SEO Interview Questions and Answers -Adesh Saxena

SEO Interview Questions
Search engine optimizationis a fast growing field ininternet marketing. Most fortune 500 companies have alreadyadoptedSEO despite their
strong brandingand overwhelminglylarge mediaspends on TV.
With increase inlarge companyspends onsocial andsearch marketing, SEO jobs are onthe rise. Whether you want to work as a SEO consultant or
a corporate employee, these SEO interviewquestions will helpyou bag a client or get a job.
Popular SEO Interview Questions and Answers
Q1: What’s your SEO experience?
When you are asked this question, if youare a fresher, you must answer the theoreticalknowledge you have. Saythat youknow about keyword
research, onpage andoffpage SEO, link building best practices andso onfrom a theoretical point of view.
If you are experienced, tell them the projects you have workedon, some of the rankings youhave achievedandthe time you to ok to accomplish
this. It also helps to talkabout technical aspects ofSEO you have handledas well.
Q2: What do you think about the latest algorithm update from Google?
You must follow industryblogs andbe updatedabout the SEO trends. Sowhenyou are askedabout the latest algorithm update, you shouldtalk
about your views onwhat kindof sites/search queries got affected, how it compares to the previous update which wasrolled out andso on.
Here is a scenario. Assume the latest update rolledout wasthe Penguin update andthe one before that was panda. You couldsaythat Penguin
update wasmostly targeted at lowqualitycontent andnot about links as the Panda update was. It hit heavilyon content farms and thin content
pages.
Q3: Are you technicallysavvy?
Not manySEO interviews focus onyour technical skills. But those who reallyknow what SEO is all about will reallyput your technical skills totest.
Most of the time, you’llhave to dig deepintoa site code to findissues. If youare not at all technicallyinclined, doing SEO might be quite
challenging. No matter howmanytools you purchase, you still needsome basic level of technicalknowledge to succeed inSEO.
Q4: Do you take onfreelance projects?
There are two things that an interviewer canfindout from the answer you give.
If you take freelance projects, it means you are a go getter and that you are comfortable withinteractingwithclients anddoingbusiness
development. Thisis a huge plus for anyemployee.
On the other hand, freelance consultants have a tendencyto get clients for themselves instead ofthe companyif it’s a service company.
If you are going to work in a companyand their policystates that youshouldnot take on other projects, you shouldn’t doit. It’s not onlyunethical;
you could also lose your joband face prosecution for violating employment agreement.
Even if your companyallows you to take freelance project on the side, it’s suggestedthat you don’t doit. Insteadchannel that leadto your
employer. Not onlyare youshowing commitment inyour current role, but you are alsocontributing to the growth ofthe companythat is paying
your bills.
Q5: Do you use anySEO tools?
If you have beenin the SEO industryfor some time, you’dhave come across manytools. Ifyou have usedtools like SEOmoz, bu zz stream,
Wordtracker, Googlekeywordtool or anyother tool, mention it.
The tools you used alsogives the employer anoverview ofwhat kindof workandprojects youhave been associatedwith. If yo usayyou are good
at SEOmoz tools, then the employer willknow that youare a professional because it’s a paid tool and not manyamateurs can affordit.
Q6: Mentionsome SEO myths you knowandwhat the actual facts are
This questionhelps the interviewer understand your knowledge ofSEO. Insteadof throwing some myths at you andtryingto mak e you answer, this
broad questionwill helpthem understandyour depthof knowledge. Here are some myths andanswers for reference

Meta descriptionis usedfor ranking- Meta descriptions are not usedfor rankings byGoogle and onlyusedas a short snippet of text whichusers
see alongwith searchresults
Google will always use mymeta-data-No. Google will not always use your meta title or meta description. Basedonthe query, Google may
change your meta data to suit the searchers query
More links the better- False. Evenone highqualityrelevant editorial links cantrump1 millionspamlinks you might get via blogcomments, forum
posting, site wide links andsoon(Not to mentionyour chance to get a penalty)
Q7: Which industryblogs andsitesdo youfollow?
This questionis askedso that the interviewer canjudge howwell you are updatedwiththe current SEO trends. Some ofthe good ones to follow
are
Searchengineland.com
SEOmoz.org
SEObook.com
Seo-theory.com
Distilled.net
Q8: Do you do black hat SEO?
If you do black hat SEO, admit it. If you don’t, tellthe interviewer whyyou do not follow suchpractices. If you are ready to stopblackhat andgo
completelywhite hat (which you shouldanyways), mentionthat as well.
Some of the reasons you donot want to use black hat are
Riskof getting penalty
Unethical
Not a longterm strategy
Q9: Can you tell me the difference betweenon page andoff page SEO?
On page SEO refers to all SEO activities done onthe website that needs to be ranked. Theyinclude
Meta optimization
Content creation
Internal linking
Fixing technical issues like page discovery, duplicate content, implementing canonical tags and soon
Optimizing usage ofkeywords
Off page refers to anyactivity we doto get links to point to our site. These mayinclude
Guest posting
Link outreach
Viral linkbuilding
Submissionto niche sites
PR outreach
Q10: What are your thoughts onbuying links, article marketing, article spinning, anddirectorysubmissions?
Buying links:Don’t doit. Not onlydoes it violate Google guidelines, it’s alsoa costlymethodwhich will backfire whencau ght.
Article marketing:Submittinghighqualityarticles to article directoriesto get traffic and some link juice is fine. However, withthe latest Google
updates, most article directories have beenrendereduseless from a linkacquisitionpoint of view. Submittingarticlesto 1000’s of article directories
is not a good idea.
Article spinning:It’s better to syndicate content rather thancreating spuncontent. Article spinningrarelyworks andmost ofthe spun content can
be easilydetected byadvanced algorithms Google employs.
Directorysubmissions:It was valuable maybe 4-5 years back. But now it’s worthless. Links from directories other thanmaybe dmoz.org, botw.com
etc is worthless.
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1- Tell me something about yourself?
Seo Job Interview Questions andHow to answer them
Seo Job Interview

(Image Source:- Voguemarieflickr )
You shouldbrief your interviewer about your family, your educationalbackgroundandyour workexperience.
2- What was the recent update whichGoogle had and what changeswouldyou suggest for it?
Google recentlyhadthe Penguinupdate which wasa measure to control webspam. Penguin update hadpenalized websiteswhichhada spammy
backlinking profile andreturnedmore semantic results. Semantic results were based onthe relationshipbetween words present onthe search
query. Penguintrusted sites that hadoriginal and goodcontent, freshcontent, goodsocial media presence andqualityorganic links.
3- What all verticals have you handledso far?
Verticals means onwhat themes of websiteshave youworkedso far- thismayinclude education, real estate, IT, travel, Shopping, jobs etc.
4- What do you understandbythe Panda update?
The Panda update wasdone to improve the qualityof search results inGoogle. Panda update alsoknown as the farmer update was done to
eliminate content farms whichprovidedless user friendly experience. It usedmachine language scalabilityas one ofthe important metrics for
judging relevancyof a webpage. All the focus wastransformedonthe user andnowqualitycontent , proper design, proper speed, proper use of
imagesandvideos, content to ad ratio all matteredmore after the Panda update. Youneedto optimize your site for better clickthrough rate anda
less bounce rate.
5- What is Google Sandbox?
Google Sandbox is animaginaryarea where new and lessauthoritative sites are kept for a specifiedtime perioduntil theyestablishthemselves of
being displayedonthe searchresults. It happens bybuilding toomanylinks withina short period oftime.
6- What is the difference between onpage seoandoff page seo?
On page seomeans optimizingyour website andmaking changes ontitle, meta tags, site structure, site content, solving canonicalizationproblem,
managing robots.txt etc.
Off page optimizationmeans optimizing your web presence which involves backlinkbuildingandsocial media promotion.
7- How will you solve canonicalization issue or what is .htacess file?
.htacess file is used to solve the canonicalizationissue of a website. It mayhappenthat the home page of the site maytake several urls like
http://www.example.com or http://www.example.com/index.html or http://example.com . The search engines might treat these url as different
and maydivide the linkjuice gainedbyhaving various backlinks made with anyof these 3 urls. The link juice gets dividedb etweenthese three urls
equally. .htacess file is created to have a single url of the home page sothat the link juice is passedonto single url.
8- What is keywordstemming?
Keyword stemmingis the process offinding out the root word fromthe search query. A queryhaving the word “ playful” wouldbe brokendownto
the word “play” with the helpof stemming algorithm. The search results returnedwouldbe having the word ” play” init.
9- What is LSI?
LSI stands for Latent Semantic Indexing. It is a data retrievaltechnique whichfinds connection betweenwords andthe use of synonyms while
fetching data from the index.
10- What do you knowabout the Florida update?
Florida update happenedonNovember 16th 2003. This update appliedstemming, maintainedlocalrank, penalizedover optimizedsitesby
applyingfilter etc. Inshort, it modifiedthe search results before presentingit to the user byapplyingfilters.
11- What are the limitations of title anddescriptiontags?
Title tagcanbe between66-70 characters and meta descriptiontagcanbe between160-170 characters.
12- Does Google useskeywordtags?
No, Google doesnot make use of keyword tags.

13- What is 301 redirect?
It is a methodof redirecting user from the oldpage url to the new page url. 301 redirect is a permanent redirect and is helpful inpassingthe link
juice fromthe old url to the newurl.
14- What was your exact job profile inyour previous company?
Provide a suitable explanationabout your job profile whichwouldinclude your job responsibilities and the amount ofwork youhave handledso
far.
15- What do youunderstandbyCloaking?
Cloakinginvolves usingdeceptive techniques whichpresents the user witha different version ofthe webpage than that presen tedto the search
engines.
16- What tools do youuse for doing seo?
I use Google webmaster tools, Google Analytics, Open site explorer, Alexa, Website grader etc.
See:- List offree seo tools
17- What are your goodqualities?
You will have to answer here about your goodqualitieslike- I am hardworking, sincere, punctual, love to accept challengesetc.
18- What is the difference betweenSeoand Sem?
Seo stands for SearchEngine Optimizationwhile Sem stands for Search Engine Marketing. Seoprovides organic traffic to a website withthe
helpof search engines while Sem involves the use of Google adwords andother paidchannelsof advertising.
19- What is PPC?
PPC stands for PayPer Click. It is a form ofadvertising methodologyin whichthe advertiser pays for everyclick ontheir ads. Google uses this
form of advertising in its channel of advertisingcalled Adwords.
20- Which is better Robots.txt or Meta Robots Tag?
Meta Robots tag is muchbetter as it helps in forcingthe search engine crawlers not to index anddisplaythe hiddenpages in your server.
21- Do you use separate Seo strategies for Google,YahooandBing?
Yes I use separate strategiesfor Google,Yahooandother search engines.More backlinks are requiredfor Google .It pays more attentionto
backlinks and site authoritywhile YahooandBing pays more attentionto title andMeta tags. Hence, a site takes time to rankon Google as
compared to YahooandBing.
22- How will youincrease the Pagerank ofa page?
Bybuilding more backlinks fromauthoritysites andhigh page rankwebpages.
23- How will youcheck the number of backlinks of your competitors site?
With the help ofthe linkoperator onGoogle andbyusing various external tools like Alexa, BacklinkWatch, OpenSite Explorer, Backlinkfinder
etc.
24- Which is more important-Buildingbacklinks to a website or buildinggreat content?
Both are important. Building great content is necessaryas it is your first steptowards ranking ;andbuilding backlinks helps to buildauthorityto
your website andis animportant metric for ranking well. Hence both shouldgo parallel and bothare e quallyimportant.
25- Who is Matt Cutts?
Matt Cutts is the headof Google's webspamteam.
26- If a website hasa searchengine saturationof 40% , what does that mean?

