How to Staff Talented SEOs In-house: 8 Tips

SUMMARY: The process of finding and hiring a good SEO specialist can become complicated when inexperienced applicants posing as experts try to swindle you.

Read on to discover our eight tips for vetting top SEO talent. Includes advice on what to look for, what questions to ask, and places to find your next natural-search guru.

Many marketers wonder whether hiring an agency is the best approach to search marketing. 49% of marketers who brought their search marketing in-house did so because they felt they could do a better job at it, according to MarketingSherpa’s Search Marketing Benchmark Guide 2009 27% wanted to save money.

When focusing on search engine optimization, the marketers’ argument becomes clearer. SEO is multifaceted. It requires a deep understanding of a business’ technology, management and marketing to develop an effective program. Having a permanent in-house person can be more effective than going to an agency. However, this presents staffing challenges -- 64% of marketers say that finding that person is somewhat to very difficult. The challenges include:
o Determining your needs
o Making sure they’re reasonable
o Finding a qualified SEO
o Vetting their expertise
o Familiarizing them with company/systems/processes

Finding Top SEO Talent: 8 Tips

Tip #1: Consult a search expert

The first step is to talk to an expert – preferably someone in your company who is well-versed in search marketing. This person should have a strong understanding of how websites communicate with search engines, and of the level of effort required to run an effective SEO program.

Experts are important for three reasons:
1. They can translate your needs into job requirements.
2. They can determine if your needs can be met by one person, or if a team is needed.
3.  They can test an applicant’s SEO expertise.

Only someone with a strong search background can tell if an applicant “sounds” like an expert or truly “is” an expert. “Search marketing takes time to show results. You don’t want to be a year or two into your program and then find out that the person you hired does not know what they’re doing and is learning on the job,” says Duane Forrester, Senior Program Manager, Microsoft. Forrester is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization and founding co-chair of SEMPO’s In-House Committee.

Tip #2: Communicate realistic expectations

SEO cannot be properly and effectively managed by someone who is also responsible for a multitude of roles, including maintenance of an ecommerce website, email marketing, and online advertising.

Take a look at the list of responsibilities you want the new hire to cover, and realistically assess whether you’re looking to hire one person or several. Ask an SEO expert to get an idea of how much work you’re looking to cover. Then write a very specific job description.

If your goal is to hire an SEO, focus on that in the job description. Communicate that the person’s job is to deliver results via natural search, and not to run every facet of your marketing. This is important for getting quality SEO applicants into your door, and avoiding those who don’t understand what they’re getting into.

“If you’re not sure what you want, it’s going to be hard to indentify if somebody is going to be a good fit,” says Nicole Bodem, Director of Search Marketing, Arbita, and author of the HR Search Marketing blog.

Tip #3: Use a strong, well-placed job posting

University marketing programs are not churning out search experts, and few, if any, offer classes on the subject. That, coupled with search marketing’s relative novelty, leaves a small pool of experienced candidates who’re being pursued by many businesses.

Your job description should attract good candidates. It should have more than the obligatory list of responsibilities and requirements. Emphasize what makes your company special, and try to throw in extras, such as conference budgets, flex time, ability to work remotely, etc. “The job advertisement is a form of advertising. A potential candidate is going to decide in the first 10, 20 seconds, first paragraph, whether or not the job is engaging or not,” Bodem says.

o Where to post?

A great way to find SEOs (Search Engine Optimizers) is by networking and attending industry conferences. Aside from that, your job posting can reach them through employment listings on channels including:
-Marketing sites
-Search marketing sites
-General job sites (see links below): these are mostly for finding entry-level candidates.

Tip #4: “In this industry, experience costs money,” Forrester says.

You can expect to pay a premium for experienced SEOs compared to other marketing disciplines. The average salary being offered for SEO specialists increased in all regions surveyed last year. The average salaries for PPC specialists and SEM managers fell. Here’s U.S. regional breakdown for offered salaries for SEO specialists from our 2009 Search Marketing Benchmark Guide:
- Northeast: $66,000
- Southeast: $60,000
- Midwest: $61,000
- Northwest: $52,000
- West Coast: $66,000

The above salaries are average. Once a search marketer has more than three years experience and a track record of proven results, their salaries can increase dramatically. Also, experienced business managers have learned that SEO can fetch much higher salaries.

