SEMrush Tracks Online Growth in Popularity of Web Summit Conference

Sudipto Ghosh

November 5, 2018

Online Searches Highlight Web Summit Growth on Time for 2018 Conference

With Web Summit kicking off today, trends data provider SEMrush crunched online search data to highlight the technology conference’s trajectory over the years. Web Summit, taking place 5-8 November in Lisbon, has grown from a tech gathering to an institution, being labeled by the likes of Forbes as “The best technology conference on the planet”.

What started off as a mix of bloggers (2009-11), journalists and technologists in a Dublin hotel with connectivity issues, went on to gain gradually more traction by joining forces with high-profile speakers like Elon Musk and Tony Hawk (2013) and Eva Longoria, Peter Thiel and Bono (2014). In eight short years, Web Summit has grown from 400 attendees to over 70,000 attendees from more than 170 countries.

Traffic to Web Summit’s website is primarily driven by the UK, the US, France, Germany and Portugal, and is more searched-for by Portugal, Ireland and Angola.

Web Summit searches have varied over the years, with huge spikes ahead or during the event, and low search volumes for the rest of the year – an average of 10,000. Starting off at 74,000 searches in November 2014, and reaching 90,500 in October 2015, searches have skyrocketed to more than 301,000 in November 2016, and 246,000 in November 2017.

Web Summit’s announcement that it will move to Lisbon in 2016 had a direct impact on relevant online searches. Searches for ‘Web Summit Lisbon’ specifically have grown from 12,900 in October 2015, to 33,100 in November 2017, adding to existing interest around the tech event.

This year, Web Summit has confirmed that it has signed a €110m deal with the Portuguese government that will keep the event in Lisbon until 2028, and will accommodate the summit’s rapid expansion. The popular conference has already benefited the city’s economy; online searches highlight a steady growth of interest for hotels in Lisbon, reaching almost 14,800 searches in October 2015, 33,100 in October 2016 and 60,500 searches in October 2017.

Furthermore, searches for ‘best restaurants in Lisbon’ reached 12,100 November 2017, from 3,600 in November 2015, highlighting reinforcing the summit’s economic impact on the city’s hospitality industry.

Currently, SEMrush is the leading digital marketing toolkit for SEO, PPC and content marketing professionals worldwide. With over 30 tools within their software, search data for over 140 countries and seamless integration with Google services, SEMrush provides solutions for in-house marketing teams and agencies that work with clients in any industry.