Marketing & SEO

SEO Job Description – Salary, Skills, Titles and Duties Explained in Simple Words

Peter Hill 7 December, 2019

Search engine optimization is an essential method for any marketing strategy. It makes your website trackable and basically, possible to find for search engines. That being said, everyone needs to hire an SEO expert who can perform the duties that come with it continuously and effectively. An SEO job description that is searchable and targeted is the only way to attract such experts, and we are about to tell you how to achieve exactly what. But, before we do so, let’s have a look at what skills you need to seek an expert in SEO.

SEO job description main image

Skills of a Great SEO Expert

Not every SEO expert has the same set of skills, experience, or academic background. As in any other industry, the job seekers in this field will vary a lot, and each of them will have a unique story. For example, applicants with SEO job titles can have experience in writing and advertising, some background in programming, or experience with technical optimization. This field requires experience with keyword research, content marketing, analytics, backlinks, competition analysis, call to action creation, etc. The applicants might have a combination of one or two of these or all of them.

There are hundreds of ways and methods that can improve the optimization of a website, which is why experts need to use various tools. Some of them will use one tool, others will use another. Naturally, you want the one whose SEO job qualification most fits your requirements. That’s the whole purpose of posting an SEO job description – to attract the expert with the most fitting skillset.

Tasks of an SEO Expert

With their own set of skills, experts perform a myriad of tasks on a daily basis. Their tasks can vary greatly, but the goal is common – to help a client reach their SEO objectives. To get there, the experts might have a single great SEO job qualification that impresses you or a combination of many. Regardless, they all share the same goal and the same tasks, which are the following:

  • Maintain content quality and track how the customers interact with the content.
  • Use keywords that are important for SEO.
  • Look for issues with loading times and page errors.
  • Detect potential violations of SEO that can incur a penalty.
  • Check the quality and amount of links from other websites back to their client.
  • Check metrics and tweak the strategy by using big data.

Choosing an SEO Expert – the Do’s and Don’ts of an SEO Job Description

An SEO expert has many things to show. He has examples and recommendations from clients who he helped by optimizing their website, boosting the visibility and rankings. Many can be true SEO professionals, but the ones you need are those whose SEO job qualifications fit your job description perfectly.

Of course, you cannot expect great results from an SEO job board right away. It does take some time. Even if your SEO job description is the best possible, it will still have to reach the candidates. It’s how search engines function. Even so, your best shot at getting a great expert is to create the best description on an SEO job board that you can. Here are the dos and don’ts you need to know to do this:

DO Use Keywords and Phrases

SEO job qualification - keywords

Yes, this will be the job of the expert you will hire when they work on your website. But, until you get there, you need to practice this SEO job qualification, too. As you know already, your SEO job description will have to reach the candidates through the search engines. Same as your posts, you need relevant keywords and phrases to reach as much audience as you can.

Even if you use an SEO job board that these experts visit, you still need the phrases and keywords to clear up to the job seekers what it is that you need exactly. With the use of the commonly-searched phrases and keywords, such as responsibilities or job SEO job titles, you are making it much more likely for candidates to apply for your job positions.

Some great tools that can help you with the keywords are: KeywordTool io, Google Keyword Planner, and Google Trends

DON’T Overuse Keywords

Here is the tricky part and one of the toughest jobs of

an SEO expert – you must use the right keywords, but just enough for them to boost the search engine optimization. Thinking that the more you use them, the higher are your chances of being noticed – is very wrong. According to UppercutSEO, a leading SEO services agency, if you go overboard with keywords in your SEO job description, it will confuse both the search engines and the candidates. Stick to using your chosen terms one time maximum per paragraph.

It’s is simple to avoid this. Just take the description, read it out loud, and if it sounds too repetitive or overwhelming, start reducing keywords. Use different ways to explain the SEO job titles. This will clarify to the applicant what’s needed, instead of just overwhelming them with the same wording, over and over again.

DO Optimize the Description of Your Company

Calliope Robins, an SEO expert at BestEssayTips stated: ‘’Focusing on the SEO job titles and the requirements are important, but this also makes for the most common mistake we see in job descriptions. The task here is to list the requirements and perhaps even the SEO job salary, but describing the company is also essential. People like to know where they might work and who they might work for.’’

That being said, you shouldn’t keep candidates in the dark about the company. Don’t just write the name down. In addition to the name, write a short description of the company that provides the candidates with its core values. This gives them an idea of what their career at the company would be like, as well as motivates them to apply for the job. It is much better than just posting an SEO job profile and expecting the candidate to find out what the company’s values are.

