We recently hosted SEO veteran Helen Pollitt in our WTS Community Slack for an Ask Me Anything (AMA).

Helen has almost 20 years of experience in digital marketing and has been hiring and managing staff for over a decade.

For an hour, Helen answered our questions about how to “ace your next SEO interview”.

Having interviewed somewhere in excess of 100 people during her career, and experiencing interviews ranging from truly great to sadly underwhelming, she is keen to help others understand how they can show off their best selves during all steps of the hiring process.

Let’s dive in with some of the Q&A...

Moving to a new role type

"How can someone moving from content marketing to SEO show their value during an interview?"

Come to the interviews prepared with examples of projects that you've been involved in.

Consider the "STAR" method of interview answers which will help you structure your examples well:

• Situation - context and goal, keep it brief
• Task - Your responsibility in the situation
• Action - Steps you took to complete the task
• Result - Outcome of your actions

What I like to do before interviews is think of an example of lots of different types of SEO activity that I know is listed in the job description and they may want evidence of.

So for a tech interview I might think of examples when I've:

• Carried out a website migration
• Debugged an issue with a deployment
• Run an SEO audit and found issues that I then fixed

This way I'm armed with some examples that the interviewer is likely to ask about.

"My experience is in local SEO for home services. I want an SEO role in B2B or Ecommerce. I’m often rejected due to lack of experience. How can I get experience to break into a new niche?"

You could approach this in a couple of ways:

1. Volunteer
Look to get experience by volunteering your time and expertise to a small business, perhaps in exchange for using them as a reference.

2. Freelance
Offer freelance services to B2B/Ecommerce businesses to build up some experience.

3. Complimentary skills
Talk on your CV and during your interviews about the skills you have that lend themselves to Ecommerce and B2B SEO.

For example, Ecommerce sites often have trouble with tech SEO issues and tracking issues (in my experience!). So you could specifically call out your experience in these areas during the interview.

4. Say it out loud
Also consider asking the interviewer "do you feel I'm lacking experience in any area of SEO that you feel is important for this role?" That gives you the opportunity to address it directly in the interview .

"Applying for agency roles, I fear I lack experience in a wide range of industries. How can I approach this?"

I think the best way to approach this is to talk about the projects that you have worked on. This way you are showcasing your skills and experience.

As a hiring manager I'm less concerned about where someone has worked, but more what sort of work they've done.

A lot of SEO is transferable between industries.

Hopefully your interviewers will be asking questions about your skills and how you've applied them, rather than the range of industries you've worked in.

Arm yourself with 10 or so examples of projects that you've worked on that cover different areas of SEO.

This way you will have examples at hand to address any questions where interviewers want to know about your experience.

If they ask you something like "do you have experience in X industry?" and you don't, you can always then say "no, I don't have direct experience in X industry, but my understanding is that X industry requires a lot of local SEO to be successful and I've had a lot of local SEO experience as a result of project Y I worked on last year..."

Changes in the hiring market

"Are you noticing a shift in the market? It feels like 6 years ago companies struggled to hire marketers and now job openings get 200+ applications."

Am I noticing a shift in the market - great question. Yes and no.

There's a definite shift in application numbers but I see this happen in waves all the time.

During 2020-2021 companies were crying out for SEOs and digital marketers - so it was a very pro-candidate market.

But since then it seemed to right itself for a bit, and then go more towards a pro-employer market.

However, in amongst this there are times when the market is saturated with candidates (after the summer holidays and winter school holidays in the UK!) and other times when it's difficult to find good candidates.

Yes, there will be a lot of applications for roles at the moment, but in my experience something like 75% of them are instant rejections - due to location (can't employ people in that locale), obvious lack of experience (no SEO experience but applying for a senior SEO role) etc.

So don't be disheartened if you are applying for roles at the moment, just make sure your CV reflects how awesome and skilled you are.

Outside of the interview

"When it comes to preparing a response to an interview task, what are they actually looking for? How much detail is too much detail?"

