Forum Moderators: phranque
I'm very confident and will discuss the general best practice white hat SEO techniques that I picked up here (ofcourse) but just wondering if anyone here has any pointers on what to focus on and how to approach the interview. Please feel free to post any SEO topics even if their obvious ;)
BTW
I found the job after I got motivated by this post from Tedster in another topic I started (Webmaster Certification)
[webmasterworld.com...]
That said, a marketing background can be a great platform to launch a career on the web. So many web workers bring either a technical background or a graphics background -- someone with good marketing chops PLUS web skills could find themselves in demand.
Thanks Ted :)
I hope everything went okay - what kind of questions did they ask you?
The 1st interview went really well. Not not many specific questions but instead asked me to talk about seo in general and what I do to seo my own sites.
They did have an interest in my marketing background as the job requires integration of their traditional media campaign with their online ones.
One specific question they did ask was about how I develop my linking strategy.
They were also interested in finding out how I would deal with stuborn clients who's seo skills do not conform with best practice and how I would approach and deal with these clients to convince them of the proper way to do things... basically, people skills, etc.
I will let you know how the second one goes.
Even if the interviewer entered the room with a rigid plan and a formal script of questions, I take it upon myself to set the tone for the interview by initiating it as a casual conversation. Sometimes interviewers are just as nervous as the people they're interviewing.
Before arriving, take some deep breaths, and visualize yourself being your most charming, self-confident, disarming self you can imagine. Remind yourself that their job in the interview is to find out if you are right for the job. YOUR job in the interview is to find out if the job is right for you.
Getting into that frame of mind will make you more relaxed, confident, put the interviewer at ease, and exudes a reassuring & casual kind of professionalism.
Good luck
how I would deal with stuborn clients who's seo skills do not conform with best practice
People skills and managerial-organizational skills are at least as important as SEO knowlege -- especially when you are working with a big operation instead of a small shop. In one case, I figure 80% of my time is all about getting these "soft factors" to line up with the SEO end goal.
that's a very good question to ask an interviewee. I've found that this is the most serious issue I've faced. I don't have a solution to it though, I just dump the clients once I realize they won't do what's needed or right, since they are wasting both our time at that point. That would not be the answer they are looking for, obviously.
I guess the answer is to make them see an example of high end seo that works. In other words, if you have a past project that is now ranking high for terms > 50 million, 80 million, 100 + million serps, show them the site, do the searches with them. Explain how that ranking was achieved. This tends to impress people, since often they struggle to rank for 1/2 million or less keywords.
Since the way to really do that consistently involves doing a lot of quality work, content creation, value added features, you have to convince them that the shortcuts they have grown attached to are bad ideas because they end up killing the site in most cases, and if they haven't yet killed it, will do so on the next major google update. Point to examples of sites that need no seo because their content brings PR, links, etc.
In other words, show them real websites that survive because of their quality, WebmasterWorld, ebay, google, dig.com, newsforge, and so on.
See tedster's comments in this thread [webmasterworld.com] for a concrete example of how you succeed.
If you don't have a concrete example to show it will be harder.
<<< People skills and managerial-organizational skills are at least as important as SEO knowlege >>>
my experience suggest that not only are people skills at least as important, they are at least 2-5 times as important. I have seen incompetent web developers, one after another, get clients, at very high fees, because they make the client believe that they have skills that they do not possess. People skills will substantially boost your income.
BTW, will be joining the WW supporters forum as soon as I get my first pay check.
Thanks to all!
That is great news Petra! For us that don't know you would you give a little about your background and the new job so that we can understand exactly what it might take to snag a position like yours.
In a word... Passion!
My background is BA in Marketing/Economics graduate US Uni.
Worked in the marketing field (large brand names) around the world, moved to London in 2002 and started building websites. Self-taught initially by reading basic HTML books, and by using MS FP as my editor, Then the magic happened, I discovered Webmaster World! MY SEO knowledge was mostly aquired here.
But again, I have to re-iterate, you have to have the Passion for this business to succeed.