While employers know that they are asking for a lot, they are not always willing to compensate adequately for their requirements. “They’ll say ‘I need a seven-year experienced SEO person that does a list of 15 things, and I have $40 grand to spend’…That’s the biggest area where I see a disconnect,” Bodem says.

o SEMPO Survey

SEMPO completed an In-House SEM Salary Survey of 656 search marketers in January 2008. The survey was of SEMs in general, not SEOs in particular. It found:
o Over 26% earned between $60,000 and $90,000 annually
o Senior managers, close to 20% of respondents, clustered in the $70,000 to $100,000 range.

“There are also some respondents who are well over $200,000 a year, with zero-to-three years of experience,” says Forrester, who started the survey. “They may have only been doing [search marketing] for two years in that company, but in all likelihood, they have 10 to 15 years of experience somewhere else or in some other function with the company.”

  Tip #5: Look for management and business skills

In-house SEOs should not be focused solely on search rankings. They need to know how their strategy will impact a business and how to derive as much benefit as possible.

Also, SEOs have to know how to motivate people. Natural search requires that copywriters, Web developers, programmers, product managers, and brand managers are working toward a common goal.

Teaching SEO to a person can be easy, Forrester says. “What’s more difficult to teach people is understanding the larger picture around what matters to business, how to communicate in a business environment, knowing what level of information to put out to the group that you’re interacting with to get the work done, and also how to influence people to get the work done that you want done…Those kinds of skills aren’t something that can be taught through the world of SEO.”

  Tip #6: Look for proven qualifications

If you’re going to pay big money, then you want an experienced professional. Aside from the qualifications you’d want in every good employee (self-motivation, aptitude to learn, pleasant demeanor, etc.) here are a few that are specific to SEOs:

o Great communication skills

An SEO has to work with multiple branches of your organization and convince many of them to care about search marketing -- without confusing them. That requires clear communication with very different groups, from editorial to programming.

o Proven business impact

Every applicant applying for an experienced SEO job should be able to point to work they’ve done in the past, whether on a personal or professional website. A key indicator of whether the site’s natural search strategy was successful is not only its ranking, but whether it generated revenue and revenue growth. Rankings are not valuable unless they’re directly tied to positive business impact.

“Chances are that their previous employer isn’t going to know the exact things that were done. But they’ll more than likely be able to tell you whether or not they believe their SEO campaign was successful,” Bodem says.

o Work in challenging verticals

Note which verticals the applicant’s prior experience is in. If he or she can show 10% monthly revenue growth in the insurance industry, that says a lot more than 10% revenue growth in the dog-toy industry.

o On-going interest in search

Search marketing changes every year. Some of changes pose problems, others bring opportunity. A good SEO will have a genuine interest in the industry, demonstrated by regularly reading search publications and blogs. It is also a good sign if the candidate regularly attends major industry workshops and conferences, such as Search Marketing Expo and Search Engine Strategies.

  Tip #7: Ask technical questions

Having a search expert for this portion of the interview is essential. You must be able to prove that the applicant is truly an expert who can do more than pay lip service to the topic. Here are a few topics you should hit in the vetting process:

1. Search basics: “What are the most important factors in SEO?” “How does a search engine work?”

For the first question, the answer should include a mention of content, links, and site design.

2. Black hat: “Which SEO tactics would you not use for our site and why?”

Hopefully, the applicant will address common black-hat SEO tactics, such as cloaking and link buying, which are not allowed by search engines and can significantly hurt your performance.

3. Communication: “How would you describe SEO to your grandmother?”

This is one of Forrester’s favorite questions. “If you can’t dumb it down, and you can’t describe it to your grandmother in very simplistic terms, then you will never get it across to the upper executive. You’re talking about really smart people here, but you’re talking about people who have maybe five minutes of time. Which means, if you’re lucky you might be able to get your message out in under two minutes, so it better be memorable.”

