Company:Ahrefs

From HandWiki
Ahrefs
TypePrivate
IndustrySearch Engine Optimization
Founded2010
FounderDmitry Gerasimenko
HeadquartersSingapore
Area served
Worldwide
Websiteahrefs.com

Ahrefs is a Software as a Service company based in Singapore that offers an all-in-one SEO toolset.[1][2] It was founded by Dmitry Gerasimenko in 2010. The company operates the biggest commercial Web crawler called AhrefsBot[3] that constantly adds and updates links in its 12 trillion link database.[4]

Ahrefs' main tool, Site Explorer, is used to analyze backlinks and search traffic of any website or URL.[5] It allows users to uncover new link building and keyword opportunities and reverse-engineer SEO tactics that work for their competitors.[6][7]

History

In 2010, the founding team started working on a web crawling and indexing system. It was developed into the paid service focused on link analysis in 2011.

During the first years of service, Ahrefs got traction in the marketing community by having a competitive edge on unique SEO data. They focused solely on product development and had no marketing or sales team.[8]

In 2017, Ahrefs launched Site Audit, a tool that crawls any website and reports what's wrong with it from an SEO perspective. This concluded the focus shift from a link analysis tool to a toolset covering all stages of SEO processes from keyword research to reporting.[9]

Business

As of 2018, the company reported $40M of annual recurring revenue with 60% annual growth rate and a team of less than 50 people.[10]

In 2019, Ahrefs ranked on 29th place in the list of the fastest growing Singaporean companies based on CAGR from 2015 to 2018.[11]

Search engine development

In 2019, Gerasimenko announced building a search engine to compete with Google. The main differentiator is focus on privacy similar to DuckDuckGo, and profit sharing where 90% of profits would go to publishers of the indexed content.[12]

Reactions to the announcement were generally positive. Some search marketers expressed skepticism due to the focus on the search engine's publishers rather than users.[13]

References

  1. Enge, Eric. The Art of SEO : Mastering Search Engine Optimization. Spencer, Stephan M., Stricchiola, Jessie (Third ed.). Sebastopol, CA. ISBN 978-1-4919-0365-0. OCLC 918941284. 
  2. Marvin, Rob. "Ahrefs Review" (in en). https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/ahrefs?test_uuid=03GdTca9yYczB0udADO47Ac&test_variant=b. 
  3. "A Closer Look at the Most Active Good Bots | Imperva" (in en-US). 2017-02-08. https://www.imperva.com/blog/most-active-good-bots/. 
  4. "AhrefsBot. Learn About the Ahrefs' Web Crawler". https://ahrefs.com/robot. 
  5. Wright, Matt D. (2017-07-12). "5 essentials to help beat your competitors at SEO" (in en-GB). The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/connect/small-business/tech/five-essentials-to-beat-competitors-seo/. 
  6. Latka, Nathan. (2019). How to be a Capitalist without any capital : the four rules you must break to get rich.. London, UK: HODDER & STOUGHTON LTD. ISBN 978-1-5293-7418-6. OCLC 1057788035. 
  7. Wilson, Lee (2019). Data-driven marketing content : a practical guide (First ed.). Bingley, UK: Emerald Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78973-817-9. OCLC 1104227384. 
  8. "Ukrainian Dmitry Gerasimenko created Ahrefs service: now it earns millions and competes with Google" (in en-US). 2019-05-30. https://ain.ua/en/2019/05/30/dmitry-gerasimenko-ahrefs-interview/. 
  9. McGovern, Scott (2019-02-13). "7 Best SEO Tools to Help You Rank Higher in Google" (in en). https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/327633. 
  10. "Inside Ahrefs: one of the world's most efficient companies" (in en-US). 2019-05-06. https://nathanbarry.com/ahrefs/. 
  11. "Singapore's Fastest Growing Companies 2020" (in en). 2020-01-15. https://www.straitstimes.com/fastest-growing-companies-2020. 
  12. "Ahrefs, SEO toolset provider, to build their own search engine to compete with Google". 2019-03-27. https://searchengineland.com/ahrefs-seo-toolset-provider-to-build-their-own-search-engine-to-compete-with-google-314677. 
  13. Montti, Roger (2019-03-27). "Ahrefs Announces Plan for New Search Engine" (in en). https://www.searchenginejournal.com/ahrefs-search-engine/300573/.