It means 40% of web pages fromthat particular website are indexedbythe searchengine.
27- What do youmean byanchor text?
Clickable text writtenon an hyperlink is known as anchor text. It is of great value to the searchenginesand is used for evaluating the relevance
of web pages withrespect to search queries.
28- How will youtreat Web standards while optimizinga website?
Google loves web standards hence I will applythe webstandards providedbyW3Cwhile optimizinga web site.
29- What methods wouldyou applyfor decreasing the loadingtime of a website?
I would use externalstyle sheets, less images(unlessnecessary), optimize the images anddecrease the file sizesof the image without reducing
the qualityof the image, use CSS sprites to reduce HTTPrequests etc.
30- Which tools doyou use for choosingkeywords?
I use Google Keyword tool, Wordtracker tool, Wordstream, Seo book keyword tool etc.
*Remember certain toolsare paidbut you may use the trialversionfor some days.
31- What blogs and sitesdo you regularlyvisit to update yourself?
I follow Matt Cutts blog. Seomoz blog, Seochat forums, Searchengineland.com,Seobook, Seosandwitch etc.
32- What are doorwaypages?
These are pagesthat are speciallycreatedto rankhighonsearchengines using deceptive techniques.Doorwaypages donot provide useful
content but insteadredirect users to the mainpage.
33- What are the Social Media channels youhave usedfor marketing?
I have usedblogs like blogger,wordpress,typepadetc, social bookmarking sites like Digg,Jumptags,Delicious etc., social networking sites like
Facebook,Linkedin etc., VideoSharing siteslike Youtube,Vimeoetc.
34- What wouldyou suggest to the client whohas a website made on Flash? How wouldyou doSeo for that site?
Search engines find it harder to parse the contents presentedusing Flash. I wouldsuggest the client to use analternative to flash like HTML 5.
35- What do youunderstandbyFramesinHTML?
A frame is a HTML technique which divides the content ofa page ontoseveralparts. Search engines see Frames as completelyd ifferent pages
and as such Frames have a negative impact on Seo. We shouldavoidthe usage ofFrames and usebasic HTML instead.
36- Which is the popular searchengine in Russia?
Yandex is popular inRussia.
37- If the meta robots tag has a value of "no index, nofollow"what does it mean?
It means the searchengine crawlers wouldnot index the contents andwouldnot follow the links present onthe page.
38- Who is RandFishkin?
Rand Fishkinis the CEO and Co founder of Seomoz, the most popular seosoftware inthe world. He startedthe informative "White Board Friday"
seriesfor explaining the concepts relatedto Seoand searchengines.
39- How will yourestrict the search engine crawlers from indexing a folder named "Secret" that is present in the root?
The following code whenadded onthe robots.txt text file would restrict the crawlers from accessingthe folder
User-agent:*
Disallow:/Secret/

40 - What do you understandbyGoogle Dance?
Google Dance happens whenmajor updates happenon the database maintainedbyGoogle. Constant shufflingleads to unstable rankings of the
Web Pages.This continues for some days andis knownas Google dance. It waswitnessedinthe past before the real time searching happened.
Now, Google updates its index almost everydayand changes are witnessed narrowly.
41- Which are the top 3 social media websitesthat you will suggest to your client for SMO work?
I wouldsuggest Facebook, Twitter andGoogle Plus.
42- How does Google Plus helps in Seo?
Google Plus helps the promotedwebpagesto get plus ones whichare considered as genuine votes byGoogle. More plus ones helps to enhance
our search engine rankings. Moreover,it helps to get highrankings in personalized searchresults where our friends cansee the webpagesshared
and promotedbyus.
Read more here:-UsingGoogle Plus for Seo
43- What is a Pizza Box interms ofGoogle?
Google server comes ina standardcase whichis commonlyknownas "Pizza Box".
44- How important is to have a keyword in a domain name?
After the recent EMD update, the weightage onthe presence ofkeywordon a domain hasreduced. It is therefore important to go for a domain
name that canfocus onbuildinga brandrather than using onlykeywords whichcouldmake a domainlook spammy. Althoughhaving keywords in
the domainhelps but it would work onlyif the combination comesout as brandable. Some popular examples of website whichsuccededwithout
havingkeywords in it are flipkart.com, myntra.com, ebay.com, digg.com, reddit.com andofcoz google.cometc. But, there are some themes where
the presence ofkeywords becomes necessarylike the presence of the keyword "recipes" inallrecipes.com or the presence of the word"food" in
the domainfoodnetwork.com. Hence, its important to take decisions basedonthe theme you needto target.
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here is the list of30 latest & frequentlyasked technicalSEO interview questions andanswers for the candidates who are willing to graba newjob
in SEO fieldinthe veryfirst attempt.
Which are the most important area to include your keywords? – Page title andBodytext are the most important areaswhere we caninclude
keywords for the SEO purpose.
What are webmaster tools?– Webmaster tools is a free service byGoogle fromwhere we canget free Indexing data, backlinks information,
crawl errors, searchqueries, CTR, website malware errors andsubmit the XML sitemap.
What is the best wayto maximize the frequencyof crawling ofyour website bysearchengines? – Frequentlyaddingnew, original andquality
content onthe website.
Do you know who is DannySullivan? – He is a Journalist who covers the fieldof web search, consideredas search engine guru and editor at
searchengineland.com
Who is Matt Cutts? – He is the headof webspamteamat Google. Readmore about Matt Cutts here: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/
What is the best criterionto identifythe value ofa backlink? – The authorityof the domain, qualityof the content on the page where the
backlink is providedandthen the page rank ofthe website.
What is keyword proximity? – KeywordProximityis a measurement criteriaof the closenessof the keywords withinthe Page Title, Meta
Description andBodyText.
What is keyword prominence? – Keywordprominence is the locationof the keywords inthe page title, meta descriptionandbodytext…..Read
more about prominence at:http://www.seoglossary.com/article/64
Difference between exit rate andbounce rate? – Bounce rate is the percentage of people wholeaves a particular website just after visitinga
single page onthisandexit rate refers to the percentage of people wholeaves from a particular page….readmore here
http://www.blindfiveyearold.com/bounce-rate-vs-exit-rate
What is the Panda update andwhichis its current version? – Panda is a searchalgorithmupdate bythe Google to take on the content farms, low
qualitywebsites andthe websites getting lowqualitybacklinks, Google removed a lot ofthe webpage fromthe higher search index duringthis

update and the current versionof Panda is 2.5.3 updated onOctober 19/20th Oct. 2011…read here for latest panda updates
http://www.seroundtable.com/tag/panda
What was caffeine update?– Caffeine update was rolledout byGoogle inJune 2010 andthe main purpose of this update was to include more
fresh results inthe search index, at least 50%..readmore about caffeine update here http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/our-new-search-
index-caffeine.html
A customer can give you an access to onlyone tool, whichone willyou choose, Webmasters or Analytics? – Of Course Webmaster tools, because
these are almost the essential tools for the search engine optimization, we can have some analytics data inthe webmasters as well. But nowdue to
the inclusionof webmaster data inAnalytics, we wouldlike to have access to Analytics.
What is 404? – It is a server error code whichis returnedbythe server what a particular webpage or the file is missingfrom the webhost server.
What is 301 redirect? – It is a SEO friendlyversionof permanent redirect for the webpages or the domains. Readmore about 301 redirect here
http://www.webconfs.com/how-to-redirect-a-webpage.php
What is 302 redirect? – It is a temporaryredirect. Read more here http://www.internetofficer.com/seo/302-redirect/
What is robots.txt? – Robots.txt is a text file used to give instructions to the search engine crawlers about the caching andindexing of a webpage,
domain, directoryor a file ofa website. Readmore here http://www.robotstxt.org/
What are the other methods to restrict a webpage from the searchindex? – we canuse noindex meta tag. Readmore here
http://www.robotstxt.org/meta.html
What are Google Webmaster Tools crawl errors? – Crawl errors provides the informationabout the URL’s of your website whichare not
accessible but linked fromsomewhere. Read more here http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35120
What is a landing page? – a landingpage is a page in the website whichis designedto attract the visitors to contact/subscribe/buya service or
the product byreading few lines of important informationabout that particular s ervice or the product on that page. Readmore about landing page
here http://www.copyblogger.com/landing-pages/
What is the recent change in Google Analytics? – Realtime visitors info, visitors flow, webmaster tools SEO data and website speed data. Read
more here http://analytics.blogspot.com/
How to handle the duplicate page in the website? – usingcanonical tag. Read more here http://www.seomoz.org/blog/canonical-url-tag-the-
most-important-advancement-in-seo-practices-since-sitemaps
What are the types of CSS andwhichis better for SEO? – 3 types, Internal CSS, inline CSS and externalCSS. Readmore about CSS types here at
http://www.expression-web-tutorial.com/Types_CSS_Styles.html. The external CSS is best for SEO purpose. Read whyto use external CSS
http://www.basictips.com/tips/article_64.shtml
How manyheading tags are there inHTML? – 6 tags, from H1 to H6
Can we use more thanone H1 ona single webpage? – Of course, if there is a need of describingtwo related topics on the same page thenwe can
use, but using more than 2 or 3 will not provide anycredit to the searchengines. Matt Cutts advise onusing more thanone H1 tag
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIn5qJKU8VM
Italic or Bold, which is more useful? – Bothare almost same but Italic have a slight more better for keywordtargetingon the webpage. Read
more here http://www.seomoz.org/blog/perfecting-keyword-targeting-on-page-optimization
What are top SEO ranking factors? – Qualityof content onthe webpage, qualityand quantityof backlinks to the webpage, anchor text used in
the backlinks, domainauthority, social sharing metrics and some other traffic metrics like page CTR, bounce rate and average time onthe webpage.
Read more here http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors andhere
http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com/2010/01/14/google-ranking-factors/
What is the criteria for removing a webpage fromGoogle searchindex? – It shouldreturn a 404 not founderror or it shouldbe 301 permanently
redirected.
Some basic and quicksteps to increase the webpage speed. – removing the unused code andscripts. Replacinginternalandinline CSS withthe
external CSS. Usingweb server’s page compressionmethods. Using small sizedimagesor minimizingthe no. of images.
What is CTR? – It is Click ThroughRate. Read more about CTR here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clickthrough_rate
What is CTA? – It is Callto Action. Read more here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_to_action_(marketing)
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Q: What is SearchEngines?
Ans:Search Engines are verycriticalkeyelement useful to find out specific andrelevant informationthrough huge extent of WorldWide Web.
Some major commonlyusedsearch engine:
Google
Yahoo
Bing
Q: Tell me something about Google.
Ans:Googleis the world’s largest andrenowned searchengine incorporating about 66.8% of market share. It wasintroduced in 1998 bystudents
of Stanford Universitystudents SergeyBrin andLarryPage. The unique algorithmic ranking systemis consideredas its keyof success. Apart of
Google Mail servicesthere are various worthyanduseful toolsare being offeredabsolutelyfree which include Blogger, Feedburner, YouTube,
Google Plus, Adsense, Webmaster Tools, Adword, Analytics andmanymore.
Q: Define SEO?
SEO
Ans:SEO is the abbreviatedformof “Search Engine Optimization”. It is the set ofprocessinaccount ofwhicha website or webpage is being
constructedor optimizedthat helps themto enhance their appearance or visibilityat topinSERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).
Q: Explaindistinct types ofSEO practice?
Ans:Primarilytwo types of SEO are beingsportinginpractice – Off-Page SEO andOn-Page SEO.
Off-Page SEO is the methodof earningbacklinks fromother websitesinorder to enhance the rankingof the site. This methodinclude various
method ofSEO includingBlogposting, forum, article submission, Press release submission, classifiedandmiscellaneous.
On-Page SEO is the process ofoptimizinga website which includeson-site worksuchas writingcontent, title, description, Alt tag, Meta tags as well
as ensuringweb-page’s code anddesignwhich canbe indexedandcrawledbysearch engines properly.
Q: What are the different techniquesusedinOffpage SEO?
Ans:There are lots of techniquesusedinOffpage SEO work. Major Techniques are:
DirectorySubmission
Social Bookmarking
Blog Post
Article Post
Press Release Submission
Forum Posting
YahooAnswer
Blog Comment
DeeplinkDirectorySubmission
Regional DirectorySubmissionandall that.
Q: Define blog, article & press release?
Ans:A blog is referredas aninformation or discussionpublishedonwebsite or WorldWide Web incorporatingdistinct entries calledas posts.
Basically, the blogis referred as everything thingwhere you can include others too. It is more individualincontrast to article and pressrelease. It is
also consideredas verypersonal insubject to both style andcomprisedideasandinformationandcanbe written inthe wayjust like you maytalk
to your readers. It is alsocalled Webdiaryor Online Diary.
The articles are concernedwithspecific topic or event andare highlyorientedtowards an opinion insteadof information. An article is supposedto
be more oriented towards showing upopinions, views and idea. Generally, it is written bya third partyor expert ofanyspecific field.
Press Release is relatedwitha specific action or event whichcanbe republished bydistinct medium of mass-media including other websites. It
should be simple, short andprofessional. It conveys a clear message or information.
Q: What are Meta Tags?
Ans:HTML meta tags are usuallyreferredas tags of page data whichsits betweenopeningandclosing headtags ofa document’s HTML code.
Actuallythese are hiddenkeywords who sits inthe code. These are invisible to visitors but are visible andreadable bySearchEngines.
Example:

