7 Career Paths for SEO Specialists

The SEO industry has undergone significant changes in recent years, with a shift towards more ethical and effective practices. As search engines continue to update their algorithms, SEO skills have become essential for digital marketers.

Gone are the days of shady tactics like keyword stuffing and exploiting website loopholes. Today, SEO is all about producing high-quality content that is relevant to users.

As a result, businesses of all sizes are investing in SEO professionals to help them achieve higher rankings on search engine result pages.

This demand for SEO specialists is reflected in the growing number of job postings for this role. As digital and content marketing become increasingly important, the need for SEO experts is also rising.

Therefore, a career in SEO is becoming increasingly attractive in digital marketing.

What is SEO Specialist?

As the name suggests, search engine optimization means search engine optimization. The SEO specialist’s job revolves around search engine optimization for better marketing results, as Brain Station says.

This profession is responsible for setting the content strategy. The content is filled with specific keywords or phrases.

So that it can increase company website traffic, as well as improve search rankings about the company in various search engines.

Additionally, he must also know SEO copywriting, layout design, and advertising techniques that can maximize website traffic.

SEO Specialists will handle search engine marketing as marketing techniques through popular search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing to maximize profits.

SEO Specialist Career paths

When you start your career, you will be positioned as a junior SEO and become an SEO executive. After two to three years in this position, you can move on to the SEO manager position. Then, this position can continue to be Head of SEO or Head of digital.

1. Junior SEO Specialist

This first year as a Junior SEO Specialist, you will test, analyze, and modify websites to make them more search engine friendly. In most cases, you will collaborate closely with the web development team (web developer) to ensure that SEO best practices are used for all web page components.

Your job responsibilities will include keyword research, page & off page optimization, article content optimization (in collaboration with copywriters), link building, and SEO reporting. The main focus is on organic traffic on the website.

2. SEO Executives

Continuing in the next year, when you have gained substantial experience in SEO best practices and analytics, you can become an SEO Executive and focus on doing on-site and off-site analysis of the competitor’s website for the company’s business that you hold.

Use tools such as Google Analytics, AHREFS, SEMRush, or other SEO tools to create a Website Performance Report. Assist the content team in creating SEO-friendly, informative and high-quality article content. Besides organic traffic on the website, the main focus is analyzing competitor websites as a reference for improvement.

3. SEO Manager

After two or three years working as an SEO Executive, the following career path is SEO Manager, the SEO Manager is responsible for planning, implementing, and managing the company’s overall SEO strategy. It usually includes web marketing, web analysis, content strategy planning, link building, and keyword strategy.

At this stage, you usually already have team members such as Content Writers, Junior SEO Specialists, and Graphic Designers to complete the division.

4. Head of Digital

After years of running in this field, you have reached the Head of your Digital career path. Responsibilities are bigger and more complex than the previous career path. As Head of Digital, you are responsible for ensuring the best practices and processes across digital teams so that results meet expectations.

Manage, monitor, and approve all digital team activities. Seek solutions and recommend improvements to the company’s digital systems and infrastructure. Here you receive organic or paid reports from SEO Specialists or Digital Marketing Specialists and can determine and suggest further steps.

Related Careerpaths

You can also switch to other similar marketing positions because SEO is in digital marketing.

1. Digital Marketer

Digital marketing uses digital technology, such as websites, social media, and email, to promote a brand or business. SEO, or search engine optimization, is a critical component of digital marketing, as it helps increase a business’s visibility and reach customers online. SEO specialists play a vital role in implementing digital marketing strategies, using various techniques to improve a website’s search engine rankings and drive more traffic.

An SEO specialist’s job includes conducting on-page and off-page optimization, creating high-quality content, and embedding tags and links. An SEO specialist should have the proper training and knowledge to excel in digital marketing. A quality SEO training course can help individuals explore and master the digital marketing landscape.

2. Social Media Marketers

Social media marketing is a critical aspect of digital marketing, as more and more brands are turning to platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter to promote their products and services.

The right mix of compelling, attention-grabbing content and SEO tactics can help brands achieve success quickly on social media. As such, SEO specialists can have a promising careers in social media marketing.

To excel in social media marketing, an SEO specialist should be skilled in crafting optimised content for search engines, using strategic keywords, quality backlinks, and other techniques.

By creating blogs and articles optimized for search engines, brands can increase their visibility on users’ feeds, and expand their client base.

The pay scale for social media marketing is also competitive, and it’s a field that is expected to grow. To succeed in social media marketing, it is essential to create posts, images, videos, and blogs embedded with SEO tools to attract the audience.

3. Marketing Analyst

With the growing use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Big Data, data analytics has become a crucial aspect of online marketing.

An SEO specialist must be able to measure, manage, and analyze consumer data to help businesses maximize their potential and optimize their return on investment (ROI). Data analytics allows companies to target the right audience at the right time.

As an SEO marketing analyst, you would track website traffic and evaluate the performance of marketing initiatives. It’s important to be skilled in generating reports and forecasting future opportunities based on research data.

An SEO specialist with knowledge of data analytics and strategy can earn well as a marketing analyst. As the use of data analytics continues to grow in the field of digital marketing, understanding and utilizing data analytics can be a valuable addition to an SEO specialist’s skill set.