List of Common SEO Tasks and Responsibilities

Couple friends of mine had a clear understanding what can be achieved online with SEO, but could not figure out how to do it. What are the most common tasks and the responsibilities such a job entails? As you know, Search Engine Optimization is the ongoing effort of optimizing a website’s on-page and off-page aspects so that it attracts more organic traffic. I’m listing below the 5 main tasks which any SEO expert will do on a regular basis.

SEO Task 1 – Keyword research (fine-tuning or finding new areas of opportunities)

How to do keyword research?

• Brainstorming sessions
• Analyze at your own website’s traffic sources and webmaster tools
• Use various online tools such as Google’s Search-based Keyword Tool
• Check what key phrases are bringing traffic to your competitors
• Estimating competition for same keywords on search engines
• Create lists of key phrases you intend to target

SEO Task 2 – On-site optimization (helping search engines to find all content correctly)

How to do on-page optimization?

• Check validation of the website’s code as per W3C standards
• Optimize HTML page titles, meta tags and content
• Enhance the internal linking structure
• Sort all canonicalization issues
• Create robots.txt and sitemap.xml

SEO Task 3 – Building online authority (gaining quality incoming links)

How to build online authority?

• Search engine submissions
• DMOZ, Yahoo and other directory submissions
• Optimize press releases
• Post content on 3rd party websites
• Contribute in your niche’s blogging community
• Contact people who might be interested in recommending your website
• Promotion of exceptional content for linkbaiting

SEO Task 4 – Monitoring industry changes (keeping up-to-date with algo changes)

How to monitor industry changes?

• Participate in specialized SEO forums and online communities
• Follow and communicate with the most popular SEO experts
• Testing various SEO ideas and monitoring performance

SEO Task 5 – Maintenance and reporting (for successful long-term benefits)

What are the most common SEO reports?

• Tracking number of indexed pages and incoming links for your website
• Keyword ranking reports to monitor position on search engines
• Daily, weekly and monthly organic traffic reports
• Reporting spam in search results to search engines

The above tips are not a complete list of all SEO tasks and responsibilities, but am sure it gives a clear picture of the effort involved.