SEO Job Interview Questions Part 1

Now I am going to share some most common SEO question and answer which helps you for getting excellent response in interview. 

SEO Job Interview Questions by tricksway


·         What is a Search Engine?

A search engine enables the user to search for specific answers, news, or details by way of the World Wide Web.

·         What are Meta Tags?

HTML Meta tags are snippets of HTML code that are inserted in a web page’s header, and come after the title tag. The title tag itself is one of the essential components used in obtaining a high ranking in the SERPs. That’s because the words of the title tag are shown on the clickable links of the SERPs.

·         Why is a Robots.txt File Used?

A Robts.txt File is used to prevent the indexing of duplicate content on a website or for implementing a no follow rule in an area of a website.

·         What are some of the Tools Used for Researching Keywords?

Searching for keywords for purposes of SEO can be a meticulous undertaking, especially if you want to choose the most relevant keywords for your campaign. Before using the tools available online, you’ll need to consider some of the elements that are factored into keyword research, such as the count, synonyms, and the competition.

The Google AdWords Keyword Tool not only is helpful for ad campaigns, it also assists you in recognizing keywords that can be used for SEO too. This tool provides research tools, such as Google Insight, an amenity that allows you to make comparisons of keywords with respect to date, category, and region.

·         Title Tag SEO Importance?

Title tags influence your SEO initiatives, so they are considered highly important in how well your web site does in the search engine rankings. Title tags show up in search engine result listings and play a key role in how your web site is received. In fact, title tags are as important to your site’s popularity as are the links directed to your web pages and the content on your site. While SEO professionals understand title tag seo importance, this key factor is often bypassed by owners of websites when they are trying to optimize their sites.

·         What is Cloaking SEO?

Cloaking is a method used by experts who practice black hat SEO to fool the search engines. In other words, the search engines are shown one kind of version of a website while the users visiting the site do not see the same page. This type of practice was more prevalent around ten years ago when Google’s filters were not as adept at catching the offenders. Typically, cloaking was used when a web page was not ranking all that high. Therefore, another page was developed for the bots to crawl.

Fortunately, anyone who wants to practice cloaking today will usually get caught, which really would not be worth it, considering that most pages can obtain a ranking even when less popular keywords are used. Plus, Google is well aware of the practice, so to take the chance of getting banned by using this approach would be unconscionable if not foolish.

·         Domain Extensions – Do They Matter in SEO Ranking?

Contrary to popular belief, domain extensions do not affect a website’s ranking for purposes of SEO. The one exception to this rule are extensions that include country codes when they are used in other countries. For example, if your domain includes .us, that extension will not rank so well in countries outside the United States., which could possibly be the reason there are an excess number of .us domains available.

If you are choosing a domain extension then, do so for reasons besides SEO. Instead, you want to focus on inserting your primary keyword in the domain name.

·         What is your favorite aspect of SEO?

If you answer the interviewer that Link building is your favorite part in SEO, the interviewer would have made up 75% of his mind to recruit you  . But the reality is for most people it isn’t, as Link Building is one of the most difficult aspect of SEO.

For most SEO’s who are also good Content Writers, Writing Unique Content would be their favourite part.

For others it could be one or more of the following;

1.   On-Page Optimization

2.   Off-Page Optimization

3.   Keyword Research

4.   Forums Posting

5.   Article Writing

6.   Blog Posting

7.   Classified Posting

8.   Link Exchange

9.   Social Bookmarking

10.Blog Commenting

11.Press Release (PR) Submission

12.Whatever be your favorite aspect, it is the feeling of accomplishment and the money which is why an SEO does what he does best.

·         What is the most difficult aspect of SEO for you?

If you ask me “What part of SEO process is most difficult?”, I would say – Off-Page Optimization. Now thats a very broad topic in itself in SEO. If you ask me “What Part of the Off-Page SEO Process is Hardest for You?”, It is Link Building for me.

Acquisition of Quality Inbound Links / Generating Quality Back Links is one of the toughest parts of SEO Process most SEO Experts face today. Here I am talking Quality and not Quantity. If its not done properly your site can even get penalized.

