How to build a career in SEO

SEO is one of the most durable skills in digital marketing. As long as people search for answers, products and services, businesses will need help being found. Search is changing with AI-generated answers, but that makes people who understand how search works more valuable, not less.

What SEO professionals do

• Research what the target audience searches for.
• Audit websites for technical problems and fix or brief them.
• Improve pages so they match search intent.
• Plan content and work with writers.
• Earn links and mentions in legitimate ways.
• Manage local SEO and Google Business Profiles.
• Track results and explain them to clients or managers.

Career paths

• SEO executive or analyst: the usual entry point, handling audits, on-page tasks and reporting.
• SEO specialist: owns projects and strategy for several clients or a section of a large site.
• Technical SEO specialist: focuses on crawling, rendering, site architecture and large sites.
• Content SEO or SEO writer: combines writing with search strategy.
• SEO manager or head of SEO: leads a team and strategy.
• Freelancer or consultant: works directly with businesses.

Skills to develop

Core

• Keyword research and search intent.
• On-page optimisation and content structure.
• Technical basics: indexing, sitemaps, redirects, canonicals, speed.
• Google Search Console and GA4.

Valuable extras

• Basic HTML and an understanding of how websites are built.
• Spreadsheets for analysing large sets of pages and keywords.
• Clear writing and presentation.
• Understanding of AI search features and structured data.

How to get your first role

1. Build your own site and grow it. Real results, even small ones, are the best proof.
2. Audit real websites and write up your findings clearly.
3. Help a local business with its Google Business Profile and site, with permission, and document the work.
4. Learn to explain what you did, why and what happened, in plain language.
5. Apply to agencies, which often hire juniors and teach across many clients.

What to avoid

Shortcuts such as buying links, spinning content and mass-produced pages can work briefly but often end in penalties or ranking drops after Google updates. Employers value people who build results that last.

Learn SEO end to end on a live website in our SEO Course.