To perform SEO, you don’t need to be a dedicated programmer or hold many specialised degrees. Utilise the advice in this article to get the job you want.
Are you looking to advance your career by obtaining a new SEO position? You might wish to think about working as an internal SEO expert.
The Great Resignation has increased the number of employment accessible, and many businesses are now accepting small work assignments. There is a substantial demand for in-house SEO positions; hundreds of vacancies have been posted alone in the United States.
Given the tremendous demand and reasonable bar, now is the perfect time to try it. As a former long-term in-house SEO strategist, I can advise you on increasing your own “hireability.”
However, why start internally?
Why Should You Consider an In-house SEO Role?
Compared to working for a small SEO agency or as a freelance consultant, in-house SEO can be preferable. Benefits can be found in areas like:
- High pay (if you do in-house for larger companies or companies in lucrative verticals).
- A more regular schedule of work.
- Stronger group benefits, like 401Ks, sick days, and insurance.
- Stability.
- Dependable infrastructure and team.
An IT specialist might be called by a larger organisation to fix your computer or internet access, for example. In contrast, you might handle everything from HR duties to hardware upgrades to system administration to accounting, IT, sales, and advertising if you work alone.
I have insights into how people may position themselves best for gaining in-house SEO employment thanks to my experience performing SEO in-house for one of the largest organisations in the world and afterwards offering strategic counsel for other in-house teams.
Here are ten suggestions to help you get that dream job.
1. Establish your area of expertise
It can take a long time to master all the facets of SEO because there are so many. The first thing you should do is make use of your current knowledge and experience.
If you have a background in programming or computer science, concentrate on learning:
- Comprehensive information on optimisation-related HTML code components.
- How HTML is used to construct structured data.
- How templates for content management systems (CMS) can be made more effective.
- How to carry out programmatic SEO.
Additionally, you might discover how to set up spidering software to conduct website audits and how this can assist in reviewing SEO aspects on many of a website’s pages.
- If you have writing experience, research:
- How to conduct a keyword search
- I am locating sites with comparative information on word and phrase selections for specific topics.
- How content marketing can help a website perform better in search by bringing in more links and traffic.
- If you have experience in graphic design, discover how even well-styled websites may contain optimised code without detracting from the site’s visual design.
Those with experience in business analytics should learn the following:
- How to evaluate the performance of websites in search results using web analytics tools.
- This performance data might highlight areas that may benefit from change or show which content on a site performs well.
Starting with your area of expertise, you’ll seek to broaden your knowledge and abilities to become a more generalist in SEO eventually.
Even if there has been more employment accessible as SEO specialists, specialisation often helps you get your foot in the door with a company since those talents may line up with more open positions.
2. Learn The Basics
Anyone interested in working in SEO should educate themselves on the most important and straightforward ranking indicators and how to determine whether a website has them in place.
I polled Twitter users before publishing this article to find out what they should do to become ready to work as an in-house SEO. “Read Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and SEO Documentation” received the most votes.
In Google’s Webmaster Guidelines, general guidance on what Google prefers and disfavors can be found. Additionally, SEO literature is available, including an SEO Starter Guide, which offers trustworthy, knowledgeable basic SEO training.
Although it is simple to become overly fixated on the dominant force in the field, reading Bing’s Webmaster Guidelines is worthwhile. Although Microsoft Bing has many similar SEO components, there are some variances.
Although SEO books were not a popular recommendation for learning the trade in my informal Twitter poll, some excellent ones can help you understand SEO very well. Several SEO books can also be quite beneficial when exploring problems that arise outside of the fundamentals.
You should read a beginner’s guide if you’re a novice, but avoid ones targeted to “dummies” because you aren’t one! The Art of SEO is also a fantastic reference book, but I would use something other than it as a starting point for learning the trade. When someone does not trust you, and you need to cite authority, having books on your desk for reference can be a terrific resource.
3. Learn HTML
The formatting instruction system that tells browsers how to display webpage content is called Hypertext Markup Language, or HTML.
It may be intimidating to learn HTML because it can be highly intricate and resembles a programming language. It is, however, relatively simple.
You may view the HTML code that makes up any webpage by putting “View-source:” in front of the page’s URL in the browser address bar and hitting “Return.” You can also view the HTML code by right-clicking the page in your browser window and choosing “View page source.”
Although you can learn HTML by simply looking at the code, it won’t be easy because many websites are so intricate.
Additionally, you can refer to publications and instructions for learning HTML and online video courses on how to write it.
Some of the most excellent courses offer a “sandbox” section on the webpage where one may type HTML directly, and the outcome will be shown immediately. The Learn-HTML.org website, for instance, offers guidelines and sandbox places to test the code.
After mastering HTML, you should learn more about CSS and JavaScript fundamentals since they are both heavily utilised in modern websites.
4. Build & Optimise Your Own Website
Nothing beats getting your hands dirty; this is perfect for learning HTML and SEO. Whatever your degree of expertise, you should have this as a choice.
Create a website based on a subject that interests you personally since it will motivate you to work on the site.
On your website, you can experiment safely with various SEO techniques, such as structured data, redirects, and image SEO.
When I hired code developers for Verizon, choosing from a large pool of skilled applicants was occasionally challenging.
But I discovered that those who had built their websites were usually far better at SEO and brought more practical knowledge and abilities to the table.
To launch your website, you do not need to code HTML and CMS manually.
You can choose a web host business that offers turnkey WordPress installations if you need to become more experienced with web coding. Try Wix or another CMS as well.
To develop skills and a deeper understanding, it’s lovely to set up a few websites on various CMS systems if you have the time and want to do so.