<head>
<title>Not consideredas Meta Tag, evenrequiredanyway</title>
<meta name=”description” content=”Write your descriptionhere” />
<meta name=”keywords” content=”Write your keyword here” />
</head>
Q: Difference betweenkeyword & keyword phrase?
Ans:The keywordtermis basicallyconcernedwitha one-wordterm, onthe other handa keywordphrase consideredas employment of twoor
more word-combinations. Therefore, it is veryconfoundedto get highranking inaccount of one-wordkeywordterm untilthe one-word keyword
has little online competition. Therefore, this practice is not encouraged to employ. In order to drive more traffic andtoprankinginSERPit is
recommended to employkeyword phrase.
Q: What do you knowabout Black Hat SEO?
Ans:In order to attainHighRanking insearchengine result page, websites gofor various methods andtechniques which are characterizedbytwo
categories.
The methodwhichare implementedandacceptable according to search engine guidelines are White Hat SEO, onthe other hand, the method
which are lessacceptable or instructed to avoidinsearch engine guidelines are “BlackHat SEO”.
Q: Can you tell me some BlackHat SEO techniques?
Ans:Some Black Hat SEO techniques are:
Keyword Stuffing
Cloaking
DoorwayPages or GatewayPages
Link Farming
HiddenText, etc.
Q: What is spider?
Ans:Spider alsocalled as bot, crawler or robot is a set of computer programthat browses World Wide Web in methodical ando rderlyfashionas
well automaticallyscan the web-page and website for updatedcontent anddownloada copyto its data center to index.
Q: Name the bots (spider)of major searchengine?
Ans:The name of bots/spider of Google search engine is GoogleBot, YahooSlurp for Yahoosearch andBingBot for Bing searche ngine.
Q: Can you differentiate ‘nofollow’ and ‘dofollow’?
Ans:Nofollowlinkis exactlyvice-versa of dofollow link. These are non-crawling linkwhich are not passedbysearchengines bot andhence can’t be
cachedor indexed. It is obvious whenwe wishto prevent a link fromcrawling andindexing.
Dofollowlinkis a kindof hyperlinkwhichsays all search enginescrawlers to passthroughwhichalsoput animpact over page rank. Whenwe opt to
employor attempt to achieve a dofollowlinkthen it is countedbysearchengines andsits in the eye ofGoogle, Bing, MSN, Yahooetc. as a backlink
for your website andenhancesyour site ranking.
Q: Define Page Rank.
Ans:PageRankis a set ofalgorithmfor linkanalysis named after LarryPage and employedbyGoogle search engine towards defininga numerical
value from 1 to 10 to eachcomponent of hyperlinkeddocuments like worldwide web. The value accepts onlyroundfigure that means decimal are
not allowed. Page rank is calculatedbytheir inboundlinks.
Q: Establisha difference betweenPR & SERP.
Ans:PR is Page Rank which is defined byqualityinbound links from other website or web-pages to a webpage or website as well as saythe
importance of that site.
SERPstands for Search Engine Result Page is the placement of the website or web-page whichis returnedbysearchengine after a search queryor
attribute.
Q: What is Cache?

Ans:Cache is the process performed bysearch engine crawler at a regular interval of time. It used to scanandtake snapshot of eachpage over
world wide webas well as store as a backup copy. Almost everysearch engine result page incorporatesa cachedlinkfor everysite. However,
clicking over cached link showyou the last Google cached versionof that specific page rather thanof current version. Also, you candirectlyprefix
“cache:http://www.webgranth.com” withdesired URL to viewit cachedversion.
Q: Define Alt tag?
Ans:The alt attribute also calledas alt tagare employedinXHTML andHTML documents incontext of defining alternative text that is supposedto
be renderedwhenthe element can’t be renderedto whichit is applied. One great feature of alt tag is that it is readable to ‘screenreader’ whichis
a software bymeans of which a blindperson can hear this. Inaddition, it delivers alternative informationfor an image due to some specific reason
a user can’t view it such as incase ofslowconnection and an error occurredinthe src attribute.
For example, the HTML for this image will appear somethinglike this:
<img alt=”youcandefine alt tagjust belowthe input box of image title while uploading or editing a image.” src=”<http://www.webgranth.com/wp-
content/uploads/2012/07/Alt tag.jpg”>
Q: What do you knowabout Adsense?
Ans:Adsense is a webprogram conductedbyGoogle that enablespublishers of content websitesto cater text, richmedia, image, video
advertisements automaticallywhichare relevant to content of website and audience. These advertisement are included, maintained and sorted by
Google itselfandearnmoneyeither byper-click or per-impression basis.
Q: Can you define Adword?
Ans:Adword is referredas the mainadvertising product of Google which is useful to make appear your ads on Google andits p artner websites
includingGoogle Search. ThisGoogle’s product offer PPC(PayPer Click)advertising which is a primarymodule andincorporate a sub moduleCPC
(Cost Per Click) where we bidthat rate that will be chargedonlywhenthe users click your advertisement. One another submo dule is CPM(Cost
Per ThousandImpression)advertising where advertiser payfor a thousand impressiononflat rate to publisher. Inaddition it alsoincludeswebsite
targetedadvertisingof banner, text and rich-media ads. Moreover, the adwill appear especiallyto those people who are alreadylookingfor such
type of product youare offeringas wellas offer to chooseparticular sites with geographical area to show your ads.
Q: What is PPC?
Ans:PPCis the abbreviatedform of PayPer Click andis a advertisement campaignconducted byGoogle. It is referred as a primarymodule with
two sub module CPC(Cost-per-click) andCPM(Cost per thousandimpression)throughbiddingandflat rate respectively. InCPCthe advertiser
wouldbe onlycharged when the user clickover their advert.
Q: What are the aspects inSEO?
Ans: The mainaspect inSEO are divided intwo class:SEO On-Page andSEO Off-Page.
SEO On-Page includesMeta tag, description, keywords optimization, site structure and analysis, etc.
SEO Off-Page aspect are Keyword Research, unique andqualitycontent, linkbuilding throughBlog Comments, Blog Posting, Article submission,
Press Release, Classified posting, Forum posting.
Q: What do you knowabout RSS?
Ans:RSS stands for ReallySimple Syndication is useful to frequentlypublishall updated works including news headlines, blogentries etc. This RSS
document alsoknownas web feed, feedor channelthat incorporate summarized text including metadata i.e. authorship and publishing dates etc.
However, RSSfeeds make the publishers flexible bysyndicatingthe content automatically. There is a standardized file format XML that lets the
informationto be publishedonce which canbe visible to severaldistinct programs. Also, thismake readers more ease to get updates timelyby
allowing themto subscribe from their favorite sites.
Q: How wouldyou define Alexa?
Ans:Alexa is a California basedsubsidiarycompanyof Amazon.com which is widelyknownfor its website andtoolbar. This Alexa toolbar
congregate browsingbehavior data andsendit to website, where the data is analyzed and storedandcreate report for company’s webtraffic.
Also, Alexa provides data concerned to traffic, global ranking andother additional informationfor a websites.
Q: How can you achieve Google Page Rank?
Ans:Generally, Google Page Rank is basedoninbound links, therefore, more backlinks youcongregate more your page rank will be. Also, it is
influencedbyrankof page whichis linked to you. One other thing to consider is that older your website will be, it will be more favorable and