When I interviewed a couple of SEO Guys asking them this question, some told me “Keyword Research”!!! I wonder why because that’s one of the most interesting steps in your campaign when you are actually learning what your client’s site is all about.

·         What has been your Biggest Mistake in Optimizing a Website for Search Engines?

1.   Acquiring Low Quality Back links too fast

2.   Link Building with the Same Anchor Text

3.   Wrong Keyword Selection

4.   Competing only on High Competitive Keywords

5.   Keyword Stuffing on Web-pages

6.   Over Optimization of web site

·         Do you have a Sample SEO Campaign Plan?

To begin with I perform the keyword analysis, which is the hardest and most critical step of any SEO Campaigns. This is nothing but choosing the right keywords/phrases (relevant keywords) for a particular website for which you desire SERP’s. There are several tools that can help you with your keyword research, but my personal recommendation is Wordtracker. If you are looking for a free tool, I recommend the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. These tools give you search volumes and assist with helping you see what the competition is targeting on their website and which are the most popular phrases relative to your business. Further competitive analysis of related sites can help you determine what keywords are highly used.

Secondly, I perform a website review and make a list of non seo friendly elements that are present in the existing site such as

1.   Missing Title / Description / Keywords Tags.

2.   Broken Links

3.   Flash Content

4.   Pop-up ads

5.   Less content in a page

6.   Excessive use of JavaScript

7.   Optimized Doorway pages or Automatic Generated pages using tools like WebPosition Gold

·         How to Increase Google Page Rank?

If you are looking to increase your Google Page Rank, you need to do Quality link building. Quality Link Building is nothing but building quality dofollow back links from higher PR sources, especially from those niche relative authority sources.

Having your link on those websites which have more PR than yours would do good, but PR gets divided among the number of links over there. So look outfor those websites which are having a Good Google PR and less outbound links (both internal and external).

Some ways that you can get good Quality Links are

1.   Article submission

2.   Blog Commenting (Do Follow Blogs)

3.   Forum posting

4.   Classified ads

5.   Press releases

6.   Link Exchange to relevant sites

7.   Social bookmarking (Sites like HubPage & squidoo are popular)

·         What SEO tools do you regularly use?

I primarily use Google Analytics. Apart from that some of the tools that I use are;

1.   Keyword Analysis Tools / Keyword Research Tools    (DP keyword suggestion tool & Google Keyword Suggestion Tool are popular)

2.   Keyword Density Tools

3.   Index Checking

4.   Backlink Checking

5.   HTML validation Tools    (W3C HTML Validation Service – validator.w3.org/ )

6.   Google Pagerank CHecker    (Google Toolbar)

7.   Google Webmasters Tool (along with Yahoo Webmasters Tool)

8.   XML Sitemap Generator

9.   Search Engine Submitters (IBP is good)

If you have a limited budget, Google webmaster tools, Google Analytics and SEO for Firefox should be sufficient. If you are using a CMS like WordPress, they come with a whole lot of SEO Plugins that are completely Free.

·         What is the difference between SEO and SEM?

SEO is Search Engine Optimization and is the process you use in getting better search engine ranking results for your pages. Typical SEO activities may include optimising the HTML and other content of your website for relevant, targeted key phrases in order to attain higher organic listings than competing websites.

SEM is Search Engine Marketing and involves purchasing advertising space on search engine result pages like Sponsored listings (that you see at the top in a Google Search Engine Results Page). You generally use SEM via Paid Inclusion into a search engine/directory, Traditional Ads on SERP’s and via Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising (Google Adwords, Yahoo Ad Campaign etc).

Both are related in a way that both work towards increasing traffic to your site. Nevertheless, SEO must be your first step in promoting your site as Good SEO would avoid you to spend additional money on advertising and paid placement.                                       - Source Internet

Himanshu is a young engineer living in India. Currently working at Cognizant as a Senior Engineer. He is an ethical hacker & blogger too, doing lots of crazy stuff... If you seem interesting, go through his portfolio: www.himstar.info : "Open Source. Millions of open minds can't be wrong!

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