Y&Y
Y&Y
The goal was to bring keyword collection, clustering and prioritization into one place, so SEOs could finish the job inside Semrush.
About Semrush
Semrush is a leading SEO and digital marketing platform with 28M users worldwide
Context
Semrush is an all-in-one digital marketing platform used by 10 million users. Its Keyword Manager existed as a storage utility, a place to save keywords collected elsewhere. It gave users data, but no direction.
The opportunity
Transform Keyword Manager from a passive list tool into an end-to-end keyword strategy experience. One that automates the hardest parts of the workflow and delivers a prioritized content plan, not just a pile of data.
Team and my role
The Problem
SEO specialists had to leave Semrush to do their actual work (Keyword Cupid, WriterZen, Frase, Surfer, Ahrefs). Every one is a tool a Semrush user pays someone else for.
There's huge potential for automation. That's exactly what we're going to build.
The opportunity
Automate the hardest steps and turn Keyword Manager into a guided path from keywords to a prioritized content plan.
Discovery
I mapped the standard keyword workflow step by step to find where users spent the most manual effort. That led to one idea: the user gives a few seed keywords, and the tool collects, cleans and groups the rest.
Breaking down the workflow showed which parts could be automated. That led to the idea of a Seed Keyword list: the user uploads keywords, and the tool collects the full keyword set and sorts it into groups.
A first MVP was launched to test it with real users and real data. What we found:
Audience
The product was designed for middle-level SEO specialists, while providing enough transparency for senior specialists to trust the results.
Design Process
Through several rounds of testing where the data kept getting better it became clear that users in this audience wanted a strategy layer to make their research simpler.
The build was split into 4 parts, so new functionality could be added carefully and gradually while keeping a close eye on the metrics.
Generate the keyword list automatically.
Surface how the keywords are organized.
Visualize topics and connections.
Turn it all into an actionable plan.
Design
Clustering → structure view → mind map → strategy. Each layer answers one finding from testing.
Users add a few seed keywords and get a full structure plus new keyword suggestions. The manual list stays for users who want full control.
Clusters became Topics: one pillar page and its subpages, in an interactive overview. This is the language users already think in.
A visual overview of the whole keyword structure: easy to grasp at a glance and ready to share with a manager or a client.
I added a "Keyword Clusters" column to Keyword Overview, where users already research keywords.
A few clusters are visible and the rest are blurred, so the value shows before the click.
The native entry point became a new acquisition channel:
Takeaways