I'll try to stop this turning into a rant about interview tasks because in general I'm very anti any interview tasks which require candidates to do a lot of work outside of the interview (I favour tasks that are set and completed during the interview itself so there's no homework).

Rant aside, I honestly think the best way to carry out an interview task is to ask what the parameters and output expectations are. So for example:

• Do they expect you to gather data or will they provide it?
• Do they want it to be a genuine reflection of what they expect you to do in the job, or is it more "if tools, resources were unlimited, this is what I'd do"?
• How long would they imagine a candidate should take to complete this?
• Output format - a presentation, guide, etc?
• Any word / page / slide limits?

Once you know this you can start to decide how much time and effort you want to put into the task.

Sometimes the tasks are outrageous and I've been in the (very fortunate) position to turn down interviews because I felt they were taking the mickey with the volume of unpaid work they wanted from me (but that's another rant!).

Always remember, even if they set you a time guide on how long it should take, another candidate may decide to go above and beyond on the task and really shine during it. It's up to you to decide if you want that person to be you or not. Usually I factor in how much I want the job when deciding that!

In my experience these tasks are designed to understand how a candidate would approach a situation that is similar to what they'd face in the actually role. So when I ask candidates to carry out an assessment it's so I can get an idea of how they think - what is their process, and how do they deal with being questioned on it.

Dealing with difficult interview questions

"What is the best way to respond to a critique like, “but you haven't led SEO inside a company like ours," without sounding defensive or insecure?"

Leave the interview, they sound rude!

No, not really, but if someone does say something like that and it's not in an encouraging or genuine manner, then I'd reconsider if I wanted to work with them!

But if it's a genuine question I'd ask them what they feel makes their company particularly unique or difficult and then I'd give examples of how I've dealt with those situations in the past.

"How do you discuss your successes when public data for your website (rankings, estimated traffic, etc) makes your SEO look ineffective?"

I would gently remind the interviewer that publicly available data only tells a small part of the story. For example, the most important measure of our success is revenue and they won't be able to get that info from a rankings report!

Talk to them about the metrics that you're proud of. What are the personal successes that you've had in the role? Things like:

• Getting a project across the line
• Managing difficult stakeholders
• Championing creation of a new sub-folder that generated X% uplift in revenue

Yes, your overall website visibility might not look great but any interviewer worth their salt knows that publicly available visibility data doesn't even scratch the surface of how well an SEO project has gone.

Talking about your work history

"If someone’s been in a role less than a year, is it a red flag if they’re already job hunting?"

Not a red flag for me personally, I may want to know why they chose to leave with short tenure though, but I know the industry well enough to know that redundancies happen, bad managers happen, life stuff happens and sometimes that means you don't get to stay at a job as long as you'd like to.

Just be ready to give a truthful but positive answer if asked why you weren't there very long.

"Is it okay to say you were laid off due to company finances, or better not to mention it?"

I think it's fine to talk about why you had to leave due to the company experiencing financial difficulties.

It's absolutely not your fault that they did, and it's a very common and understandable reason why someone would have to leave a job.

"With little SEO experience, what makes a CV stand out and makes you think, “Ah, this candidate has potential!”?"

If I knew a candidate was looking to break into the SEO industry I would look for examples on their CV to demonstrate their understanding of what SEO is (many people think they know, but don't understand the breadth of SEO) and if they have applied that understanding ever.

So for example, perhaps they have some certificates to show they've completed the Google Analytics test, or some "intro to SEO" type courses. Essentially evidence they had an interest in SEO before stumbling across my job ad!

Also, I like to hire people who show passion, and ability outside of just SEO.

So perhaps talk about projects that you've worked on that demonstrate transferable skills, not necessarily just SEO skills. Perhaps you've organised an event, or had a job as a teaching assistant - when I'm hiring for early career roles I'm looking more at the person and their ability to learn/be taught and their interest in SEO, rather than their experience in it.

"How can I frame my SEO consulting and teaching experience in interviews so it is seen as leadership, not just execution?"

Say it!

