I recently came across an interesting online conversation in which someone asked what I believe to be a very valid question:
What are the right questions to ask during an interview of a potential SEO specialist candidate?
Unfortunately, this question was immediately met with a bit of a rude response. Essentially, the first responder said that if you don’t know what interview questions to ask, then you shouldn’t be handling the interview in the first place because you won’t know what the right answers will be.
Granted, in a perfect world, you would always have an accomplished and experienced SEO pro handling all SEO-related interviews, whether they be for an individual candidate or for an SEO provider such as an agency. Unfortunately, this not always feasible. In fact, I would say that in well over 50% of scenarios that I find myself in when pitching my agency’s SEO services, the organization making the decision doesn’t have a single employee with any real experience or expertise in the SEO field.
So what’s a company supposed to do? Hire a consultant just to help with the SEO hiring/sourcing process? How can they be sure that the consultant they hire knows what they’re doing? It really is a vicious circle of sorts.
With that in mind, here are some of the key questions that an organization should ask, as well as some answers that they should be looking for. I would love it if folks could chime in with additional questions and answers:
Question: On a scale of 1-10, how strong are your writing skills?
Answer: 10 out of 10 (or close to it)
In my experience, the ability to communicate extremely well via the written word is crucial. In fact, over the years, the few unsuccessful hires that I have made in the SEO space had one common thread; they had poor grammar and composition skills, and that killed their credibility with clients and colleagues. An SEO that doesn’t have a strong command of the written language will struggle with the subtle nuances of keyword research and recommendations as well as struggle to communicate internally with key stakeholders (more on that in a moment…)
Question: What kind of experience do you have working with other departments in order to successfully implement SEO initiatives, and with what departments have you worked with?
Answer: If need be, I can work with the janitorial staff if that’s what it takes to successfully implement SEO.
In all seriousness, you’re looking for a successful track record of working with IT/dev stakeholers, fellow marketing stakeholders, public relations stakeholders, legal department stakeholders, and even C-level executives. Often times, successful SEO is more about communication and internal selling than it is about technical ability.
Question: What is your approach to link building?
Answer: I love natural, one-way links with really good, keyword-rich anchor text, and I know how to reach out to webmasters (via email, phone, and social networks) to build relationships and rapport that lead to those kinds of links. Lastly, I know that one of the keys to getting these kinds of links is having the right kind of “link friendly” content that makes people want to link to our site.
In a nutshell, you want someone that understands how social media and link building overlap, in that the key to building good links is building relationships with webmasters and providing content that lends itself to sharing and linking. A bonus would be someone that understands the paid links arena, but doesn’t plan on making that a core facet of his/her strategy. And if anchor text isn’t brought up, red lights should start flashing, because if the individual doesn’t understand just how instrumental this facet is in the grand scheme of SEO (not just in terms of external link building but also in terms of internal site architecture and linking) you’re in for a disappointing engagement.
Question: Do you, or have you in the past, written or blogged about SEO in industry portals? If so, can you share links to those writings?
Answer: Yes I have. Here are some links to articles that I’ve written and here are some examples of best practices documentation that I’ve written for past clients and/or employers.
9 times out of 10, if they have a strong body of public-facing, written work relating to the technical details of SEO implementation, then it’s likely that they are passionate and serious about their craft.
Question: What’s your approach to analytics for SEO?
Answer:I’m all about ROI. And what I mean by that is that I want to first understand what the value of a site conversion is (e-commerce sale, lead generated, advertising CPM revenue, etc) and I want to then track incremental conversions that come from SEO so that we can understand just how much revenue SEO is bringing to the table on an ongoing basis.
I go beyond ranking reports and look at traffic and conversions. I go beyond just aggregate data, and focus in on things like non-branded search referrals (because branded search referrals are not a function of SEO, but rather a function of brand awareness, since most companies already rank No. 1 for virtually all keywords that have their name in it). I also focus on year-over-year comparison to account for seasonality as well as focusing on specific keywords to identify opportunities to make an impact on money, on-the-cusp keywords.
SEO without solid, in-depth analytics and a focus on the dollar value of a conversion is doomed from the start, so make sure the folks you’re speaking with are serious about their approach to analytics.