4. Search details: “Can you describe work you’ve done on other websites?” “How valuable do you consider XML sitemaps?”

Here you can dig into the nuances of PageRank, social media’s effect on SEO, Google’s Universal Search, and a host of other natural-search technicalities. Work with a search expert to come up with a short list of questions that will confirm that the applicant knows more than the basics.

5. Process: “When do you do your keyword research?”

“If their answer is anything other than ‘at the beginning of the project, before you do anything else,’ they’re wrong. No work gets done unless you know what phrases you’re focusing on,” Forrester says.

  Tip #8: Consider recent graduates

If you have a search background, it might not be necessary to hire a search expert. David Perez, Founder, E Dating for Free, and someone who has launched several free dating sites and children’s coloring sites, has hired capable recent graduates for search positions and trained them.

“I fully believe in training as opposed to hiring more expensive people. … I’d rather bring someone in on an internship basis, train them and determine if they’re going to be a good fit and to hire them on a full-time basis if they would be,” Perez says.

Perez posts want ads at university websites, such as Stanford’ and UCLA’s, for summer interns interested in search marketing. Qualities he looks for in applicants include:
o Doing well at school
o Comfort at a computer and online
o Comfort with Excel and HTML
o Motivation to work and learn

He does not focus on applicants from specific majors of study, and he typically looks for students in their junior year.

o Test project

Once Perez finds a handful of potential candidates, he assigns them a task. The tasks always consist of real work that he needs completed for one of his sites. For example, he might give them a spreadsheet of HTML code and clearly explain some adjustments he wants made. He pays about $15 to $20 an hour for the work, he says.

“It’s not testing a wide range of skills, but it’s testing a person’s skills on Excel, and it’s testing the speed at which they can get a task done, and their ability to understand instruction and execute.”

o Internships

Selected candidates work for the summer, gain training, and experience life as an SEO. “The best part about an internship is that it’s risk-free for both parties. If they don’t like it, or they’re not good at it, they don’t have to go back. They get a good resume entry and a recommendation. And if they like it, and they’re good, they get a good job.”

o Hiring

If both Perez and the intern are happy, Perez will make a job offer in the $50,000 to $60,000 annual salary range, he says. “I would never do that blindly. If you haven’t done an internship with a candidate, I would never make an offer along those lines.”

Hotels companies, long steadfast in requiring business clients to forfeit deposits when they cancel or scale back events, are starting to soften their stance.

Whether businesses are worried about being seen as big spenders in these lean times or they just don't have enough participants signed up to make an event worth holding, they are finding hotel officials increasingly willing to negotiate on room rates, catering bills and even cancellation penalties.

"Being in the service industry, it's in our nature to always find a win-win," said Cassy Scrima, the marketing director at Marcus Hotels and Resorts, which owns the elegant Pfister Hotel in downtown Milwaukee. "We understand the predicament people are in, and as a hotel you want that repeat business to come back to you."

In good times, hotel companies usually charge a hefty fee when a client wants to cancel an event, said C. Patrick Scholes, an analyst with Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. in Arlington, Va., sometimes as much the event's full cost. But the tough economy is forcing them to reconsider.

"We're seeing where people may go to the properties and say they want to cancel, and the companies say, 'Don't cancel, we'll cut you a better deal,'" Scholes said. "Something is better than nothing. Right now hotels have lower bargaining power due to the economy."

Scholes estimated that bookings for corporate meetings across the country were down 35 percent last month compared with February 2008.

Some hotel companies are offering to eliminate so-called attrition fees, which apply when a client's meeting draws fewer guests than scheduled. Omni Hotels, the Dallas-based operator of 40 hotels across the U.S, announced last month it would waive the fees for most events booked by June 30 and held by the end of the year.

"We know our clients wanted to hold meetings but were concerned about committing to a certain number of guest rooms," said Tom Faust, Omni's vice president of sales. "This incentive lets them know we're there as a partner helping them overcome their biggest concern."

Companies across the industry saw revenue fall between 10 percent and 20 percent in late 2008 compared with a year earlier. It's hard to separate business travel revenue from leisure. But revenue at Manhattan hotels, which draw a particularly large share of their revenue from business travel, fell a record 30 percent in January from a year earlier and appeared to be down 40 percent in February, according to a report the Federal Reserve released this month.

Room rates fell about $7 to a national average of roughly $100 per night between last February and this February, according to Smith Travel Research Inc., while occupancy rates for the month slipped below 50 percent from about 55 percent.

The Pfister, by converting one client's sit-down dinner for about 600 into five smaller lunches, helped the client save $8,000, Scrima said.

"It's about finding creative solutions," she said. "This solution worked out for everyone."

Other hotel companies have found their own solutions. Hyatt Hotels & Resorts in Chicago will discount the final bill 6 percent for events at its upscale Hyatt resorts or 10 percent at Hyatt hotels. Marriott International Inc., based in Bethesda, Md., is now offering meeting planners a 2 percent discount plus twice the promotional reward points.

The cost of a large-scale event varies based on location, time of year and number of attendees. A typical 1,000-person conference for three nights costs between $1 million and $1.5 million, for example. Depending how much notice planners give, cancellation fees run between 10 percent and 100 percent of the event's full cost.

A hefty enough penalty can convince planners to conduct the event even with low attendance, said Robert LaFleur, an analyst with the Susquehanna Financial Group in Stamford, Conn.

"It might make more sense to pay the full amount and hold the event than to do nothing and still take a financial hit," he said.

But forcing clients into such a position can make them angry. So hotels like the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas are now offering clients the option of moving an event to a less busy season or applying whatever penalty they pay toward a future booking, said hotel executive Richard Harper.

"Every negotiation is with an eye toward future business with that customer," said Harper, the Mandalay Bay's vice president of sales and marketing. "So we'll be flexible. We're not going to turn our back on a customer just because of the economic downturn."

Most hotel companies declined to give specific numbers about the cancellations they're seeing or their bookings for the future.

"I'm sure you'll see a lot more of these new incentives," said Scholes, the analyst. "I would expect, since Omni and Marriott are offering these deals, the others are sure to follow."

Some hotels are offering savings by other means, such as modifying menus, which can cut costs substantially and is usually easy because food typically isn't purchased until just before an event.

"You can go with chicken instead of steak, not do an open bar, do a buffet instead of a served lunch," said LaFleur, the analyst. "You can knock 20 to 30 percent off the cost that way."

The industry's new flexibility may also be good for event planners looking to lock in favorable deals down the line. Katie Callahan-Giobbi, the chief business architect for Meeting Professionals International, a Dallas-based organization that represents event planners and conference venues, said planners looking at 2010 and beyond should be just as aggressive as those renegotiating events this year.

"The way things are going, I would get on the phone and start negotiating a deal right now," she said. "Everyone's in a mood to negotiate, whether for this year or 2012 or 2015."

The Associated Press March 26, 2009, 2:27PM ET

March 24, 2009 | Online Travel

Yapta.com, an online travel shopping service that monitors airline ticket pricing for travelers, today announced a new hotel price tracking services that for the first time will enable travelers to track and compare pricing on national and international hotel properties.

Unlike other opaque accommodation booking services such as Hotwire.com which do not allow consumers to see the specific hotel property they are bidding on, Yapta enables travelers to designate the hotel they’re most interested in and then sign up to be automatically alerted when the rate drops. Since launching its initial airfare tracking service in May 2007, Yapta has alerted over 600,000 travelers to more than $160 million in potential savings.

“Hotel rates are highly volatile and can fluctuate on a day to day basis. Unfortunately, this ‘black box’ of pricing information has remained obscured to travelers who have little idea of when or in which direction pricing changes will occur,” said Tom Romary, co-founder and CEO of Yapta.com. “By giving travelers a simple online tool by which to track hotel prices over time, they will have full price transparency and a much better understanding of what constitutes a good value. And with Yapta.com’s integrated alert system, they’ll be able to act quickly to secure the best rates on the hotel properties of their choosing.”

