How to Set Up Your First Semrush Project: Step by Step

A Semrush Project groups everything the toolkit does for one website — recurring Site Audit crawls, Position Tracking for your keywords, and connected Google data — under a single dashboard. To set one up, you create the Project, add your domain, connect Google Analytics and Search Console, then configure the Site Audit and Position Tracking campaigns inside it.

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If you’re new to Semrush, the word “Project” causes more confusion than it should. It isn’t a task list or a folder of reports — it’s a container: one Project per website you manage, holding the campaigns that run on a schedule. Setup is a one-time job, maybe thirty minutes taken slowly, and every tutorial on this site after this one assumes it’s done.

One standing note: Semrush updates its interface — if a label moved, search Semrush’s help center for the current name. The steps below describe the workflow at the general level, which is exactly the level that survives redesigns.

Key takeaways

One Project per website. A Project is the container that groups a domain’s recurring campaigns — Site Audit, Position Tracking, and similar tools.
Gather three things first: your domain, Google Analytics access, and Google Search Console access for that domain. Connecting both enriches every report.
Site Audit and Position Tracking are the two campaigns to launch first. Audit watches technical health on a schedule; Tracking watches your keyword positions daily.
Connecting Google data is the highest-value five minutes in the whole setup — it adds your real clicks and impressions alongside Semrush’s estimates.
You can edit everything later. Crawl scope, tracked keywords, and schedules are all adjustable after setup, so don’t agonize over first choices.

What a Project is (and isn’t)

A Project is Semrush’s way of saying “everything we do for this website, in one place.” Create a Project, add your domain, and you unlock the campaign-style tools — the ones that run on a schedule and build history: Site Audit (regular technical crawls) and Position Tracking (daily ranking checks for your keyword list).

What a Project isn’t: it isn’t required for one-off research. Keyword Magic Tool sessions, competitor domain lookups, single-keyword overviews — none need a Project. Projects exist for your own sites: the ones you can change and want to monitor over time.

The mental model: research tools answer questions on demand; Projects keep watch. This guide comes before the dashboard tour and the audit walkthroughs because the watching only works once the Project exists.

Before you start: the three things you need

Gather these before you click anything. Each one removes a mid-setup stall.

1. The domain you want to track. The exact domain as it appears in a browser, www included. Unsure which version is canonical? Check your homepage URL — the audit crawls exactly what you enter.

2. Google Analytics access. A Google account with access to the site’s Analytics property. No Analytics yet? Set it up first — a Project works without it, but connecting it makes setup far more valuable.

3. Google Search Console access for that site. Same idea: a Google account with the site verified in Search Console — the source of your real search data (impressions, clicks), which Semrush displays alongside its estimates.

If you don’t have Analytics or Search Console yet, you can still create the Project and connect them later. But since both connections take only a few minutes each, doing them now means every report you run from day one is richer. First-party data and Semrush estimates complement each other — one records reality, the other helps you plan.

Step 1: Create the Project

The Projects area lives in your Semrush dashboard — look for the Projects section in the main navigation. (If the layout has changed since this was written, use the tool search or the help center; the concept is stable even when the furniture moves.)

Creating a Project generally works like this:

Open the Projects dashboard and start a new Project.
Enter your domain and give the Project a recognizable name — the site name, or the client’s name if you’re an agency.
Confirm the domain details. Semrush will typically detect the basics from the domain itself.

That’s the container created. It looks empty at first, and that’s expected — a Project is a shell until you add campaigns. Think of it as renting the office before moving the furniture in.

Naming tip: name Projects after the client or site, not the date. In six months, “Acme Dental — main site” is findable; “Project 3” is not.

Step 2: Connect Google Analytics and Search Console

This is the highest-value step in the entire setup, and the one beginners skip most. Connecting your Google accounts lets Semrush pull your real performance data into its reports — actual traffic, clicks, impressions — next to Semrush’s estimates. Estimates tell you what’s possible; your own data tells you what happened. Both views in one place is what makes the reports genuinely useful.

The connection flow is a standard authorization: Semrush asks you to sign in with the Google account that has access to the site’s Analytics and Search Console, you grant Semrush permission to read the data, and you select the right property. Practical notes:

Use a Google account that has access. If a client or previous developer owns the Analytics property, get added as a user first.
Pick the right property. With several sites on one account, double-check you’re connecting the property matching this Project’s domain. Wrong-property connections are a classic silent error: everything looks fine, but the data belongs to another site.
Permissions are read-only in effect. Semrush reads your data; it doesn’t change your Google settings.
You can disconnect or switch properties later. Nothing is permanent.

Failed connection? The usual culprits: wrong Google account signed in, no access to the property, or a brand-new property with no data yet. All fixable in minutes.

