Adobe buys Semrush | MarTech

Leading SEO platform Semrush is acquired by software company Adobe.

Adobe announced the acquisition today. The all-cash deal is valued at approximately $1.9 billion and is expected to close in the first half of 2026, subject to regulatory and shareholder approval.

Semrush acquired Third Door Media, publisher of MarTech, in October 2024

What Semrush says

Semrush CEO Bill Wagner shared this on LinkedIn:

Andrew Warden, head of marketing at Semrush, shared this on LinkedIn:

The Adobe press release:

SAN JOSE, CA & BOSTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Today, Adobe (Nasdaq:ADBE) and Semrush Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:SEMR) announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Adobe will acquire Semrush, a leading brand visibility platform, in an all-cash transaction for $12.00 per share, representing a total equity value of approximately $1.9 billion. Semrush is a powerful partner for marketers looking to manage brand visibility and audience reach through its data-driven Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) solutions.

Adobe is leading the way in customer experience orchestration in the age of agentic AI with comprehensive solutions spanning content supply chain, customer engagement and brand visibility. Adobe enables 99% of Fortune 100 companies, including The Coca-Cola Company, General Motors and IBM, to use AI to transform the way they work.

Brand visibility is a priority for Chief Marketing Officers as consumers increasingly turn to LLMs, such as ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, for information, recommendations and purchasing decisions. As generative AI platforms become a new interface between customers and brands, organizations that invest in GEO alongside their SEO capabilities are poised to keep their brands represented, discovered and trusted across owned and earned channels.

With its GEO capabilities and over a decade of SEO expertise, Semrush helps brands increase brand visibility and expand audience reach. Semrush solutions meet a growing, essential need for marketers: staying discoverable in AI searches. As marketers increasingly turn to their SEO teams and partners to power their generative AI marketing strategies, Semrush offers powerful solutions to deliver brand visibility and relevance. In its most recent quarter, Semrush delivered 33% year-over-year growth in its enterprise customer segment, winning the trust of industry leaders like Amazon, JPMorganChase and TikTok.

With products like AEM, Adobe Analytics, and the newly introduced Adobe Brand Concierge, Adobe is solving major pain points for brands embracing agentic AI. Together, Adobe and Semrush will deliver a comprehensive solution that gives marketers a holistic understanding of how their brands appear across owned channels, LLMs, traditional search, and the broader internet.

“Brand visibility is being reimagined by generative AI, and brands that don’t embrace this new opportunity risk losing relevance and revenue,” said Anil Chakravarthy, president of Adobe’s Digital Experience Business. “With Semrush, we are unlocking GEO for marketers as a new growth channel alongside their SEO, driving greater visibility, customer engagement and conversions across the entire ecosystem.”

“Adobe is a leader in helping marketers create personalized customer experiences at scale. With the advent of LLMs and AI-powered search, brands need to understand where and how their customers are using these new channels,” said Bill Wagner, CEO of Semrush. “This combination offers marketers more insights and opportunities to increase their discoverability in today’s evolving digital landscape.”

Generative AI platforms are already driving shifts in consumer behavior. New data from Adobe Analytics showed that traffic from generative AI sources to US retail sites rose 1,200% year over year in October.