Roles we recruit
Seven practices, 27 functions. Start at the practice when you cannot yet name the title; go straight to the function when you can.
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An SEO strategist decides which searches your business should win and in what order: search demand, content architecture, competitive gaps and a plan tied to your buyers. Audits are easy to produce and priorities are not, so we screen for a plan they ran, searches they chose to skip and traffic they tied to pipeline.
Search results lag the work, so the first quarter is judged on decisions: which searches matter, in what order, and whether the team agrees. Each stage below has a signal that predicts it, and we test for that signal before you meet anyone.
The ramp, and the test behind each milestone
Weeks 1 and 2
Search Console, analytics and rank data: which searches buyers use, where the site stands on each, what competitors own and which pages already produce leads.
On track looks like a short brief naming the searches that matter most to pipeline, where the site stands on each and who owns the rest.
How we test for it before you meet them
A live exercise in our screen: twenty minutes on a sample keyword set and Search Console data. We score which searches they would go after first and what they would ignore.
Weeks 3 to 6
Topics grouped by buyer problem and stage, the intent behind each, the type of page needed and the gaps competitors leave, agreed with sales and the content lead.
On track looks like a topic map with intent and priority for each topic, agreed with the head of content and sales.
How we test for it before you meet them
We ask for a topic map they built and the traffic and leads it produced over the next year. A former head of marketing confirms it.
Weeks 7 to 10
What to build, refresh or merge first, with expected impact, effort, an owner and a date for each, and a plain list of what is not on it.
On track looks like a two-quarter roadmap with owners, dates and a stop list, signed off by the people who will deliver it.
How we test for it before you meet them
We read a roadmap they wrote and ask what they left off and why. A strong one names searches it chose not to chase.
Weeks 11 to 13
Decisions on hubs, internal links and URL structure, briefs for the first pieces and a clear handoff to the specialist and the writers who will build them.
On track looks like the first topic cluster live, built from the strategist's briefs and linked into the site structure.
How we test for it before you meet them
We read a brief and a structure note they wrote. A strong one explains why the pages sit where they do and how a reader moves between them.
After day 90
A quarterly report on clicks, leads and pipeline by topic, the plan revisited on the evidence, and coverage of AI answers added to the questions the plan tracks.
On track looks like a quarterly report showing which topics earned leads and pipeline, and what the plan changes next.
How we test for it before you meet them
We ask how they would judge the plan after a year. A specific answer built on leads and pipeline by topic predicts a strategist who earns trust beyond rankings.
Five responsibilities. If the seat mainly does the hands-on page work, it is an SEO specialist; if it mainly fixes crawling, indexing and speed, it is a technical SEO specialist.
Which searches buyers use, how much demand each has and how well the site and its competitors serve it.
How topics group into hubs, which page answers which search and how the pages link.
Where competitors rank and the searches they ignore, and which of them are worth contesting.
What to build, refresh or merge first, with impact, effort, owners and a list of what not to do.
Reporting by topic on clicks, leads and pipeline, and the quarterly decision on what changes.
Three neighboring seats absorb work people assume belongs here. Drawing the line wrong is how a strategy hire ends up fixing title tags or planning content for channels beyond search.
That seat ownsThe hands-on work: keyword research, on-page fixes, internal links, briefs and reporting.
Hire it instead whenthe plan exists and the gap is doing the work page by page.
That seat ownsCrawling, indexation, rendering, site speed, structured data and migrations.
Hire it instead whenthe plan is sound and the site itself stops pages from ranking.
That seat ownsWhat gets written and why across every channel, not only search: audience research, formats and the plan.
Hire it instead whenthe question is what content to make across channels, beyond what ranks.
The title stays the same; the site does not. Pick the one that matches your situation.
Owns the search plan for one company’s site and works daily with content, product and developers.
Redesigns how a large site is organized: hubs, templates, internal links and URL structure.
Extends the plan to AI search: the questions buyers put to assistants, and which pages earn the citations.
The questions we ask in our own screen. Use them in yours; the warning signs are as useful as the answers.
Every candidate we put forward is scored on these five, and the scores travel with the shortlist, gaps included. Four out of five with a named weakness beats a clean sweep you cannot verify.
| What we score | Weak evidence | Strong evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Plans they built | Ranking screenshots with no plan behind them. | A plan with research behind it, and results by topic, including what did not work. |
| Prioritization | Chases the keywords with the highest volume. | Ranks by buyer intent, demand, difficulty and fit, and names what to ignore. |
| Content architecture | One article per keyword. | Hubs, answers and internal links that serve a long buying process. |
| Tying search to pipeline | Reports rankings and traffic. | Reports leads and pipeline by topic, confirmed by sales or marketing. |
| Fit with your site | Ecommerce or local SEO for a B2B content site, or the reverse. | Has planned search for a site like yours: your size, your buyers and your sales cycle. |
Public US benchmarks, read October 2026. Salary.com’s SEO strategist band sits below its SEO specialist band, and Built In has no page for the title, so the chart sets the strategist beside the neighboring seats. Price on scope: a strategist who owns the plan, the architecture and the reporting to leadership sits toward the upper end of the band, one who hands a roadmap to others nearer the lower end.
Each bar runs from the 25th to the 75th percentile, the middle half of reported pay.
Base salaryWages including commission (BLS)Median base salaryAverage total pay, base plus variable
SEO Strategist
Salary.com base benchmark
$72,625 to $90,363 base
SEO Specialist
Salary.com base benchmark, neighboring seat
$87,333 to $108,622 base
SEO Manager
Built In, self-reported, neighboring seat
$75,000 median base$89,385 average total
Marketing specialists
BLS, all industries, the marketing specialist category
$58,350 to $108,310
SEO Strategist and SEO Specialist bars: Salary.com base salary, 25th to 75th percentile, United States, as of October 1, 2026. SEO Manager dot and ring: Built In median base salary and average total compensation (base plus additional cash, self-reported), reviewed September 28, 2026. Marketing specialists: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, annual wage at the 25th and 75th percentiles (SOC 13-1161), all industries. Public aggregates, not ZaphyrRecruit placement data.
An SEO strategist decides which searches a business should win and in what order. They analyze search demand, group topics around buyer problems, decide how content and pages are structured, find the gaps competitors leave and build a roadmap with owners. They report results by topic in leads and pipeline, not only rankings, and revisit the plan each quarter.
Salary.com puts an SEO strategist at $72,625 to $90,363 base, with a median of $80,185 (October 2026). Its SEO specialist band runs higher, at $87,333 to $108,622, and Built In’s self-reported figures for an SEO manager are a $75,000 median base and $89,385 average total. Titles overlap, so price the seat on what it owns: the plan, the architecture and the reporting, or a roadmap handed to others.
An SEO strategist decides what the site should rank for and in what order: demand analysis, content architecture and the roadmap. An SEO specialist does the hands-on work: keyword research, on-page fixes, internal links, briefs and reporting. In small companies one person does both. If nobody has decided which searches to win, hire a strategist; if the plan exists, hire a specialist.
When you publish plenty and none of it compounds, when traffic grows and leads do not, when several teams create pages with no shared structure, or when an agency’s plan is followed by nobody. Before that, a strong SEO specialist with a clear owner may be enough. The signal is output rising while organic leads stay flat.
An agency suits a defined project, such as a strategy for a launch, a migration plan or a content gap study. In-house pays off when the plan has to be maintained: weekly decisions with content and developers, protecting priorities from every request and reporting results to leadership. Some teams keep an agency for technical depth and hire the strategist in-house. We recruit the in-house seat.
Give them a list of about 200 keywords and your Search Console data, and ask which ten they would go after first and which they would ignore. An hour is enough. It shows how they weigh buyer intent, demand and difficulty, which a case study hides. Then ask for a plan they built and what traffic and leads it produced.
Ten working days from a signed brief to a shortlist of three to five calibrated candidates, each with our keyword prioritization exercise scored and past plans checked with a former marketing leader. Interview speed decides the rest: good SEO strategists rarely run one process at a time, so a decision within two weeks of the first interview keeps them.
Tell us about the site, what you publish and which searches should be bringing leads. We come back within one business day with how we would run the search and what the seat pays.
We build shortlists from people doing this work now, often before a seat is advertised. Set up a job alert for SEO roles, or send your CV and we will come to you when a seat opens.
The SEO strategist is one of ten seats in this function. If the gap sits elsewhere, start there.