% year-over-year 

• Semrush customers who pay more than $10,000 annually grew by 35% year-over-year

• Company announces $150 million share repurchase program

• Approximately 116,000 paying customers as of June 30, 2025

• ARR of $435.3 million as of June 30, 2025, up 15% year-over-year

So what does this mean?

Revenue is increasing at the company but something interesting is happening.

Their Q1 2025 press release stated they had 118,000 paying customers and Q2 says 116,000. A decrease.

They also wrote $105M USD revenue in Q1 while there was $108.9M USD revenue in Q2. An increase

I don’t know if this is a substantial trend but Semrush keeps reporting increases in bigger paying customers. That is a strong signal in support of SEO but it could also be a worrying sign.

Casualties of SEO

There are a lot of affiliate sites that have been wrecked and I also believe there are quite a few SEO professionals out of a job. These 2 cohorts likely represent a loss of customers in tools like Ahrefs and Semrush. Those SEO tools are likely benefitting from companies investing heavier into SEO either because the ROI is likely there for them. 

StatsDrone’s growing use of dynamic variables

One of our products that is growing our revenue is dynamic variables. It is the richest data you can get from any affiliate program and I’d call it richer than postbacks even. 

The only downsides of dynamic variables is it costs more to use and the setup requires a little bit of technical knowledge.

At some point, I’d like to find a way for StatsDrone to make this tool a bit more accessible. 

In terms of pricing, our average costs are around $1 per program per month where with dynamic variables, it is $2 per program per month on top of the additional costs. 

I would describe dynamic variables as similar to the premium pricing of Semrush. Customers use it because the enriched data is almost like an unfair advantage. 

What can dynamic variables do you for as an affiliate in iGaming?

• Own your players combined with first party data

• Know exact player values

• Monitor player decay

• Quickly spot any trends and changes in player values

The Payout Mafia Book

The Payout Mafia book by Niels Zee and James Dooley is seemingly echoing what I’m noticing in affiliate marketing, in SEO and also what these signals suggest in Semrush’s financial reports. 

Some people are leaving which James Dooley is implying those are the lazy SEOs or the lazy affiliate marketers. Niels is implying that there are less people in the game but making more money and having a party. 

You can find the book on Amazon here.

Sentiment on SEO

Overall, the SEO people I talk to and read their content on social media and newsletters, almost all are saying the same thing. There has never been a better time to be an SEO. These people are finding more success with their websites and their client work has taken off. 

Of course these people are personalities so they are winning the business via trust but they are also working hard at SEO, testing and networking with the best minds in the world of search. 

SEOs to follow

I could do a major name drop of SEOs to follow but I’m going to narrow it to the ones that are producing a lot of insights and sharing it frequently. These people when they share something, I pay attention to.

• James Dooley

• Karl Hudson

• Sean Bianco

• Lily Ray

• Kasra Dash

• Steve Toth

• Andrew Ansley

• Glen Allsopp 

Of course one more shoutout to Maja Jovančević who just is now Head of SEO and Content at Blexr!