If you have taught then you have been a leader in your classroom - you've designed curriculum, created materials, assessed the individuals in your classroom to identify skills and knowledge gaps.

You will have dealt with tricky HR situations (late homework, poor performance etc) all things that leaders in businesses have to do.

So just have a look at a job description of a leadership role and fit your classroom experience to the skills listed.

Same for consulting - you will have been liaising with senior stakeholders, making executive decisions etc, which are all very valuable skills for leaders.

"When discussing past projects, how do I strike the right balance between technical/tactical details and high-level strategy?"

This very much depends on the role.

Sometimes the job description doesn't give you many clues, so early on in the interview I'll ask the interviewer if they see this more as a strategic or hands-on role. Then I focus my answers more on the one they say, but also showing I can still do the other one (everyone says they want someone strategic who can still do the work, in my experience!).

Showcasing your abilities

"What do you think are the most important skills to highlight on your resume or in interviews?"

I think this comes down to tailoring your CV to the job you are applying for.

So have a look at the job description, maybe run it through ChatGPT and ask what the key required skills are, and then make sure to show those on your CV. Even if you are literally just listing them as keywords on your CV (that helps with those automated CV software thingies).

KPIs or stats are always good to include on your CV if you can. It helps to demonstrate the level to which you have achieved something.

"How can you show AI/ML learning on your CV without project experience?"

You could talk about the courses that you've taken, or perhaps how you are applying AI/ML in your workflow - even if it's not at work, but something you have done in your own time.

Outside of work experience is really valuable too, so don't forget to talk about that also!

When at interview you can talk about interesting articles you've read, or webinars you've participated in that focused on AI/ML. That way you are demonstrating your knowledge even if you haven't been able to apply it at work yet.

Don’t forget, there's always that question that is typically asked at the end of the interview; "do you have any questions?".

You can always use that to ask about how the company is using AI/ML and segue into your knowledge and understanding that way.

After the interview

"How can I push for constructive feedback after “you were great, but no”?"

Most companies will have some sort of recruitment software where interviews are meant to note down their thoughts on the candidate.

So really, it should be possible for recruiters to give you more feedback than just "we went with someone else" but typically they don't share that unless you ask directly.

So my best advice is to ask targeted questions, like:

• Were there any key skills I didn't demonstrate?
• Was there any particular gap in my experience you were concerned about?

"What is something a candidate did that impressed you?"

I've had some really wonderful interview experiences. One that stood out was when the candidate - who I'd already decided to hire because their interview was amazing - messaged me on LinkedIn with some further information that answered one of the interview questions.

It made me chuckle because they were so amazing and thorough in the interview that their follow-up just showed me how diligent a colleague they would be!

For the employers

"How can we encourage applicants to not use AI in their application responses? We'd love to hear from THEM."

I very much see the benefit of using AI to help deconstruct and understand a job description, or to compare your CV with the skills listed in the advert.

But when candidates use AI to write their CV entirely or their cover letter, it's very obvious!

It can be quite off-putting for employers to see that answers are entirely AI written as it makes us think "what are they hiding?".

And if writing ability is critical to the role then not demonstrating your ability and instead using AI will hamper your efforts to get the role. Plus you lose your unique voice when you use AI to write for you.

Interviews and hiring are all about looking for the right fit. If you are applying for a role you want to make sure it's the right fit for you too. It's hard to determine that if you aren't being your authentic self, and relying too much on AI to present yourself.

I'd maybe consider putting it in the job advert "we want to hear from you in your authentic voice so we discourage the overuse of AI within your written answers" or something similar.

Parting words from Helen

Interviews can be a stressful, confusing and time-intensive part of job-hunting.

The best way to alleviate that is to really understand what the role is and what is expected of you during the interview process.

Don’t be afraid to ask questions. You won’t look foolish, you’ll seem engaged.

This way, you give yourself the best opportunity to be prepared for whatever comes your way during the hiring process, but also, it helps you figure out if this is the job you truly want.

Don’t forget this classic “the interview is as much about them deciding if you’re right for the role, as it is about you deciding if the role is right for you”.