DON’T Make It Too Big

There might not be a limit as to how big your description should be on the SEO job board you’ve chosen, but you should have one, anyway. Even if a person is seeking a job, that doesn’t mean that they don’t have other obligations. So, making it too long and time-consuming is far from a good idea. Ideally, your SEO job description should be complete, but concise. Don’t create these walls of texts that don’t belong in a description.

This also means that your text shouldn’t be too demanding. If you list every possible skill or qualification an SEO expert can possess in your SEO job profile, you’ll quickly alienate candidates. You can hardly find an expert that has knowledge of anything and everything – it is simply not doable, so don’t confuse the candidates with it.

Think of what is most important for your company and that job position, and create the SEO job profile based on that.

DO Use Simple Job Titles

You might be tempted to use more complicated, more-serious appearing SEO job titles. But you shouldn’t. The simpler and more specific it is, the more candidates it can attract.

In other words, the title in your description should be specific, unabbreviated, and relevant. If the hours of work are relevant, for example, you should definitely add full-time or part-time to achieve clarity.

DO Make It Visually Appealing

Instead of just posting an SEO job profile that lists everything you need without a specific order, use clear headings and bulleted lists. How well you organize the information in your SEO job description will determine how appealing it will be to the candidates. In addition to being short and concise and include a company description, your description needs to create a good visual experience.

Search engines don’t just look for the bullet points and good text organization. They also look for useful links or even use of multimedia. You can create a careers page and place links to it in your SEO job description – this should make it more visually appealing, shorter, and yet – more informative for the applicant.

DO Make Use of Local SEO

SEO job board local searches

Have you heard of local SEO? It is very helpful to businesses who want to strive in local search results. This is the best starting point you have – you first begin local optimization and move upwards. Or at least, that’s what the chosen job candidate will do for your website once you hire them.

Candidate searching is often limited to local SEO. If you want a person who will work at your office, you need them to be close. So, localize the search by using your location in the SEO job description. It will get you higher in the search results for job seekers in the area. See the careers page on the CaptivateSEO company’s website for examples on how to best locally-optimize job description pages.

DO Check Google for Jobs

Google for Jobs was invented with the goal to display the job listings in the search engines that are most relevant to the applicants. This is one of the most important places to look when you want to see how your SEO jobs description looks like, or where it is ranked on search engines.

It will help you track how far your description goes, tell you how to improve it and help you structure the information within a short description. Basically, this will tell you how to write your SEO job profile by using structure data that abide by the Google guidelines.

DO Share the Postings

This is how search engines work – they share the most popular postings there are. So, if you want to get the description out there, you should actually get it out there. Share it on social media and basically – anywhere you can. Use different job boards, career sites, social media pages, and even websites to show the search engines that your posting is popular.

Example of a Job Description for an SEO Position

Now that you are informed on the do’s and dont’s of writing descriptions for an SEO expert, we provide you with an excellent example of a job description for this position. SEO is a complex and variable landscape, so you will definitely need to tweak this example as per your company’s requirements and tasks. However, we hope that this template will help you optimize your own description before you post it on different job boards and career sites.

Job Title: Part-Time SEO Specialist at NAME OF COMPANY

Name of company in location seeks SEO specialists for an open job position.

Key requirements:

  • Experience in SEO, content marketing and content growth.
  • Experience and knowledge of the common SEO practices.
  • Ability to work strategically and think creatively.
  • Fast decision-maker and problem-solving expert.
  • Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
  • Familiarization with different SEO tools and analytics tools.
  • Ability to work on his own and with a team.
  • Adherent to deadlines.
  • Outstanding organizational, analytical, and time management skills.

Responsibilities:

  • Running the company’s PPC campaigns.
  • Preparing up-to-date, continuous SEO strategy reports.
  • Reviewing clients’ sites for the purpose of optimization and improvement.
  • Finding the most powerful and effective keywords for SEO content.
  • Writing enticing calls to action that converts the visitors.
  • Writing and filling blogs and websites with quality content and related keywords.
  • Developing smart link building strategies.
  • Keeping track and analyzing the SEO techniques and keywords in the specific industry.

To apply:

  1. Submit your full resume.
  2. Submit a cover letter.
  3. Send us your contact details.

SEO job salary: TBD

SEO job salary: ranging from xx to xx (based on qualifications and work hours)

Final Words

Are you ready to post your focused SEO description and get excellent candidates for the job position? Follow our tips and make use of this excellent example. The more you focus on your description, the higher are your odds of reaching the right candidate. It only takes one candidate to bring the best SEO strategies and work into your business, and this is your best shot at finding and hiring them!

Featured image by Freepik

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Tags: search engine marketing SEO seo guide
Author: Peter Hill
Peter Hill is a professional writer and journalist. He is a socially active person, engaged in the photo and video editing. You can find him on Twitter and Facebook.