trusted to Google. Google reward those websites who incorporateslots of pages, tons ofincoming link andalsohealthyquantityof internal links to
another pages withinthe site. In respect ofSEO projects, relativelyit is not sosignificant but delive rs a picture about workto perform towards
earning inboundlinks.
Q: Whythe Title TaginWebsite is valuable?
Ans:In our SEO efforts Title Tags are veryearnest. It is highlyrecommendedto include a Unique Title that exactlysays about the contents sits in
that page. It is valuable because thisis thingwhichappears in the searchengine result section and tells the user & search engine, what is about this
page.
Q: What is Site MapanddistinguishbetweenHTML sitemapandXML sitemap?
Ans:A sitemap incorporateslist of web-pages whichis accessible to users or crawlers. It might be a document in anyformemployedas a tool for
planning either a webpage or webdesign that enables them to appear ona website as wellas typicallyplaced ina hierarchicalstyle. Thishelps
search engine bots andusers to findout the pages ona website. The site maprenders our website more searchengine friendly as well enhances
the probabilityfor frequent indexing.
HTML sitemapcanbe incorporated directlyin a web page for user’s flexibilityand canbe implemented through proper design. On the other hand,
XML sitemapis useful onlyfor searchengine crawlers or spiders and doesn’t visible to users. It sits inthe root of website.
such as:http://www.webgranth.com/sitemap.xml
Which is better:anHTML site mapor XML Sitemap? BY Matt Cutt
Q: What’s the significance of Robots.txt file in a website?
Ans:Robots.txt file is consideredas a conventionuseful to prevent cooperating web robots andwebcrawlers fromaccessing all or part of a website
or its content for whichwe don’t want to be crawledandindexedbut publiclyviewable. It is also employedbysearchengines to archive and
categorize website and to generate a rule ofno follow regardingsome particular areas of our websites.
Q: How Keywords are implemented for optimization?
Ans:The best wayto opt and implement keywords is to designate those keywords whichare popular, relevant to our content, co mpriseshigh
search volume andeffective. Stuffing andover employment ofkeywords must be avoided. Inorder to get best result and effect, our pages
shouldn’t containkeyworddensitymore than3-4%. Including keywords into title anddescriptionis highlyrecommended.
Q: What is cloaking?
Ans:Cloakingis a technique whichis used inBlack Hat SEO that enables to create twodistinct pages where the page content being presentedto
search engine spider is different from that whichis beingpresented to user’s browser. These techniquesdoesnot come under the guidelinesof
search engines.
Q: Do you know about BlogFlipping?
Ans:Blog Flippingis the practice to sale a blogwhenit becomesfamous and popular as well as drivinghealthyamount oftraffic.
Q: What you opinedabout HTML either it is Case Sensitive or Case Insensitive?
Ans:HTML is case Insensitive. It doesn’t matter and deliver identical result either you write inUpper Case or Lower Case.
Under what circumstances you wouldintendto eliminate pages from searchengines throughrobots.txt vs. Meta robots tag?
Ans:Generally, I wouldcontinue to employrobots.txt inorder to make search engine indexing a directoryon a website. This might be oftena
directorythat is concerned withadminfunction or incorporate contents onlyin form of script or image gallery. Generally, robots.txt is employedto
prevent a directoryand its sub-folders and files to crawl bysearchengine bot as wellas Meta robots tag for a specific webpage.
Q: What things are significant inorganicallyranking a website?
Ans: Basicallythere are various things that is beingemployed for organicallyranking a website whichcanbe classifiedin3 distinct categories:
Website content:It must be qualityandunique content as well as most be well optimized and wellstructured.
Website structure: Thisinclude TAGS, clear navigation, ensuringusability, validation ofHTML errors andmiscellaneous.
Back-links:You can create a link for anywhere but prior to this it is obvious to ensure for relevant site andhealthylink.
Q: What steps wouldyou followto optimize a website?
Ans:These are following steps to be followedwhile optimizing a website:

First of all we will interviewwebmaster or website owner to congregate relevant information, goals andwebsite’s purpose.
Performing keyword analysis and findout the best searchvolume keywords that shouldbe incorporatedinto the website as well as individual
pages of the website.
Analyzing the content of website in order to ensure usage of content relevant keywords andphrases. This comprisestitles, “a lt” attributesand
META tags (Meta Title, Meta description& Meta Keyword).
Target & implementing keywords as H1, H2 & so onrelevant to the site and its content.
Analyzing website navigation.
Ensuring the robots.txt file and sitemap existence as well as check their efficiency.
If required, makingrecommendations for modifications inwebsite as well as its eachandeverypage and soon…..
Q: SEO Checklist for NewWebsites
Q: What is considered as more significant – Creatinggreat content or building backlinks?
Ans:Both are obvious. Creatingqualitycontent is consideredas the first element responsible for rankingas wellas buildingbacklinks is useful to
buildauthorityto a site as well as coined as a metric for rankingwell.
Q: What willbe your stepwhenthe companywebsite you are working withwishto migrate its all content to a new domain?
Ans:First of all I wouldupdate the previous website withpermanent redirect to new page for eachandeverypage. Later eradicate previous
content from searchengines incontext of avoiding duplicate content issues.
Q: How can I merge two sites?ByMAtt Cutt
Q: What’s your opinionabout link buying?
Ans:GenerallyI avoid this practice. Thoughother means of paid marketing are alsoavailable. The process oflinkbuying is don’t liked bysearch
engines. It doesn’t comes under the guidelinesof search engine.
Q: Can you establisha difference betweenSEMand SEO?
Ans:SEO is a set of processes to get our website or pages appear in searchengine result page. On the other handSEMis searchengine marketing
being usedin practice to purchase advertising space insearch engine page result.
Q: What strategieswouldyou implement for backlinks?
Ans:I wouldrequest for backlinks to competitors relevant website as wellas provide reciprocal link if required. In addition, I would attempt to
submit pressrelease, article submission, blogsubmission and other aspects of off-page SEO to most relevant and qualitysites.
Q: What do you thinkabout social media inSEO strategy?
Ans: Social networkingwebsites are consideredas social media whichis veryeffective and robust for viral marketing. Viral marketinghas been
proved as verypowerful resource, inthe case if our content is unique, attractive and appealing. Some media Site:
Facebook
Twitter
Linkedin
Myspace
Digg
Youtube
Myspace, etc.
Q: In order to prevent penalty, what things you shouldn’t perform to increase ranking?
Ans:I woulddiscard links from those websites whichis supposedto act as linkfarm as well as poor qualitysites whichhave low page rank. Ensure
that our site must containunique andqualitycontent without keyword stuffing. Also, I usedto avoidanypractices of ‘spam’ which include certain
affiliate advertising websites, unsolicitede-mail campaigns etc.
Q: What mistakesyou should avoidwhile optimizing the website?
Ans:The mainmistakes that shouldbe avoided are filling keywords inWeb-Page, employing identical anchor text for link building, keyword
stuffing, gettinglow qualitybacklinks etc.
Q: Define andDifferentiate Webmaster Tool & Analytics Tool?

Ans:Webmaster Tool is a free service cateredbyGoogle which provide us a complete report for indexed data, crawling errors, backlinks
information, search queries, website malware errors, CTR and submitting XML sitemap. Basically, it acts as a mediator between website andserver
provide complete overviewof data, issuesand other queries.
Google Analytics is a free web analysis tool first rolledout inlate 2005 but generallyit become available for users in August 2006. This tool acts
betweenwebsite & internet browser/users andoffers complete overviewof visitors statistics whichexactlysays about generalwebsite activities
like page views, site visits, bounce rates, average time spent onsite or pages, sources of traffic, locationetc. It is also obvious for tracking Adword
queries.
Beginners Guide to Google Analytics
Q: How can you enhance the crawlingfrequencybysearchengines for your website?
Ans:Includingnew, original, unique andqualitycontent onour website more frequentlyenables searchengines to crawl more frequently.
Q: What do you knowabout Keywordstemming?
Ans:It is the practice to find out root word fromsearch query. For instance, a keyword like “playful” will be split to the word“play” bystemming
algorithmthat turns it possible. Thus, the search result appear onthe screenwill containthe word “play” in it.
Q: What do you knowabout LSI?
Ans:LSI is the abbreviatedform ofLatent Semantic Indexing. It hasbeen emergedas a technique of fetching data via establishinga communication
among words as wellas employingsynonyms in the midst ofretrievingthe data fromthe index.
Q: Can you tell me about Frames inHTML?
Ans:Frames inHTML are obvious as theyusedto discriminate the page content intodistinct fragments. Search enginestreat these frames as
absolutelydifferent pages as well as frames alsoput annegative impact over SEO. Therefore, we shouldavoid the practice of using Frames and
implement basic HTML instead.
Q: How can you knowabout your SEO campaign whether it is workingor not?
Ans:First of all I wouldattempt to make a search onall search engines employing relevant keywords and keyphrases, I am optimizing for. The
analysis of result will saywhether the methods ofoptimization have gainresults or lost. I wouldanalyze the report regularlyas search engine make
update and index. I would attempt to another aspect of website statistics whichsays about originof traffic.
Q: What is the meaning of competitive analysis?
Ans:Competitive analysis, as its name suggestedit is establishment of a comparison ofdata betweenthe website I am optimizing and that website
who rank highlyinsearch results. It will be a great source ofidea.
Q: After implementing distinct SEO methods for a site, if you haven’t got anyimprovements. What wouldbe your next step?
Ans:I wouldmake troubleshootingfor the issues. Firstly, I woulddesignate whether it is a new project. Again I will analyze relevant keywords and
phrase for the site I am optimizing for as well as took an insight studyof competitive analysis. Ifthe website andpageshas beenindex and appears
in the first 10 pages of search engine result page but not in the topthree, I wouldgo for some transformation to onpage te xt, page titles andpage
descriptions. But in the case if website has not beenindexedstill or droppedfrom index, might be it comprises some big issuesandtotal re -
submissionand re-work might be required.
However, I opinedhere that this post willbe highlybeneficialfor whoare stepping towards marshaling their career as SEO professional especially
for those whoare stillfreshers. Moreover, inthis post I have also listedsome useful SEO interviewquestionfor experienced professionals that will
definitelyhelpthem to grabtheir dream job andoffer a great opportunityto add sparkles intheir career.
--
1.
Give me a descriptionof your general SEO experience.
A. My experience is mainlywith myownsite at www.afreshpath.comand one other site www.qualitymotorsreno.com. So far, mysite is on page
one for narrow searchterms involving outdoor recreation inNevada. The other site has gone from not being listedat allinthe first 10 pagesof any
search result to beinginpages2 and3 of a couple ofsearch engines. That workis ongoing at this time.
2.
Can you write HTML code byhand?
A. Yes I can. I douse some WYSIWYG editors andthenmodifythe code byhandas needed.
3.
Could you brieflyexplainthe PageRank algorithm?

A. In simple terms, Google uses the gross number of inboundlinks to a page to determine how important the page is. This “pagerank” haslittle to
do with actualsearchresults but can make a difference on user behavior.
4.
Have you createdanySEO tools either from scratch or piecedtogether from others?
A. No, I do make use of manytoolsalreadyavailable on the internet as well as SEO programs that I have purchased.
5.
What do you thinkof PageRank?
A. In relationto SEO projects, it is relativelyunimportant but cangive an indication ofhowmuchwork needs to be done in gaining inboundlinks.
6.
What do you thinkof using XML sitemaps?
A. I use them. Theyare an additionaltool to help the searchengines when theycrawl a site. There is norequirement for any sitemap and your
pages will get indexedwithout themif youpayclose attentionto navigationwithin your site.
7.
What SEO tools doyou regularlyuse?
A. Keyword analysis tools, keyworddensitytools, index checking, backlink checking, wordprocessor to check spellingand grammar, HTML
validationandothers.
8.
Under what circumstances wouldyou lookto exclude pages fromsearchenginesusing robots.txt vs meta robots tag?
A. UsuallyI woulduse the robots.txt to keepa search engine fromindexinganentire directoryon a site. Thiswouldoftenb e directoriesdealing
with adminfunctions or directoriesthat onlycontainscript or image libraries.
9.
What areas doyou think are currentlythe most important inorganicallyranking a site?
A. Text on page! Search enginesutilize text andonlytext in providingsearch results. That text is found in manyplace including the URL andtitle of
your pages as wellas the visible text you place on your pages.
10.
Do you have experience incopywriting andcanyou provide some writing samples?
A. My experience in “copywriting” is limitedto mysite at www.afreshpath.com. It is a blog about outdoor recreationinNevada and sofar is placing
well insearch results.
11.
Have you ever had something you’ve writtenreach the front-page of Digg? Sphinn? Or be Stumbled?
A. Not yet! I am not particularlyworriedabout it but I dotryto write insucha waythat others wouldbe inticedto submit myarticles.
12.
Explainto me what META tags matter intoday’s world.
A. The most important META tag for SEO is your page description. Searchengines domake use of this tag but it does not outweigh the title or
visible text. The META keywords tag is not muchof a factor inthe major searchengines but shouldnot be overlooked.
13.
Explainvarious steps that you wouldtake to optimize a website?
A. 1. Interview website owner or webmaster to get a goodgraspof the site’s purpose andgoals.
2. Perform a keywordanalysisto findbest performingkeywords that shouldbe usedfor that site andfor individualpagesof the site
3. Analyze site content to determine usage ofrelavant keywords andphrases. This includes visible text as well at titles, META tags, and“alt”
attributes.
4. Examine site navigation
5. Determine the existence ofrobots.txt andsitemapandexamine those for effectivenes.
6. Make recommendations for changes neededfor the site andeachindividual page.
14.
If the companywhose site you’ve beenworkindfor hasdecidedto move all of its content to a new domain, what steps wouldyo u take?
A. I would update the oldsite with permanent redirects to to new page for everypage. ThenI wouldattempt to remove old content from the major
search enginesto avoid duplicate content issues.
15.
Rate from 1 to 10, tell me the most important “on page” elements
A. #1 issue is visible text being relevant to expected search terms.
# 2 would thenbe page titles
# 3 is navigation and “alt” attributes for navigation items andlinktext.
# 4 would be “alt” attributes for images andother media presentedonpages.
16.
What do you thinkabout link buying?
A. I discourage the practice for the most part. There are more effective means of paidmarketing. One exceptionwouldbe purchasing listings in
highlyreputable directoriessuch as Yahoodirectory.
17.
What is Latent Semantic Analysis (LSI Indexing)?
A. LSI indexingries to overcome the limitations of“literal” searchterm matching . For example, if someone is searching for “hiking in No rhter
Nevada” a literalsearch wouldonlymatchthe words usedwithout taking into account words suchas “hike”, “hiked”. LSI cangive more relevant
results because it does take word usage andcontext intoaccount determining what a page is “about” rather thana strict reliance onliteral
wording.
18.

What is Phrase Based Indexing andRetrieval andwhat rolesdoesit play?
A. In regards to searchresults, it is a methodthat searchengines suchas google use to determine relevance of a page based onphrases acutally
usedina document. For example, ifyou have a page instructing people on wildlife photography, the searchengine wouldreasonablyexpect to see
terms and phrases suchas “selectinga camera”, “appraochingwildlife”, and “lowlight photoconditions”. Relatedphrases will addto the relevance
of a page where unrelatedphrases will reduce the relevance ofa page. This is one technique that Google is using to weedout “spam” sites.
19.
What is the difference betweenSEO and SEM?
A. Seo is searchengine optimizationand is the process youuse ingetting your pages to place well onsearch results. SEMis searchengine
marketing and involves purchasingadvertising space on searchresult pages. Sponsored listings are SEM. Bothare relatedthough! Whenu sing
Google Adwords, the better you optimize your pages for search, the lessyou will be paying for your selectedkeywords inthe PPCcampaignand the
better placment your ads will get.
20.
What kindof strategiesdo you normallyimplement for backlinks?
A. I check the competitors backlinks to findhightlyrelevant sitesandrequest a linkfrom them. If reciprocal linkingis required, I maybe able to
place a likbackto them in a relevant portionof a page onthe site but if not, I will state soand maynot gain that link. Another methodI use is to
submit pressreleases to relevant media.
21.
What role does social media playin anSEO strategy?
A. Social media suchas socialnetworking sitesand news sites can provide for viral marketing. Viralmarketing hasproven to be powerful if the
content of a site is appealing.
22.
What things wouldn’t youto do increase rankings because the risk ofpenaltyis toohigh?
A. I would avoidanysite with the appearance of a linkfarm. I would alsoavoidany“spam” practice such as unsolicited email campaigns, certain
affiliate advertising sites, sitesthat re-direct visitors to your site, andanything resembling the practices ofZango.
23.
Whymight you want to use nofollowon aninternal link?
A. Manysiteshave shoping carts andmember loginor logout links. Thistype oflinkis simplyan administrative functionand doesnothigto
contribute to site content. The search engine does not needto index those pages.
24.
Are you familiar withweb analytics andwhat packages are your familiar with?
A. Yes I am andthe tool I use most frequentlyis Google’s webmaster tools. I also use the available Yahooho stingtools for myown sites. Knowing
what searchterms your visitors are actuallyusing to find your site as well as where those visitors are comingfrom will helprefine SEO efforts. The
amount of time eachvisitor spends onyour site will helpin determiningifcontent changes are needed.
25.
From an analytics perspective, what is different betweena user from organic searchresults vs. a type-inuser?
A A user coming intoyour site from anorganic search usuallyhas never visitedyour site before or is performing a generalsearchfor a specific
product or topic. These visitors are trying to find the site that most suits thier needs. A “type -in” user is specifallyinterestedin your website.They
mayhave found your URL inprint advertising or from a friend. Often, these users are familiar withwhat you are offering andare comingbackto
your site as a repeat visitor.
26.
How do you evaluate whether anSEO campaignis working?
A. The mainindicator is to performa search onall major search enginesusing the keywords/ keyphrases I amoptimizingfor. An analysis of those
results will helpto determine ifoptimization has gained inthe results or lost ground. This analysisshouldbe done over ti me as eachsearch engine
will update andindex on a varying schedule. Another aspect is to use website statistics to determine where traffic is originating.
27.
What does competitive analysis meanto you andwhat techniques doyou use?
A. Competitive analysis means taking a close lookat websites that rank highlyin searchresults and comparingthose sitesto the one youare
optimizing. Theyhave employedmethods that are workingand are a valuable source for ideas.
28.
If you’ve done 6 months of SEO for a site and yet there haven’t been anyimprovements, how would you goabout diagnosing the problem?
A. I might approachthe problem as if it were an entirelynewproject. Againtaking a look at the keywords andphrases that I amattemptingto
optimize for andagaintaking a close inspectionof topranking competition. If the site is indexedanddoes show upinthe irst 10 pagesof a search
but on in the topthree, I wouldlook into modificationof major areassuchas page titles, onpage text, and page descriptions. If the site is not yet
indexedor has been droppedfrom anindex, there are major problems andthe site mayrequire a total re-workandre-submission.
29.
How manytarget keywords should a site have?
A. I advise not more than three or four well related keyword phrases. This allows for more effective optimization.
30.
You hear a rumor that Google is weightingthe HTML LAYER tag veryheavilyinrankingthe relevance ofits results – howdoesthis affect yourwork?
A. It doesn’t unless the rumor proves to be fact. Yes, I checkon the rumor but as withall rumors, it canhave detrimental effects if you “jumponthe
band wagon” andit proves to be just a rumor withnobasisinfact.
31.Whydoes Google rankWikipedia for somanytopics?
A. Wikipediais anestablished authority! As such, it is referencedbyhuge numbers of other documents withrelevant text associatedwith links back
to Wikipedia.
32.If salaryandlocationwere not anissue, whowouldyou work for?

A. Myselfand onlymyself if those conditions existed.
---
SEO InterviewQuestions & Answers is one ofthe hot topics among SEOs. There are manycompanies, software as their core business, SEO as their
side business, andlooking for SEO experts who canmanage their clients SEO projects. The problem behindthis situationis th e interviewer’s lack of
SEO stuffs. Some SEO newbies are gettingbenefits withthis. Some interviewer are having wrong ideaabout SEO andnot accepting the points from
a SEO candidate. This is worse thanthe interviewer having zero knowledge inSEO.
If an interviewer doesn’t have anystuff about SEO, thenhe willbe asking general questions. As a candidate, if we make the interviewer understand
some basic points of SEO thenthe interview willbe successful.
In mySEO career, I have attendedmanyinterviews and some endedup with comedies. RecentlyI attendedaninterview froma pure Internet
marketing companyis the specialone whichI got a feelthat is anSEO interview. Evenas aninterviewer inmypresent companyI haven’t thought
of askingsuchquestions. ReallyI enjoyedthe interview verywellandjust want to share the questions askedbyinterviewer and answers from my
side.
1) Can you tell me your owndefinitionfor SEO?
Yes sure, SEO is the collection ofstrategies that we are followingto get visitors to our website from searchengines via organic search results. (But
almost similar)
2) What’s your ideaabout page rank and how it’s calculated?
Let me first tell about the calculation behindthat. Googlesays that page rankcalculationformulais havingmore than2 lak hvariables. I amsure
that following things are the mainfactor,
1) Internal BackLinks
2) External Back Links
3) Domain Age
Apart from this, number of visits, bounce rate, CTR etc maybe a factor in calculating the page rank. Page rankis just a metric fromGoogle which
defines the qualityof the page. Moreover we dohave manyother targets like keywordposition, qualitytraffic andconversions. Inmyvision,I am
havingveryleast importance to page rank. But I amcrazyabout getting full green PR tool bar for myblog.
3) I want to change the domainname of wellrankedwebsite in SERP. Is it possible to retainthe same keyword positions?
Yes, definitelywe can. Just 301 redirecting the corresponding oldURLs to the newURLs. Ininitial after we did this, we mayexperience a dropin
rankings. Once our newURLs got indexed, we canexpect a same positionthat we hadearlier.
4) Can you name the SEO blogs that you regularlyread?
1) Search Engine journal
2) Search Engine Land
3) SEOMOZ
4) SEOSmarty
5) Jimboykins
5) What SEO tools doyou regularlyuse?
1) Google Adwords Tool to findkeywords suggestions andsearchcount
2) IPBlacklist tool
3) Server Header checker
6) How can you rate you out of 10 in the following areas On-Page Optimization, Off-Page Optimization, Photoshop, and Coding (PHP)
On-Page Optimization – 09
Off-Page Optimization – 08
Designing– 06
Coding (PHP) – 03
7) How can you optimize a website having 2 lakhpages?
Following are the special additionalSEO stuffs that we have to implement for dynamic website.
1) Generation ofdynamic title & description
2) Dynamic XML Sitemap generation

3) Good Internal linkstructure (Normal)
8 ) Have you attendedanysearch related conferences?
Yes, I have attended one conference named“searchCamp2008? held at Chennai (India). I had a wonderful time there bysharingthe SEO ideas
with manywebmasters.
9) What’s special in XML Sitemap and where do you submit that?
That is a file whichlist all the pages of website in XML format designedfor SE’s. Here we cangive the crawlable frequencyandalso we candefine
the priorityof all the webpages(1.0, 08. 065 etc). This canbe submittedinGoogle Webmaster tools.
10) What areasdo youthinkare currentlythe most important in organicallyrankinga site for a particular keyword?
1) Keyword in anchor text of external& internal backlinks
2) Internal link structure
3) Keyword densityincontent, title, description, alt tags, h1 tagetc
-----
Question1- What is on page SEO?
Ans:- The onpage SEO is making sure that your website is searchengine friendly. To make your website searchengine friendlyyou have to perform
below written works.
Website Analysis
Optimize Meta Title
Meta Description
Meta keyword,
Optimizing H1, H2 tag
You have to optimize website directorystructure as well as navigation
Sitemap creationandupdation
Check keywordstuffing
Check the qualityof the site content
Checking for brokenlinks
Optimizationof ALT Text, Anchor Text
Managingrobots.txt
Question2- What is Off page SEO (SearchEngine Optimization)?
Ans- The main off page SEO work is to increase rankingof website insearch engines. It includes“Link Building” or “Back Linking”. Keepone thing in
mind that making thousands linkdoesnot matter makingqualitylinks matter. The major searchengines are Google, Yahoo, bing. Youcan improve
rankingof your website bydoing belowwrittenwork.
Submitting website to SearchEngine (knownas search engine submission )
DirectorySubmission
Article Submission
Blog creationandSubmission
Press Release creationandsubmission
Social Bookmarking
Videosubmission
PPT Submission
RSS FeedSubmission
Social mediapromotion
And manymore……….
Question3:- What are Meta Tags?
Ans- Basically, Meta tags are keywords. It includesMeta title, Meta keyword, andMeta description. It is a hiddencode in website page. Search
engine cansee it but generallywebsite visitor cannot. The Meta tags playveryimportant role in the visibilityof website in the searchengine.
Question4: - What is the main use of Robots.txt file?

Answer:- The main use of Robots.txt file is to be safe from searchengine duplicate content penalty. Apart fromthis, the robots.txt file is usedto
stop search engine crawler to crawl private andsensitive data. The locationof robots.txt file is veryimportant. It must be inthe maindirectoryor
website suchas (http://mysite.com/robots.txt). Bythe help ofrobots.txt file you cancreate nofollow rule for specific areas of your website.
Question5:- What is the best wayto maximize website crawling?
Ans- Updating originalandqualitycontent on the website are the best wayto increase search engine crawling rate.
Question6:- Tell me the difference betweenbounce rate and exit rate?
Note:- This is veryimportant question askedinthe interview.
Ans- The bounce rate is nothing but a percentage of website visitor wholeaves andparticular website just after visitinga single page. The exit rate
is the percentage of visitor wholeaves from a particular page.
Question7 – What are the mainSEO rankingfactors explain?
Ans- There is severalraking factors. Some ofthe main and important searchengines raking factors are discussedbelow.
Website content quality
Qualityof backlinks
Age of the domainname
Social sharingmetrics
Page CTR
Bounce Rate
Anchor text usedin the backlinks
Question: 8- What are the limitation ofdescriptiontag andtitle tag?
Ans- The descriptiontag must be between160 to 170 characters andthe Title tagmust be between66-70 characters. Putting keyword in Title tag
and Descriptiontag is verybeneficial.
Question:9- What are the most important toolsfor SEO (Search Engine Optimization)?
Ans:- The most important tools are Google Analytics, Google Webmasters tools, Opensite explorer, Alexa rank toolbar, Google Toolbar, SEO
toolbar, website grader etc.
Question10:- How to check number of backlinks of your competitor website?
Note: - This questionis also asked bymanyinterviewers
Ans- There are lot of ways bywhichyou can keepeye on your competitor website suchas bythe help ofOpen Site Explorer, BacklinkWatch,Alexa,
using backlinkfinder, bythe help ofGoogle link operator
Question11:- Tell me some name of Social Media channelswhich you have usedearlier?
Ans:- There are lot of social media channels out there some of the popular channels are:
Wordpress
Blogger
Typepad
Digg
Delicious
Social network like facebook, Google+ or G+, Linkedin, Myspace, Twitter
Video sharing site like Vimeo, Youtube etc
Question12:- What is Site Map?
Ans- Bythe helpof site map youcanmake your website more searchengine friendly. The best thingis that it increases the chance of quick indexing
in the search engine.
Question13:- Who is Matt Cutts?
Note: - This is the mainquestion generallyaskedbyintervieer
Ans- Matt Cutts is a headof spam team at Google.

Question14:- Do you know about PPC?
Ans- PPCstands for PayPer Click advertisements. Basically, PPCis a method ofonline advertisement where you payper click when visitor clickon
particular advertisements whichis displayedinthe search engines.
Question15:- What is black hat SEO?
Ans- The black hat SEO is nothing but doingSEO work byignoring searchengine guidelines. Most of the people start doing spam to get highranking
in the search engine. The website optimization methodwhich is not acceptedbysearch engine is calledblack hat SEO. Black hat SEO couldbe very
dangerous because it maypenalize your website.
-----
What does SEO stand for? Thisacronym itselfstands for SearchEngine Optimization.
What is SEO? The processof makinga site andits content highlyrelevant for both searchengines and searchers to increase ROI or meet goals. SEO
includes technical tasks to make it easier for search engine spiders to index the content on a website or social media networking community.
Is SEO spam, junk, dead etc.? Some believe that SEO is deadbut with the expansionof social media networkingcommunities, ethical and “white
hat” SEO is more alive than everyandis highlynecessarywhenperforming social media optimization(SMO).
Whyaren’t we #1 or on page 1 at Google? AnySEO companythat promises youthe #1 spot on searchengines is trying to sell you something. There
are no guarantees as far as search enginesare concernedbut if youhaven’t done SEO yet, have noreal website content, and have a site that
contains mostlyFlash, AJAXandJavascript, you will have a difficult time showingup inanysearchengines. SEO is a long term strategy – not a
keyword densitygame.
Whyam I on #1 all the time but when mywife searchesfor me she doesn’t findme?Search engines like to cache (or keep) your personal
preferencesandpersonalizedsearch queries to make searching more convenient for you. If you searchandclickon your website often, search
engines such as Google will bring that website to the topof the stack. Clear your history/cache and turnoff personalizedsearch options to see the
real ranking.
When will we see results?Some websitesare indexedina few hours andsome take a few months. This time spandepends onthe search engine’s
processes, your content and age of website as well as your l evel of competition.
Can we rankfor Apple? Ranking for a highlycompetitive keywordsuchas this will decrease your possibilityof getting ranked properly. Remember
that you are indirect competition withthe likesof Steve Jobs.
Can we rankfor everything (huge list of keywords)? Sure youcanbut this is not the most effect wayof being ranked. Customers who want anApple
computer but come to your website that sellsmattresses is not onlygoing to leave but will most likelynot return evenwhen theyare readyto
purchase a mattress. It is all about the long tail approach and relevancy. You have one chance to make a first impression withyour customers.
How much doesSEO cost? This reallydepends the goalsof that you or your companyhave inplace. Every good SEO companywill workwith youto
assess your goalsandgive you a project cost and timeline agreement basedon anhourlyrate as SEO is anongoingprocess. So me SEO companies
have createdpackages witha set of deliverablesto helpthe decisionmaking process.
Whyis SEO soexpensive?This depends on your classification of“expensive”. High qualityethical andnatural SEO costs more because you are
payingfor the return onthat investment. SEO is a science andanart that will bring in more moneyto your companythanit takes. An ethical SEO
companywillfocus on your ROI.
How longdoes it take to get indexed byGoogle? Each searchengines indexes different sites at different times. It couldtake minutesor weeks
depending onyour site. Without SEO, it maynever be indexed.
How to submit mynewsite to Google/Bing/Yahoo etc.?The search engines provide a few submission portalsbut thesedays your website it
submittedthroughcontent and XML Sitemaps.
How do I submit to 1000 search engines? There is absolutelyno needto submit to that maywebsites. The top3 search engines (Google, Bing and
Yahoo)usuallyfeed all the smaller websites their findings. Submit to the big 3 searchenginesand the smaller ones will findthem.
Do I need an XML Sitemap? There is some room for debate but it is highlyrecommended to have a XML Sitemapfor your site to provide further
informationto search engines.
Do I need meta tags for SEO? Yes, althoughsome meta tags are no longer beingusedfor search engine placement andindexing, the informationis
usuallydisplayandwillincrease the chances ofsomeone clicking a linkto your website. Other meta tag information gives data to the search
engines to help decide if your site is safe andwhentheyshouldreturn to index again.

Do I need a highPageRankfor SEO? PageRankis important to some but it is all about the content onyour site andyour target audience. There are
thousands ofwebsites that have great PageRank withabsolutelyno returnon investment (ROI) andvise-versa.
What is linkbait?It is highlylinkable masterfullycraftedpieces of content people not onlylike but alsorecommendto others bylinking.
Can’t myniece whois a graphic designer dothe SEO? Again, SEO is anart and a science. There are a number of people that are well versedinmany
areas of website designand development but those who are successful inSEO have anextreme passionfor SEO specifically. Just as webdesigners
are no coders, graphic designers are not SEO experts.
Can’t mynephewwhois a web developer do the SEO?Manyprofessionalschoolsdon’t train webdevelopers about SEO andits place inweb
programming. A goodwebdeveloper can onlyprovide about one thirdof the skills neededfor successful SEO.
Can myson-in-law who is a Perl, Java and Cprogrammer do mySEO? Programmers oftenunderestimate the difficultyof SEO andattempt to attain
rankings bycreating scripts that automaticallyenhance websites. This is a veryriskybusiness as it oftencrosses the thin line of what’s allowedby
the search engine guidelines.
WhyshouldI outsource mySEO? SEO is a full time process. Unless youhave at least one experiencedfulltime SEO in-house it is stronglyadvised to
seekassistance from a SEO companyor consultant.
Can’t I just use WordPressplus plugins for SEO? Youcanto get startedbut it’s not enough. Nowadays most moderncontent management systems
(CMS) and blogsoftware have built-intechnical SEO capabilities. To outrankothers who use mostlySEO friendlysoftware, you needa professional.
Does Google hate SEO? No, Google provides information and website tools to help webmasters fine-tune their SEO efforts. Infact the Google
employees andSEO practitioners speakat the same conferences and work together as business partners.
Does SEO mean optimizationfor search engines spiders not humans?SEO is not usedto please just search engines robots but humans as well.
Most reputable SEO experts advocate search engine optimizationfor end-users and customers.
Is buyinglinks, hidden text, IPdeliveryetc. black hat SEO?Most definitely! Some techniquescanbe usedethicallyas well but there these specific
tactics are blackhat SEO tactics.
Is black hat SEO legal? The questionto ask shouldrather be whether blackhat SEO is recommended. No it is not. Most ofit is probablystill legal,
depending onthe technique. It pays onlyfor the fewwhodoit onlarge scale but most that dofindtheir websites and IPadd resses blacklistedfrom
search enginesquickly.
Does site size matter?Yes, site size does matter. Searchengines willonlycrawl a portionof the data ona site if it is overrun withprogramming
codes, large graphics andother technologicalinstances that wouldslowdown as website load time.
Do domainextensions (toplevel domains like .com, co.uk)matter?Yes theydo. Especiallywhenit comesto country-baseddomains like .fr, .de or
.es – for local results in respective countriesyou shoulduse preferablya countrydomainto get a small advantage.
Do nofollowlinks count?Yes, searchengines don’t discount nofollow links completelybut it decreases the credibilityof the linkandtherefore it’s
link“juice”.
Do you offer PageRankoptimization, searchengine submission, meta tagoptimization?These things are secondary or negligible. In the worldof
SEO, content andlinking reignsupreme.
Is blogcommenting for SEO spam?Like inmanyother cases, it depends on how it is used. Your name should be relevant and comment value needs
to be added.
I have a questionor answer that is not onthis FAQ what canI do? There is a comment section! Addyour questions and/or answers there. They
might get addedto the actual FAQ. Ifyou wouldlike to keepyour question private or wouldlike to hire me as your SEO consultant, feelfree to
contact me for free SEO quote.
What does SEO stand for? The acronym stands for SearchEngine Optimization. Inother words, ifyou want your website to be “o ptimized” for great
search engine rankings, you want to take advantage of SEO!
What is SEO? SEO is the combinationof necessarysteps that result inimproved (higher) rankings in the searchengines’ organic (non -paid)listings.
SEO includestechnical tasks to make it easier for search engine spiders to index the content on a website or social media n etworking community.
Is SEO spam, junk, dead, etc.? Virtuallyeverylarge companyengagesandinvests in their own SEO campaigns. Theypractice SEO like most other
website owners. Bythe numbers, SEO is booming all the time andhas beenfor severalyears now.
Whyaren’t we #1 or on page 1 at Google? AnySEO companythat promises youthe #1 spot on searchengines is trying to sell yo u snake oil. There
are no guarantees as far as search enginesare concerned. However, here are some questions to consider:Does your site consists mainlyof Flash,
AJAX or is it simplygraphics?Are other websites linking backto yours?Does your website have anykind ofsocialmediapresence?These are some

of the things woulddefinitelyhurt your ranking abilities, but the list ofoffensesis actuallymuchlonger andrequires the attentionof a serious SEO
campaign.
Whyam I on #1 all the time but when mywife searchesfor me she doesn’t findme?Youprobablyneedto disable personalizedsearch –
http://www.google.com/support/accounts/bin/answer.py?answer=54048. Search engines like to cache (or keep) your personal preferences and
personalizedsearch queries. If you search and click onyour website often, the personalized searchwill bring that website to the topof the stack.
Therefore, cleanyour cache andturn off personalized searchoptions to see the real ranking.
When will we see results?It will take a while depending onwhat results you expect what for. Some keywords might eventake a year or more while
others mayworkafter weeks or months. Also, keepinmind that SEO is basicallya continuous process that never stops and, after time, should pay
for itself withthe number of new customers it brings you.
Can we rankfor everything (huge list of keywords)? Unless you have a nearlylimitless budget, we recommend that you choose and set your
preferences. You needto determine your main keywords, a few of them, andgo after them. Your mainkeywords wouldbe the most relevant,
popular, andprofitable ones.
How much doesSEO cost? Our SEO plans are primarilydetermined byyour geographicaltarget. If you are competingon a nationwide scale, your
SEO campaignwill be more involved and aggressive thanifit were onlycompeting ona local / citywide scale. Our plans are simplycategorizedas:
Local ($250 monthly), Regional ($500 monthly), andNational ($750 monthly).
Whyis SEO expensive? Think about it another way:SEO isn’t about costing youmoney, rather, SEO is about making you money. Anythingthat is
effectivelygoing to bring you more exposure andbetter online rankings is goingto require a lot of time andresources. That said, when you
compare our plans with our competitors, you quicklylearnthat we are not expensive. While our competitors often charge thousands ofdollars per
month, our plans beginat only$250!
How longdoes it take to get indexed byGoogle? There is nohard and fast rule to this question. The time it takes varies. Each search engine indexes
different websites at different times. It could take minutes or weeks dependingon your site. Without SEO it might even take forever.
How to submit mynewsite to Google/Bing/Yahoo etc.?These days, websitesaren’t submitteddirectlyto search engines. We link to themfrom
alreadyindexed sites, pingthem via blogposts, andsubmit XML sitemaps. These activities result inyour site being indexed inthe searchengines
naturally.
Do I need an XML sitemap?Thisis a debatedtopic. Dependingon your site you mayor maynot need one; however, we generallyrecommendit.
Do I need meta tags for SEO? Yes. Although some meta tags are nolonger being used for searchengine placement andindexing(suchas meta
keyword tags), the Title andDescriptionmeta tag informationis often displayed inthe search results andcanincrease the chances that someone
will click the link to your website. Other meta tag informationgives data to the searchengines to helpdecide if your site is safe andwhenthey
should returnto index again.
Do I need a highPageRankfor SEO? Youneedinternal Pagerankfor your site to get indexed. Toolbar PageRank (the greenbar in your Google
toolbar) is not a prerequisite. There are thousands ofwebsites that have great PageRank withabsolutelynoreturnoninvestment (ROI) andvise-
versa.
What is linkbait?There are at least two commondefinitions oflinkbait (or link bait). One negative and one positive. The negative one says that it’s
luring people to linkto you for a reason theynormallywouldn’t. The positive one explains that linkbait is a highlylinkable masterfullycraftedpeace
of content people not onlylike but that theyalso recommend to others bylinking.
Can’t mynephew, whois a graphic designer, do the SEO?SEO is anart anda science. There are a number of people that a re well versedinmany
areas of website designand development but those who are successful inSEO have anextreme passionfor it. In most cases, designers
underestimate the importance of SEO and misunderstand it.
Can’t myfriend, whois a webdeveloper, do mySEO? Manyprofessional schools don’t trainweb developers about SEO andits place inweb
programming. A goodwebdeveloper can onlyprovide about one thirdof the skills required for successful SEO.
WhyshouldI outsource mySEO? SEO is a full-time job. Unless you have at least one experiencedfull-time SEO in-house it is stronglyadvisedto
seekassistance from a SEO company.
Can’t I just use WordPressand some SEO-related plugins for better rankings? That wouldbe a start, but even knowing for sure how to properlyset-
up WordPress as well as whichSEO plugins workthe best, without conflictingwith one another, is an involved matter. Evenif this were to take care
of your on-site SEO needs, you wouldstill needoff-site SEO (suchas gaining links to your site from other websites). For on-site SEO purposes, we
highlyrecommendour own SitePressor website designtechnologyandservice!

Does Google hate SEO? Not at all. Google evenoffers SEO advice anda plethora of SEO tools. It’s a myth that Google fights SEO’s. In fact, Google
Is buyinglinks, hidden text, IPdeliveryetc. black hat SEO?Some of these techniques canbe usedethically, but onlythe context candetermine
when a particular measure is “black” or “white hat”. (“Blackhat” is a term usedto refer to unethical SEO tactics, while “wh ite hat” is a term usedto
refer to honest andethical SEO tactics.)
Do nofollowlinks count?It has longbeen knownthat Yahoo doesn’t discount nofollowlinks completely. It alsoseems that Google makes
exceptions as well.
Do you offer PageRankoptimization, searchengine submission, meta tagoptimization?These things are secondaryor negligible. In the worldof
SEO, content andlinking are what matter.
QuestionandAnswers:
What does SEO stand for? The acronym stands for SearchEngine Optimization. Inother words, ifyou want your website to be “o ptimized” for great
search engine rankings, you want to take advantage of SEO!
What is SEO? SEO is the combinationof necessarysteps that result inimproved (higher) rankings in the searchengines’ organic (non-paid)listings.
SEO includestechnical tasks to make it easier for search engine spiders to index the content on a website or social media networking community.
Is SEO spam, junk, dead, etc.? Virtuallyeverylarge companyengagesandinvests in their own SEO campaigns. Theypractice SEO like most other
website owners. Bythe numbers, SEO is booming all the time andhas beenfor severalyears now.
Whyaren’t we #1 or on page 1 at Google? AnySEO companythat promises youthe #1 spot on searchengines is trying to sell yo u snake oil. There
are no guarantees as far as search enginesare concerned. However, here are some questions to consider:Does your site consists mainlyof Flash,
AJAX or is it simplygraphics?Are other websites linking backto yours?Does your website have anykind ofsocialmediapresence?These are some
of the things woulddefinitelyhurt your ranking abilities, but the list ofoffensesis actuallymuchlonger andrequires the attentionof a serious SEO
campaign.
Whyam I on #1 all the time but when mywife searchesfor me she doesn’t findme?Youprobablyneedto disable personalizedsearch –
http://www.google.com/support/accounts/bin/answer.py?answer=54048. Search engines like to cache (or keep) your personal preferences and
personalizedsearch queries. If you search and click onyour website often, the personalized searchwill bring th at website to the topof the stack.
Therefore, cleanyour cache andturn off personalized searchoptions to see the real ranking.
When will we see results?It will take a while depending onwhat results you expect what for. Some keywords might eventake a year or more while
others mayworkafter weeks or months. Also, keepinmind that SEO is basicallya continuous process that never stops and, after time, shouldpay
for itself withthe number of new customers it brings you.
Can we rankfor everything (huge list of keywords)? Unless you have a nearlylimitless budget, we recommend that you choose and set your
preferences. You needto determine your main keywords, a few of them, andgo after them. Your mainkeywords wouldbe the most relevant,
popular, and profitable ones.
How much doesSEO cost? Our SEO plans are primarilydetermined byyour geographicaltarget. If you are competingon a nationw ide scale, your
SEO campaignwill be more involved and aggressive thanifit were onlycompeting ona local / citywide scale. Our plans are simplycategorizedas:
Local ($250 monthly), Regional ($500 monthly), andNational ($750 monthly).
Whyis SEO expensive? Think about it another way:SEO isn’t about costing youmoney, rather, SEO is about making you money. Anythingthat is
effectivelygoing to bring you more exposure andbetter online rankings is goingto require a lot of time andresources. That said, when you
compare our plans with our competitors, you quicklylearnthat we are not expensive. While our competitors often charge thousands ofdollars per
month, our plans beginat only$250!
How longdoes it take to get indexed byGoogle? There is nohard and fast rule to this question. The time it takes varies. Each search engine indexes
different websites at different times. It could take minutes or weeks dependingon your site. Without SEO it might even take forever.
How to submit mynewsite to Google/Bing/Yahoo etc.?These days, websitesaren’t submitteddirectlyto search engines. We link to themfrom
alreadyindexed sites, pingthem via blogposts, andsubmit XML sitemaps. These activities result inyour site being indexed inthe s earchengines
naturally.
Do I need an XML sitemap?Thisis a debatedtopic. Dependingon your site you mayor maynot need one; however, we generallyrecommendit.
Do I need meta tags for SEO? Yes. Although some meta tags are nolonger being used for searchengine placement andindexing(suchas meta
keyword tags), the Title andDescriptionmeta tag information is often displayed inthe search results andcanincrease the chances that someone