You might use your website as an example of your work when you get ranks for essential terms associated with your topic.
5. Intern
Numerous firms and renowned consultants could take on interns or apprentices in exchange for work. Consider accepting such a job to build your resume and obtain more experience in preparation for an in-house SEO career.
But be careful. Applying for posted internship openings differs from cold-calling individuals or organisations you like. Those running agencies get a lot of cold-call proposals from people wanting to work for us as well as off-shore developers and lead-gen partners.
You will therefore need to either limit your attention to applying for internship positions that have been posted or put in extra effort to woo an agency or independent consultant compellingly enough to stand out from the competition.
Once you have an internship, you can use it to advance into a different position that will help you construct your resume for your ideal in-house SEO employment.
6. Advocate For A Lateral Shift Inside A Company
It may be simpler to land a job at a company in a non-SEO function at first, but you can shift into offering SEO analysis, coaching, or development.
Find out who in the organisation makes the decisions that can approve SEO activities or who may already be offering some SEO advice.
You could run a campaign to join the team of the principal in-house SEO specialist if one already exists, or you could be able to support them in your current role.
The IT and Marketing teams frequently collaborate in some capacity on SEO projects. (It might even be in the business development or sales divisions in some locations.)
People with an advantage can delicately and tactfully position themselves to aid in SEO and articulate its value proposition while looking at how to make optimizations happen. They may be given a role that is tailored to them.
7. Work on Soft Talents
This advice ought to be my top piece of advice for internal SEOs!
You could assume that SEO knowledge would be the most useful for these professions, but soft skills should come first in importance.
But more than anything else, being diplomatic and talking clearly and professionally will advance your career.
When your system administrator blocks the bothersome Googlebot and Bingbot, you may fantasise about yelling in an indignant, dramatic tone. Still, you might also need that person later to do you a favour. So, embarrassing them in front of the top brass won’t make you their buddy or ally.
As an internal SEO, you must convince your leadership of the benefits of ROI, persuade others to work with you, and motivate everyone to increase quality referral traffic.
My mentors advised me to improve my soft skills earlier in my career and to pick up the phone more frequently instead of attempting to direct and persuade through email.
They were accurate. Their overly direct and unprofessional speech has also hampered the development of younger SEO specialists.
Even worse, other people have made mistakes in interpersonal interactions because they needed to see the importance of maintaining culturally sensitive communications in formal contexts.
Think about improving your writing and public speaking skills.
Take online training classes on diversity and sensitivity, too.
8. Remain Current With SEO Developments
We all need to stay up with a quickly changing environment, which is one trait of SEO specialists.
You can also read leading industry consultants’ articles on new and developing things.
Such data and insights can be often found on DMA Blogs to help you stay relevant in the game.
Some of the papers published on the websites of the primary SEO tools are also of exceptionally high quality, especially the infrequently conducted research studies.
Search engines publish millions of updates each year, so reading the weekly articles released on popular websites will help you identify the information that is most crucial for you to take in.
Create a dependable habit, and you will avoid falling behind or becoming stale.
9. Participate In An SEO Conference, Gathering, Or Workshop
Around the world, there are many conferences, meet-ups, and workshops offered. One benefit of the epidemic era is that many of these can be attended to from the convenience of your home.
Often, those who are more experienced than beginner-level may find these more helpful. In any case, they offer talks by knowledgeable speakers who can teach you a lot.
According to my informal survey, this was not a popular method of getting ready for in-house positions, but that might be because conferences can be expensive.
Do this for career growth if you have the money to do so. If not, seek free opportunities. Keep less expensive possibilities in mind, including local search marketing association meetings.
You could attend sessions at other live conferences in exchange for helping out there.
Many internal SEOs attend larger conferences frequently to further their education. As a result, people who already work for a significant business should lobby for the employer to foot the bill for one or two conferences per year.
The company’s internal SEO team’s education in optimization nuances could pay off in the form of a higher website ranking and more qualified visitors.
10. Obtain Google Analytics Accreditation
An essential talent for anyone working in SEO is understanding web analytics.
The training course for Google Analytics formalises such knowledge. It can assist you in assessing your optimisation efforts’ success and finding out what attracts visitors to your website.
For vital analytics about your organic search presence, you should also become familiar with Google Search Console.
Additionally, getting certified makes you seem like a genuine SEO professional, which is undoubtedly advantageous for an in-house career.
Sadly, the switch from the traditional GA Universal Analytics to GA4 has caused a significant sea change in web analytics. Some metrics may be more simplistic than they were in the past. Think about getting acquainted with available alternative analytics providers.
Final Thoughts
Do not allow “imposter syndrome” to hold you back, make you feel uneasy about applying for SEO jobs, or prevent you from working hard enough to win the SEO career you want.
Even though SEO has changed over the past 20 years, it is still entirely doable for everyone, regardless of technological proficiency.
It is still possible for a straightforward website with nicely written content to outperform a similarly themed website that has been technically optimised to the nth power.
It would help if you tried to broaden your knowledge and abilities, but you don’t have to be afraid to present yourself as an industry expert.
Because SEO is a subject that might draw those who want to carve out a niche without going through a lot of official red tape, there are some narrow-minded gatekeepers in it.
Nevertheless, there is plenty of opportunity for new individuals to join in, and nobody should try to make it look more complicated.
To perform SEO, you don’t need to be a dedicated programmer or hold many specialised degrees.
All you need is the will to push for quality while being aware of what the search engines value.
By and large, this will be a hard process to go through for the inexperienced. You might want to consider visiting DMA Services to assist you to achieve the best outcome possible for yourself.
