SEO Consultant Career Guide

The main responsibilities of an SEO consultant are as follows:

• Firstly, they begin by gaining an understanding of their client’s industry (products and services, competitors, purchasing behaviour, etc.);
• They may then need to carry out a technical or semantic audit, depending on the client’s needs;
• Next, working with the client or the marketing team, they undertake keyword research to produce a list of topics to be covered in an editorial strategy;
• As new pages and content are published, they monitor their quality, ensure they are properly indexed and track their rankings;
• Always with a view to improving organic search rankings, they implement an internal linking strategy (by creating links between the various pages of the site) and a backlinking strategy (by obtaining links from other websites);
• Finally, they produce regular reports (monthly, quarterly or half-yearly) on performance to analyse the results achieved, share them with the client and adjust the strategy if necessary.

They mainly work as:

• A self-employed freelancer;
• An employee within a company;
• An employee or manager within an SEO or digital marketing agency.

The main difference between a self-employed SEO consultant and one in a salaried role lies in how they secure their assignments.

As a freelancer, they must find their own clients. To do this, they often rely on word of mouth, build their visibility on social media, generate leads via their own website, or sign up to specialised platforms such as Malt.

But whatever their status, their daily life remains hyper-connected and driven by communication! They spend most of their days in front of their computer and often work remotely.

In large, often international companies, the Head of SEO is the professional responsible for the organisation’s SEO strategy. They set the tone and generally manage a team comprising several professionals (web editors, content managers, junior SEO consultants, etc.).
Those with a three- or five-year degree in marketing can progress to this role fairly quickly in micro-enterprises and small SMEs. In larger organisations, this position is very often reserved for senior SEO consultants.

Over the course of their career, an SEO consultant can climb the ranks within the company and progress to management roles in digital marketing, thereby becoming a marketing manager. They then oversee the entire marketing team, working with them to boost the brand’s online visibility and improve its conversion rate.

Finally, some senior SEO experts choose to set up their own specialist agency, whether in SEO or digital marketing in general.
This choice is often made by consultants who have a wide network of contacts and who have developed managerial skills to run an entire organisation and make the transition from consultant to director.