By Kayla Carmicheal

SEO helps businesses keep their website visible to people looking for what they offer.

It’s a technical specialty that requires understanding its foundational processes, continuously monitoring performance, and staying on top of search algorithm updates and new requirements.

The person at a business who monitors trends and helps sites remain visible is an SEO expert. In this post, we’ll discuss exactly what they do and advice from experienced HubSpotters on how to become one.

What is an SEO expert?

An SEO expert monitors search trends and uses analytics to help businesses build websites that rank highly in search engines, reach target audiences, and meet business objectives. The optimized websites they help create generate leads and drive conversions to support business growth.

A successful SEO expert:

• Has a well-rounded understanding of on-page, technical, and off-page SEO and how each impacts site performance independently and together.
• Understands how search engines and SERPs work (like indexing and crawling)
• Can do SEO-focused research (like keyword research or competitive analysis)
• Can understand, analyze, and report on SEO analytics (like clicks, conversions, etc.) to make data-driven decisions and recommendations
• Use SEO tools (like Ahrefs or Google Search Console)
• Understand how to make SEO-focused content
• Stay on top of search trends and algorithm updates that might impact site performance.
• Create SEO-focused strategies (like a keyword strategy)

Some SEO specialists don’t start out with the intention of dedicating their careers to SEO.

Braden Becker, SEO Lead at Faire, along with other SEO and historical optimization experts at HubSpot Aja Frost, Victor Pan, and Amanda Sellers — offered their advice about what it takes to become an SEO expert and the paths they took to get there.

1. Develop your skills.

“Getting a job in SEO ideally requires two things: content creation skill and analytical skill. Most SEO professionals today have one of those and develop the other,” Braden says.

SEO experts are skilled writers with creative instincts, so it’s helpful to have a strong writing background to optimize content in a way searchers will comprehend. Becker noted that his writing background helped him get his start in SEO:

“My background in writing and editing helped me get my foot in the door, but a willingness to focus on the structure, mechanics, and intent behind my writing is what I think secured my role as an SEO specialist for HubSpot.”

Before Frost became an SEO strategist at HubSpot, she was the editor of HubSpot’s Sales Blog.

“I taught myself how to do keyword research and competitive analysis as the Editor for HubSpot’s Sales Blog,” Aja says. “The Sales Blog’s traffic had been flat for a year and a half — I noticed that the only posts that consistently generated views for us were getting all of those views from search. So I began looking for sales-related keywords we could rank for that would help boost …read more

Source:: HubSpot Blog

Author: Aaron