Step 3: Configure your first Site Audit

Site Audit is the campaign that crawls your website regularly — like a search engine would — and reports technical issues. Setting it up means telling Semrush what to crawl and how often:

Crawl scope: which pages to include. For most sites, the whole domain is the right start. Very large sites may need a narrower scope or page budget.
Crawl limits: how deep to go and how many pages to check. Defaults suit small and medium sites; leave them unless you have a reason to change.
Schedule: how often the audit re-runs — weekly is the common choice. Fix things, and the next crawl confirms the fixes worked.

Once configured, run the first crawl — minutes for small sites, hours for large ones. You’ll see a health overview and categorized issues. Don’t fix anything yet — the first audit is for reading. Our first Site Audit walkthrough covers that first read.

Step 4: Set up Position Tracking

Position Tracking checks where your site ranks for your chosen keywords, every day, building a history you can chart. While Site Audit watches technical health, Position Tracking watches visibility.

Setup asks for:

Your keyword list. Start with 10–30 keywords that genuinely matter — terms you’d be happy to rank for, not vanity terms. Starting small keeps the data readable.
Location targeting. Rankings differ by location, so set where the check happens — country level at minimum, city level for local businesses. Match the geography your customers actually live in.
Device type. Desktop and mobile rankings differ. Track both — most audiences use both.

Once it’s running, resist checking daily. Rankings bounce day to day; the signal is in the trend over weeks. Our Position Tracking and reporting guide covers reading trends and turning them into reports.

Reading your new Project dashboard

With campaigns configured, your Project dashboard becomes the morning-check view: audit health at a glance, position trends, alerts when something changes. Worth knowing:

Data builds over time. Day one shows a thin picture; the dashboard gets more useful weekly as history accumulates — set this up early.
Alerts are configurable. Get notified about major ranking changes or new audit issues. Start with defaults and tune later; too many alerts on day one trains you to ignore them.
Each campaign has its own detailed view. The dashboard is the summary; clicking into Site Audit or Position Tracking opens full reports with filters, history, and exports.

If the dashboard feels like a maze, that’s normal — the dashboard tour is the next read.

Mistakes beginners make at setup

Creating one Project for multiple sites. Projects are per-domain. Lumping two sites into one muddles every report — each site gets its own Project.

Skipping the Google connections. The number-one setup regret. Everything works without them, but every report is thinner. Five minutes now pays off in every session afterward.

Tracking too many keywords on day one. A 500-keyword list on a new site produces noise, not insight. Start with terms mapping to pages you actually have, then expand as you publish.

Choosing the wrong location. A business serving one city that tracks country-level rankings sees numbers that don’t reflect its real customers. Match tracking geography to business geography.

Fixing audit issues before understanding them. The first audit always looks alarming. Most issues are routine. Read the severity guide first (our audit walkthrough covers it), then fix in priority order.

Never re-running the audit after fixes. The audit is a loop: crawl, fix, re-crawl, confirm. Skipping the re-crawl means you never verify the work, and the dashboard keeps showing stale issues.

Frequently asked questions

How many Projects do I need?
One per website you want to monitor: a blogger with one site needs one Project; an agency with twelve client sites needs twelve. Research tools work without any Project — Projects are for your own sites, the ones you can change and track over time. Plan limits affect how many Projects an account can hold. Check your plan’s current Project allowance in your account settings if you manage many sites.

Can I set up a Project for a site I don’t own?
You can add any domain to research tools, but Projects are designed for sites you control — you must connect Google Analytics and Search Console and act on audit findings. Tracking someone else’s site is pointless (you can’t fix what you find) and the wrong tool for the job. For competitors, use research tools like Domain Overview instead. Projects monitor; research tools investigate — use each for its job.

Do I need Google Analytics and Search Console connected?
Strictly speaking, no — Projects work without them. But connecting both is strongly recommended: it enriches every report with your real performance data alongside Semrush’s estimates. The connection is read-only, takes minutes, and can be changed later. If you do one optional step in this guide, make it this one. Skipping it leaves every report thinner than it should be, so treat the connection as part of setup.

How long does the first Site Audit take?
Small sites often finish in minutes; large sites can take hours. You’ll see progress in the dashboard while it runs, and your chosen schedule (weekly is typical) controls re-crawls afterward. Don’t watch it — set it running and come back to read the results fresh. Use the waiting time to take the dashboard tour or plan which audit issues you’ll read about first.

Can I change the settings after setup?
Yes — everything is adjustable. Crawl scope and limits, the tracked keyword list, location targeting, schedules, connected Google properties: all of it can be edited after the fact, and the settings panels stay available whenever you need them. Treat your first configuration as a draft, not a commitment. As your site grows and your strategy sharpens, revisit the settings every few months and tune them.

Your concrete next step

Right now, create the Project for your main site — domain in, name it clearly, connect Google Analytics and Search Console, launch Site Audit with defaults. Don’t read the results yet; tomorrow, open our first Site Audit walkthrough and learn to read what the crawl found.

HowToSemrush publishes educational guides only. Semrush updates its features and pricing over time — verify current details on semrush.com before relying on them.