Yapta.com now provides consumers with an arsenal of fare and price tracking tools to ensure that they get the best deals on airfare and hotel rates. Some of the key features in the new hotel tracking service include:

- Daily Price Checks - Every day Yapta.com fetches the lowest published rate of a tracked hotel and creates a dynamic histogram that visually demonstrates the price of a given hotel property over time.

- Track and Compare Hotels - Yapta.com allows users to track as many hotels as they would like in order to compare prices between similar hotels.

- Customized Threshold & Target Alerts - Users can customize how often they are alerted to rate changes and set thresholds for these alerts (i.e., only alert if the price of a room drops by more than $20, etc.)

- Dynamic Filters - Users of the Yapta.com service can sort and search for hotels by several dynamic filters, including property rating (one thru five stars), price, amenities, and hotel brand.

“Given the choice between more or less information, travelers always want more information in order to make smarter decisions,” said Nancy Helms, director of sales and marketing for the Renaissance Seattle Hotel, a Marriott property. “We’re always looking for new ways to add value to the guest experience and believe that this new rate tracking service from Yapta.com will go a long way toward assuring travelers that they are getting the best deal on their hotel stay.”

Hotelmarketing.com

Think Box Ltd  présente

TOURISME – LE NOUVEAU BUSINESS MODEL

Séminaire animé par

Dr Gaëtane Gambier-Thurot, Directrice de la Recherche de l'ESCAET

Maurice se trouve loin de ses marchés émetteurs et la formation continue des professionnels du marketing du tourisme fait largement défaut. C'est ce constat qui a poussé Think Box Ltd à s'associer à l'ESCAET afin d'offrir des séminaires d'un niveau qualitatif extrêmement recherché et réservé jusque là à quelques privilégiés.

Le jeudi 23 avril 2009

Lieu:  Labourdonnais Waterfront Hotel, Port Louis
Heure: Enregistrement 08:30 Début 09:00 Fin 16h30
Coût: Rs 10,000 par délégué, TVA incluse

(comprenant également le déjeuner

et les pauses-cafés)

CIBLE
Tous les professionnels impliqués dans le management ou le marketing du tourisme  (hébergement, transporteurs, réceptifs, enseignants, ministère, e-commerce, etc).

OBJECTIFS
Le « business model » de l'industrie touristique est en constante mutation. Ses modes opératoires sont influencés, entre autres, par les avancées technologiques qui ouvrent de nouveaux axes de distribution et modifient  les comportements d'achat des consommateurs. C'est seulement en comprenant et en intégrant ces nouveaux vecteurs de croissance que la destination Maurice parviendra à s'adapter et à profiter des changements intervenant sur nos marchés. L'objectif principal de ce séminaire est de situer les nouveaux enjeux d'un business model en pleine mutation.

QUELQUES PRECISIONS
Dr Gaëtane Gambier-Thurot, 54 ans, titulaire d’une maîtrise de Sciences Economiques et d’un Doctorat en Economie du Tourisme, a occupé la fonction de Directrice des Etudes dès 1984, date de création de l’ESCAET par Jean Maurice Thurot. Depuis 2006, elle occupe la fonction stratégique de Directrice de la Recherche. C’est à la fois par des activités de consulting (mise en place de l’Observatoire du Tour Operating en France pour le CETO, Association des Tour Operators), par une analyse assidue des grandes mutations de l’Industrie du voyage qu’elle a  fortement contribué à l’ évolution des programmes de formation   d’abord dans le Leisure Travel, puis plus récemment dans le Corporate Travel (l’ESCAET, membre depuis 2004 de l’Association of Corporate Travel Executive, participe d’ailleurs depuis 2007 aux travaux de ACTE-France). Elle participe à la vie du réseau des professionnels du voyage qu’elle a formés.

