How many people made a resolution to find a new job this New Year? Deciding to leave your current employer is not an uncommon decision to make, particulary after Christmas. Today I thought I’d share some experiences I’ve had in the past on becoming an in-house SEO. What are the differences between working in-house compared to “agency side” and how could making the change impact the way you work and the SEO that you do?

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Much of my time in the past month has been consumed by an SEO recruitment campaign we’ve been running in the US and UK for a major client. In that time, I’ve had the opportunity to really think about my relationships with the recruitment agencies I’ve been working with and review how their selection process has helped or hindered our efforts. I’d like to share some pointers based on an ideal initial recruitment process to filter the best SEO’s and make finding your SEO Management rock star a painless process.
In this post, we’re going to be looking at what steps should be happening before the interview…
During Q&A on day one of the SEOmoz Pro Training Seminar, I was asked “What makes for a good SEO Manager?” by one of the attendees. Good question. While researching this post, I found it surprising that there’s a near total lack of content on the subject of SEO Management that I could find. Awesome, I thought. Here’s to writing in an under-served niche, and hopefully creating a useful blog post.

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![Linkbuilding tool tips The In-House SEO Agency Cycle [In House Tips]](http://seogadget.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/lego-blocks.gif)
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One of the toughest challenges for an in-house SEO, especially in a large organisation, is keeping a company wide awareness of existing SEO campaigns and communicating the need to respect SEO requirements throughout the web development, product and content lifecycle. Occasionally, we even struggle to convince cynical business owners to get started in a programme of Search Marketing.
I noted a comment made by an (ex) employee of American Airlines about the sheer complexity and number of stakeholders making changes to the website while reading this post on Econsultancy:

The SEOmoz / Distilled Pro Seminar was, without a doubt, a hugely successful event. While the attendees eagerly await the publication of the DVD, I thought I’d provide a bit more background on some of the slides covering organisational SEO.
Planning Your SEO Activity for 2010
One of the key points I made at the conference was have a plan. By first listing your objectives, and making them compatible with the commercial metrics that drive your business, it’s far easier to construct a case to justify additional resource or agency support. In short, you’re creating a commercially driven SEO strategy, beyond simple traffic and conversion metrics. This post covers the primary stage of making your commercial SEO plan.

Putting together a team of the right people for great SEO is just one step towards reaching organisational SEO nirvana. In my post at Blogstorm I covered the concept of how great SEO starts with the right people, and what qualities you’re looking out for during your recruiting process. This post takes a step back and discusses the organisational layout of your team.
Design an SEO team before you start recruiting
Recruiting a top flight SEO can be a daunting challenge for the inexperienced recruiter. This post examines what you may need to consider along the way, how you need to be prepared before placing an advertisement and what to ask in an interview to make sure you’ve got the right candidate for the job.
1) Create your job specification and job advertisement
Badenoch and Clark sum it up quite nicely in their “How to write a job specification” guide: