SEO Através dos Olhos da Mulher: O que nos surpreendeu? Relatório internacional 2023

Tabela de conteúdos

 

Porquê este tópico em particular?

A pergunta básica: então quantas destas mulheres estão de fato na indústria de SEO...?

No topo: estrutura de emprego e o lugar das mulheres nas organizações

Contratações de mulheres especialistas em SEO. Há mais mulheres juniores na indústria?

Teto de vidro - tem certeza? Salários e oportunidades de progresso para as mulheres na indústria de SEO

Uma questão de gosto. Prós e contras da indústria de SEO através dos olhos das mulheres

Previsões, ou o futuro da indústria SEO através dos olhos das mulheres

46 mulheres especialistas em SEO

Metodologia - como foi produzido o relatório?

Porquê este tópico em particular?

Há já alguns anos que se fala muito sobre as mulheres na área de TI (por exemplo, campanhas como #girlswhocode), mas até agora pouca atenção tem sido dada à indústria de SEO. Chegou a hora de mudar isso! 

A iniciativa já começou a aparecer pelo próprio lado das mulheres, que passaram a se reunir em vários níveis diferentes: desde grupos do Facebook (tais como Sisters in SEO), a conferências (Women in Tech SEO ou Women in STEM Leadership Summit). Porque há cada vez mais eventos centrados em torno das mulheres? De acordo com conversas com as criadoras destes eventos, é evidente que elas querem ser levadas a sério, ao invés de serem convidadas para os painéis apenas por causa do seu gênero.

Profissionais femininas bem sucedidas são uma inspiração para outras, além de poder dar-lhes apoio prático. Dr. Marieke van de Rakt, quando era diretora da Yoast entre os anos 2019 e 2021, fornecia auditoria SEO a 13 milhões de sites em todo o mundo, e dirigiu programas de treino para mulheres na sua organização, tornando mais fácil para elas romperem o teto de vidro. No entanto, até ela admitiu que a proporção de gênero entre os funcionários de sua empresa (especialmente em cargos-chave) era desequilibrada naquela época. E como é que é hoje? Vamos tentar responder a esta questão no nosso relatório sobre a situação das senhoras na indústria de SEO.

A pergunta básica: então quantas destas mulheres estão de fato na indústria de SEO...?

Não há dados sobre quantas pessoas trabalham especificamente na indústria de  Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) na Polônia. Contudo, assumindo que existe um número variável entre um e centenas de profissionais de SEO trabalhando em cada uma das várias centenas de agências de marketing online, e acrescentando freelancers, é seguro assumir que se trata de pelo menos milhares de pessoas. A pesquisa da WhitePress® referia-se a 1.500 pessoas parte da indústria, mas não eram todos precisamente representantes desta indústria . Uma em cada três participantes era uma mulher.

Isto coincide com resultados de pesquisas que mostram que, ao contrário da opinião popular, proporcionalmente a maioria das mulheres na indústria de SEO encontra-se na Grécia e nos países da leste europeu: Lituânia, Letônia ,Estônia, Polônia e Ucrânia. 

Isto é confirmado pela  ucraniana Julia Nesterets, CEO e co-fundadora da JetOctopus.com.

Nunca senti quaisquer restrições de gênero na Ucrânia, e isto é válido para diferentes esferas profissionais. Foi o mesmo com SEO.

Não menos surpreendente são os países que são os mais "atrasados" em termos de igualdade de gênero em SEO, que acabam por ser Suécia, Noruega e Dinamarca, onde apenas um em cada quatro especialistas em SEO é do sexo feminino. Estes números aplicam-se à Europa, mas a situação é semelhante a nível mundial. - No Brasil, há muitas SEOs boas, mas ainda não temos as mesmas oportunidades ou igualdade de salários.  O mercado ainda é predominantemente masculino. . - nota Lisane Andrade, CEO da iana.ai, uma agência que combina as possibilidades oferecidas pela inteligência artificial com o mundo de SEO. Ela enfatiza que os obstáculos que as mulheres enfrentam na indústria vêm tanto de fora como ... de dentro. - Acredito que, por diversas questões, acabamos questionando cada passo minuciosamente. Muitas vezes, por medo de errar. Errar faz parte do crescimento e é dessa forma que ganhamos experiência. - diz Lisane.

Isto é confirmado por dados há muito conhecidos da investigação interna da Hewlett Packard, citados em livros como o "Faça Acontecer"de Sheryl Sandberg: os homens candidatam-se a empregos mesmo quando as suas qualificações correspondem apenas a 60% da descrição do emprego. As mulheres, por outro lado, só se aplicam quando correspondem a 100 por cento da descrição dos requisitos do empregador. E voltando à questão do número de mulheres que trabalham na indústria de SEO, se em média nos países europeus, aproximadamente 35 por cento dos profissionais de SEOs são mulheres, então estamos a falar de pelo menos 50.000 mulheres na indústria nesta região.

No topo: estrutura de emprego e o lugar das mulheres nas organizações 

Quase a metade (aproximadamente 42%) das mulheres em SEO trabalham em papéis especializados tais como content marketer, analista ou técnico de SEO. Apenas uma em cada cinco são diretoras ou fundadoras da sua própria empresa (13% e 11%, respectivamente), embora isto esteja começando a mudar. Em alguns locais, uns mais rapidamente que outros, como discute Sandra Julia Heirbaut, Gestora de Operações de Divulgação na Vime Digital:

Acredito que Barcelona é única em muitos aspetos e a bolha de SEO local não tem falta de mulheres. A cidade está cheia de mulheres jovens criativas, ambiciosas e inteligentes. De facto, a Vime é maioritariamente feminina e a maioria dos meus especialistas e candidatos a Outreach são mulheres.

Encontro cada vez mais mulheres fantásticas que estão trabalhando numa função sénior ou de gestão. Contudo, é ainda muito raro que conferências, eventos online, cursos de formação ou webinars tenham mulheres como palestrantes ou convidadas principais.

 

- diz Katarzyna Baranowska, vice-presidente da Fox Strategy

Isto reflete-se nas respostas a uma outra pergunta, precisamente quem é o seu supervisor imediato. 65 por cento admitiram que se tratava de um homem. Quando perguntámos a Beatriz Abrantes sobre isto, ela apontou uma possível razão:

Acredito que também há um fator importante que é o quanto esses homens aparecem ou estão em uma posição de visibilidade. Eventos, palestras, podcasts. (…) há pouco espaço para essas mulheres se colocarem, contarem suas histórias e participarem de maneira mais ativa nessas comunidades.

A falta de representação em podcasts ou convites para conferências significa menos reconhecimento e menos ofertas de emprego lucrativas, o que por sua vez alimenta o mecanismo de favorecer os homens em posições-chave. O círculo se completa. 

Eva Varga, fundadora da agência Varga Eva EV, salienta que as mulheres não são impedidas de iniciar os seus próprios negócios por falta de educação ou de conhecimentos. - Isto não é sobre SEO. Trata-se de como começar um negócio ou como começar uma carreira na sua vida. - assinala Varga, acrescentando que as mulheres ainda são uma minoria entre os empresários (por exemplo, na Polônia, onde 0,79 milhões de mulheres e 1,56 milhões de homens têm o seu próprio negócio). 

Usando o seu próprio exemplo, Ewelina Podrez-Siama, CEO da Fox Strategy, enumera as qualidades que ajudam as mulheres em altos cargos: - Quando se trata de ser um líder, é sobre empatia e comunicação aberta combinada com coerência de objectivos (embora ainda tenha muito que trabalhar neste último).- ela admite.

Quando perguntados sobre as áreas "favoritas" das mulheres na atividade de SEO, descobrimos que a maioria das mulheres estão envolvidas no  SEO do lado do conteúdo, o que está de acordo com o estereótipo da mulher como humanista . Olhando para o lado positivo, porém: quase uma em cada três mulheres já estão envolvidas na parte técnica do SEO. No entanto, esta é ainda uma percentagem relativamente pequena. Mas porquê? Este enigma é resolvido por Carlota Rincón Muñoz, Chefe de Conteúdo da Vime Digital. - Penso que é difícil para uma mulher iniciar uma carreira em qualquer indústria que possa estar relacionada com questões mais técnicas. Não porque não somos capazes, mas porque estas indústrias são mais centradas nos homens. - diz ela claramente.

Júlia Neves, Chefe Global de SEO no Day.io, concorda com Carlota.

Vejo também que mulheres são muito postas na caixinha de SEO de conteúdo, tirando as habilidades e o potencial da parte técnica.

Uma situação semelhante também ocorre na Turquia, onde a SEO técnica é também fortemente dominada por homens, como mencionado por Kübra Külünk, Gestora de SEO na Legal Templates:

Uma vez que o SEO ainda é considerado algo muito mais técnico, o número de homens é maior, contudo tem existido uma evolução e penso que esta evolução vai aumentar.

Beatrice Köhler, da Alemanha, também vê esta situação como um problema:

Penso que ainda há muito poucas mulheres, especialmente na área técnica de SEO. Na criação de conteúdos, a situação parece muito melhor. Também se nota que as mulheres são muito mais calmas e, por conseguinte, não se “destacam” tanto como os seus colegas masculinos.