L'Ecole Supérieure de Commerce et d'Administration des Entreprises du Tourisme (ESCAET) est le diplôme qui bénéficie de la plus grande notoriété auprès des professionnels du tourisme en France. C'est aussi celui qui obtient les meilleurs résultats en terme d'insertion professionnelle, face aux masters tourisme délivrés par les universités et aux ESC tourisme. Ce succès repose sur une coopération entreprise/formation originale, ambitieuse et créative dans le Management du Voyage. L'ESCAET est aussi le siège du plus important fonds documentaire mondial.

Réservez dès MAINTENANT, les places sont limitées

Pour plus d'informations veuillez contacter Vanessa Béchard   

E-mail: thinkbox@orange.mu

Tel: 697 38 19  Portable: 727 4006

Think Box Ltd: Rue des Talipots, Floréal.

Une demande a été déposée afin que ce séminaire soit homologué par le MQA pour faciliter le remboursement partiel des coûts de participation.

Avec la participation de AIR MAURITIUS

Après 15 ans à la direction commerciale d'hôtels de luxe et d'un groupe hôtelier (affaires et resorts), j'ai décidé de mettre en place ma propre structure de conseil en 2008. Mon expérience me permet donc d'offrir un service de conseil aux entreprises du tourisme, et plus généralement aux entreprises de service.

Spécialisée en marketing et communication, je fus la première personne à l'île Maurice à utiliser l'email comme outil marketing. C'est le flagrant manque de compétences dans le domaine de web marketing, de l'emailing, et du référencement qui m'a poussé à effectuer mes propres recherches. De nos jours, une véritable stratégie marketing ne peut se permettre de faire l'impasse sur les nouveaux modes de consommation, ni d'ignorer les dernières tendances en terme de communication.

C'est donc ici une partie du fruit de mes recherches que je mets à votre disposition. J'espère que les informations que vous y trouverez vous seront aussi utiles qu'elles me le sont. 

Think Box a pour vocation d'offrir des services complets permettant d'optimiser la performance de ses clients par le biais d'une stratégie marketing et communication 
Basée à l'île Maurice, mes clients sont essentiellement des sociétés de services opérant dans la zone océan Indien (Maurice, Seychelles, Réunion, Madagascar), l'Afrique australe et le Moyen Orient (Dubai, Oman, Qatar). Mon parcours professionnel dans l'industrie du tourisme de luxe me permet d'offrir une véritable valeur ajoutée aux entreprises de ce secteur.
N'hésitez pas à me contacter si vous avez besoin de conseil ou si avez une mission spécifique.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Baltimore Business Journal

The travel agency industry, seeing a steep drop in leisure and corporate travel, is hurting badly in the recession. It’s the latest blow to an industry that has struggled for the past decade to hold onto sales. The erosion has been caused by people booking their own travel online, a resort and cruise industry that often deals directly with travelers, and the lingering effects of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

To make things worse, cruise operators, resorts, hotels and airlines are offering bigger discounts to woo travelers. Agents, who make commissions based on the price of the trip, are earning less and scrambling to book more trips.

“Firms are having to adjust quickly to survive,” said Scott Koepf, president of the National Association for Career Travel Agents.

He said the industry may see more consolidation and more firms going from salaried employees to home-based agents working on commission.

Sales at Liberty Travel, a New Jersey-based travel agency, dropped by nearly 20 percent to 25 percent late last year. To cope with a slowdown in leisure travel, the firm closed offices in downtown Baltimore, Lutherville, Gaithersburg and Laurel and laid off 18 travel agents in the area. The cuts were part of a companywide layoff of more than 100 travel agents and closure of 31 offices.

“The economy forced our hand, and we had to make tough decisions,” said Sue Brennan, director of human resources for Liberty Travel.

Safe Harbors Travel Agency, an Owings Mills firm that books corporate travel, was quick to make changes to survive the slowdown in business travel.

Businesses canceled some out-of-town trips late last year and slashed travel budgets, said Jay Ellenby, president of the firm. Some clients even told Ellenby not to expect their business again until 2010.

Safe Harbors’ sales were down nearly 18 percent for the first few months of the year. The firm has laid off three of its 27 travel agents between. It also moved out of Canton and into cheaper space in Owings Mills last year.

Still, Ellenby said he is optimistic the company can weather the bad economy.