will click the link to your website. Other meta tag informationgives data to the searchengines to helpdecide if your site is safe andwhenthey
should returnto index again.
Do I need a highPageRankfor SEO? Youneedinternal Pagerankfor your site to get indexed. Toolbar PageRank (the greenbar in your Google
toolbar) is not a prerequisite. There are thousands ofwebsites that have great PageRank withabsolutelynoreturnoninvestment (ROI) andvise-
versa.
What is linkbait?There are at least two commondefinitions oflinkbait (or link bait). One negative and one positive. The negative one says that it’s
luring people to linkto you for a reason theynormallywouldn’t. The positive one explains that linkbait is a highlylinkable masterfullycraftedpeace
of content people not onlylike but that theyalso recommend to others bylinking.
Can’t mynephew, whois a graphic designer, do the SEO?SEO is anart anda science. There are a number of people that are well versedinmany
areas of website designand development but those who are successful inSEO have anextreme passionfor it. In most cases, designers
underestimate the importance of SEO and misunderstand it.
Can’t myfriend, whois a webdeveloper, do mySEO? Manyprofessional schools don’t trainweb developers about SEO andits place inweb
programming. A goodwebdeveloper can onlyprovide about one thirdof the skills required for successful SEO.
WhyshouldI outsource mySEO? SEO is a full-time job. Unless you have at least one experiencedfull-time SEO in-house it is stronglyadvisedto
seekassistance from a SEO company.
Can’t I just use WordPressand some SEO-related plugins for better rankings? That would be a start, but even knowing for sure how to properlyset-
up WordPress as well as whichSEO plugins workthe best, without conflictingwith one another, is an involved matter. Evenif this were to take care
of your on-site SEO needs, you wouldstill need off-site SEO (suchas gaining links to your site from other websites). For on-site SEO purposes, we
highlyrecommendour own SitePressor website designtechnologyandservice!
Does Google hate SEO? Not at all. Google evenoffers SEO advice anda plethora of SEO tools. It’s a myth that Google fights SEO’s. In fact, Google
Is buyinglinks, hidden text, IPdeliveryetc. black hat SEO?Some of these techniques canbe usedethically, but onlythe context candetermine
when a particular measure is “black” or “white hat”. (“Blackhat” is a term usedto refer to unethical SEO tactics, while “wh ite hat” is a term usedto
refer to honest andethical SEO tactics.)
Do nofollowlinks count?It has longbeen knownthat Yahoo doesn’t discount nofollowlinks completely. It alsoseems that Google makes
exceptions as well.
Do you offer PageRankoptimization, searchengine submission, meta tagoptimization?These things are secondaryor negligible. In the worldof
SEO, content andlinking are what matter.
1) HOW DOES SOCIAL MEDIA AFFECT SEO?
This is becomingone of the most commonquestions around, andopinions varyquite widely. Althoughsocial media marketinghas beenseeninthe
past as a separate entityto search engine optimisation, it is becomingcloselyassociatedwithSEO with the twopractices mu tuallybeneficialto
each other. Social media indirectlycontributes to SEO through generating an audience to share content with and who mayeventuallycreate links
to your website for you.
However, it is becomingapparent that social media alsohassome direct contributionto a website’s search engine ranking. Ma tt Cutts hasgiven us
mixed ideas of just howdirectlysocial media affects search engine rankings, and more detail canbe foundat the Nebstone blog. Inshort, both
socialmediapopularityandsocialmedia links have some impact ona website’s searchengine ranking, meaning social media re allyis becomingan
essential part of SEO and is likelyto playa larger role inthe future.
2) DOES ARTICLE MARKETING STILL CONTRIBUTE TO SEO?
This questionis perhaps debatable. Good quality, unique content submitted to qualityarticle sites is probablystill effective. However, it maybe a
mistake to fill it with keywordedbacklinks to your website, because this might be flaggedas SEO spamand the potential cred ibilityof the article’s
backlinks maybe shot down. Havingsaid this, it is worth noting that Matt Cutts is not a bigfan ofarticle marketing andsuggests leaning awayfrom
this (although he doesn’t sayit’s ineffective).
3) HOW DO I INCREASE MY PAGERANK?
A lot of people still thinkPageRankis animportant part of attaining highpositions in the SERPs. Thismayhave beentrue 10 years ago but
nowadays, there is reallyverylittle correlationbetweenPageRankandsearchengine rankings. Therefore, the answer to this questionis just you
don’t needto worrytoo muchabout it. PageRankreallyonlytellsGoogle how frequentlyto crawl that website, soifyou have a low PageRank
Google maycrawl your website less oftenyes, but don’t worryabout your searchengine rankings, a webpage withPageRank1 ca n easilyoutrank a
webpage witha higher PageRank of6.
4) HOW IMPORTANT IS DOMAIN NAME FOR SEO?

A lot of people askwhat theyshould use as their domainname and how important it is. Domainname canhelpwith SEO yes, but in future, Google
mayput less weight onthis, withnumerous complaints that Google has weighteddomain names tooheavilyinthe past. Don’t get tooworried
about domainname though, it’s bynomeans necessaryto have a keywordeddomainname. Inmanycases it maybe muchbetter to have a
brandeddomainname, showing customers whoyou are and creating a more personalisedfeel to your website. Insomanycases, websiteswith
brandeddomainnames are at the topof the search results, because brand matters, and there are somanyother effective ways to optimise your
website for SEO.
One more thing to mentionis not to get over cautious about negative SEO and the idea of beingpenalisedbyGoogle. Google is simplytryingto
present customers withwhat theyare lookingfor, andare not tryingto look for reasons to penalise everyone! There isn’t oftena black andwhite
answer whenit comesto SEO, andeverysooftenyou just have to make a judgement callon whether something is going to be goodor badfor your
specific website.
.Whyare you leavingyour current job?
Sample answers to the interview question"Whydidyou leave your job?
I found myselfboredwith the work andlookingfor more challenges. I am an excellent employee andI didn't want myunhappiness to have any
impact on the jobI was doing for myemployer.
There isn't room for growthwith mycurrent employer and I'mreadyto move onto a newchallenge.
I'm looking for a bigger challenge and to grow mycareer and I couldn't jobhunt part time while working. It didn't seem ethical to use myformer
employer's time.
I was laid-offfrom mylast position when our department was eliminateddue to corporate restructuring.
I'm relocating to thisarea due to familycircumstances andleft myprevious positionin order to make the move.
I've decidedthat is not the directionI want to go inmycareer and mycurrent employer has noopportunitiesinthe directionI'dlike to head.
After severalyears in mylast position, I'm looking for an companywhere I cancontribute and grow in a team-orientedenvironment.
I am interestedin a new challenge andanopportunityto use mytechnical skills andexperience ina different capacitythanI have inthe past.
I recentlyreceivedmydegree andI want to utilize myeducationalbackgroundin mynext position.
I am interestedin a jobwithmore responsibility, and I am veryreadyfor a new challenge.
I left mylast positioninorder to spendmore time withmyfamily. Circumstances have changedandI'mmore thanreadyfor fu ll-time employment
again.
I am seeking a positionwith a stable companywithroomfor growthandopportunity for advancement.
I was commuting to the cityandspendinga significant amount of time each dayontravel. I wouldprefer to be closer to home.
To be honest, I wasn't considering a move, but, I sawthis jobposting andwas intrigued bythe positionandth e company. It sounds like an exciting
opportunityandanidealmatch withmyqualifications.
This positionseemedlike anexcellent match for myskills andexperience and I am not able to fullyutilize them in mypresent job.
The companywas cuttingback and, unfortunately, myjob was one ofthoseeliminated.
Q:What appearedto be the latest update whichGoogle hadandexactlywhat changes would you suggest regarding it?
A:Google latelypossessed the Penguinupdate that hasbeen a measure to control web spam. Penguinupdate had penalizedweb sites which
usuallyhada spammybacklinking profile and returned more semantic results. Semantic results were being determinedbythe relationship
betweenwords present onthe searchquery. Penguintrusted sitesthat hadoriginal and goodcontent, freshcontent, goodsocialmedia presence
in additionto excellent organic links.
Q:Under what circumstances wouldyou lookto exclude webpages fromsearch enginesusing robots. txt vs meta robots tag?
A. UsuallyI woulduse the robots. txt to keep a search engine from indexing an entire directoryon a site. This wouldoftenbe directories dealing
with adminfunctions or directorieswhichonlycontainscript or image libraries.
Q:What are the other methods to restrict a webpage from the search index?
A:we can use noindex meta tagfor the page whichwe dont want to be indexedingoogle searchsothat google will crawl andleave the site without
indexing.
Q:What exactlydoyou understandfromthe Panda update?
A:The Panda update wasdone to improve the qualityof search results inGoogle. Panda update alsoknown as the farmer update appeared tobe
done to eliminate content farms which providedless user friendlyexperience. It usedmachine language scalabilityas one of the important metrics
for judging relevancyof a webpage. All the focus wastransformedonthe user andnowqualitycontent, proper design, proper speed, suitable use
of images andvideos, content to adrationall mattered more after the Panda update. Youshould optimise your site for better clickthroughrate and
a a reducedamount of bounce rate.
Q:What areas doyou think are currentlythe most important in organicallyranking a website?
A:Text on page! Searchengines utilize text and onlytext inproviding search results. That textualcontent canbe found inmanyplace includingthe
URL and title ofyour respective pagesas wellas the visible text you place on your webpages.
Q:Whyis a Robots. txt File Used?
A: Robts. txt File is used to prevent the indexing ofduplicate content ona website or for implementing a no follow rule in anareaof a website.
Martijn Koster inventedthis file inthe earlypart of the 90s - the file used more andmore with the development well-knownsearch engines as time

SEO Interview Questions and Answers -Adesh Saxena

SEO Interview Questions and Answers -Adesh Saxena

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