Lastly, but perhaps most importantly, make sure to get some solid references from your potential SEO provider or SEO agency, and call those references. This is usually the best way to ensure that the folks you’re talking to have a real track record of succes.
I hope you folks out there that are stuck in this type of catch-22 situation find this post helpful. My goal was to arm you with some relatively non-technical SEO questions and answers that could help guide you on your way.
If you have suggestions on other key questions or simply want to leave feedback, please do so in the comments section below.
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{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
Excellent summary, Hugo! I would add a question,
“How familiar are you with HTML standards, Web dev and servers?”
Many are entering SEO from the marketing side while others come from the technical side. On-site SEO, aside from good copy, requires a technical understanding and ability to have such conversations with IT and often fix their HTML.
Thanks for taking the time to share, especially your ROI approach. Spot on!
Thanks for the comment, Dana!
I totally agree. The only catch with that question is that if the person asking it has no real grasp of HTML, web dev, and servers, it will be difficult for them to know if the answer they’re getting is legitimate.
That’s what makes this so tough for companies in this position.
Although the questions are good there is always more than one way to do it. If you don’t know good from bad SEO hire someone to reveiew your site and help you choose the firm that can get that job done. Potentially you are about to spend from 6000-30000 on services that could make or break your online store. Spend the 2000-3000 to hire someone who does… in the end you save a lot of time and money.
Thanks for the comment, Terry!
Thing is (as I mentioned in my post) you still have to hire someone to do that review, and if you don’t know anything about SEO, how do you know that individual you hire is worth their weight.
It’s sort of a catch-22 situation.
And what’s really scary is that I routinely see companies set to spend six-figures plus on an SEO agency engagement without the internal expertise needed to weed out the stories that “sound good” vs. the stories that are based on legitimate SEO principles.
Hugo, understood it is a catch 22. That’s where more organization within the industry could play a part. Consumers need a no spin zone where they know they can trust the process.
No doubt about it.
Sadly, we’re stuck with outfits like TopSEOs masquerading as unbiased, legitimate third parties for this kind of thing.
Thank goodness that we have ethical folks like @pageoneresults working hard to expose that nonesense.
People who know SEO will likely answer the questions differently. Instead of listing your “correct answers” maybe you should list “incorrect answers.”
If any candidate says “meta keywords” or “hits” employers should end the interview on the spot.
Thanks for the comment, Dustin!
Agree for the most part on your statement regarding meta keywords and hits.
Not sure that listing the “incorrect” answers would do anyone much good, since there are so many variations of “incorrect” answers.
Also, not totally sure what you mean by “people who know SEO will likely answer the questions differently.” In any case, thanks for contributing.
Nice & sincere work Hugo. And that is precisely why we came into existence. SEO remains a mystery even to these so-called specialists. Its time we had a self-regulatory body like in journalism, advertising, medicine, law et. al. (Too many unscrupulous black hats in the market for a few ethical white hats making this entire business a grey zone).
Hugo, great stuff. However, I still think that in order to make the best decision, you simply have to learn some basics. But in their absence, I’m referring folks to your advice.
Thanks for the comment, Gyi!
I definitely agree. Unfortunately, the [online marketing] industry is still in its infancy, so sadly, most companies simply don’t have folks in-house that understand SEO.
I do expect that to change over time, though.
Hi Hugo, Good set of questions.
There’s one additional question I would ask:
Q: What can you do to help grow my business? If I hire you, how can you add to the bottom line?
This might be implied in your last question. But rather than waiting for the interviewee to bring it up, I’d bring it up because I’d want an interviewee to know how important the business results are to me and the business I work in.
- Anita
Great point, Anita! Thanks for sharing.
Hugo great blog
One question that I would ask also
“how long do you think it will take to get at the top of the engines”
answer
“This depends on the industry that you are targeting and how aggressive the other companies are that will determine the length of sucess of the project”
not hearing “it will take 2 weeks”
I totally agree with your ROI aproach and what you said ‘I want to then track incremental conversions that come from SEO so that we can understand just how much revenue SEO is bringing to the table on an ongoing basis.’
This is direct and I like this approach, great article
Thanks for the compliment, Seb! Good to know I’m not the only one that thinks this is the right way to do things.
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