A situação é idêntica na África do Sul, como revela Sofie Koevoets, SEO & Content Ops Manager at Superside:

Sou holandesa, mas vivo na África do Sul, onde sinto que muitas mulheres ainda são vistas como "não suficientemente conhecedoras", especialmente no que diz respeito a questões de TechSEO. Embora as capacidades analíticas de muitas mulheres sejam - na minha opinião - o que cria o melhor conhecimento e perícia em SEO. Ser capaz de 'ver o panorama geral' é essencial em qualquer coisa relacionada com SEO, porque tudo está relacionado. Sinto que por vezes é difícil para as mulheres explicar isto aos seus colegas ou superiores masculinos, que por vezes não têm essa visão.

E é a SEO técnica que é frequentemente vista como a mais importante, incluindo por Ana Heloisa Costa, directora de SEO na Webedia Brasil:

O perfil analítico é o mais importante. Desde a análise do público à compreensão das nuances do conteúdo que teve melhor desempenho, a comparação com a concorrência, sabendo que dados das ferramentas de SEO não correspondem à realidade, até à compreensão do público-alvo de uma forma mais completa e com o utilizador em primeiro lugar.

A importância do pensamento analítico é também realçada por Rosi Ghalachyan, gestor de contas SEO na uSERP:

O trabalho de SEO envolve uma grande quantidade de análise de dados e resolução de problemas. Ser capaz de decompor conjuntos de dados complexos e identificar padrões pode ajudar os profissionais de SEO a tomarem decisões conscientes.

A indústria também está a ver a mesma tendência que outros setores (por exemplo, médico ou educação). Lidia Velicu, Directora de SEO na DWF, descreve isto com o seu exemplo:

Quanto mais subia de posição na empresa, mais me dava conta de que enquanto a gestão intermediária tende a estar cheia de mulheres, a gestão do topo continua a ser um ambiente predominantemente masculino.

A mesma observação é feita por Júlia Neves, Chefe Global de SEO na Day.io.

O que vejo como o maior problema ainda hoje em dia é a questão de cargos de liderança. Vejo pouquíssimas mulheres como especialistas, gerentes ou em média/alta gestão.

Mónika Maksa, especialista em SEO na Marketing Astro Kft, pensa de maneira similar. - Ainda acontece - infelizmente com demasiada frequência - que quando se trata de escolher entre dois candidatos com competências iguais, as empresas preferem contratar homens. - explica Monika.

De onde poderá isto vir? Vivienne Goizet, Editorial Lead SEO da BILD, fala sobre isto:

Muitas vezes sentimos que precisamos de mil certificados e aprovações antes de podermos começar a fazer algo. Isto é seguramente o motivo pelo qual nos pedem por mais vezes provas das nossas capacidades e não nos dão o benefício da dúvida que os homens recebem a toda a hora. No entanto, podemos ambicionar mais um pouco, pois não existem tantos certificados para SEO. Podemos confiar mais na nossa capacidade de aprender coisas novas rapidamente e de nos adaptarmos. E caminhar para essa nova carreira de SEO mais cedo do que mais tarde.

A investigação também mostra que as mulheres sentem-se mais confortáveis num ambiente empresarial, uma vez que 43% delas trabalham numa empresa que emprega pelo menos 50 pessoas. Talvez isto tenha a ver com uma relutância de se destacar, o que ainda será mencionado no relatório.

E como é que os próprios donos das empresas avaliam o aumento da participação das mulheres no setor? Curiosamente, os inquiridos de 24 por cento das agências acreditam empregar uma quantidade similar de homens e mulheres. O número daqueles que afirmam empregar predominantemente um dos sexos é também mais ou menos uniforme. Isto sugere que a proporção de gênero em SEO é de cerca de 50/50. No entanto, tendo em conta que as estatísticas mostram claramente o contrário, os empresários e empresárias parecem ser demasiado optimistas na sua avaliação da situação ou estar fazendo vista grossa às desigualdades que os rodeiam. Embora ocorram excepções à regra, como mesmo na Polônia existem empresas onde predominam mulheres.

Conduzo uma das equipes de SEO mais empenhadas do meu país. Uma equipe que no tempo dos dinossauros era constituída apenas por homens, mas hoje em dia na sua maioria empregam mulheres. - nota Marianna Krupa, Chefe de SEO na empresa MaxROY.agency. - Foi apenas com o propósito deste estudo que comecei a contar quantas mulheres e quantos homens há na minha companhia. No dia-a-dia, o mais importante é que trabalhamos juntos, nos divertimos, crescemos e - independentemente do sexo -nos apoiamos e nos escutamos.

A popularidade do modelo freelance entre as mulheres, porém, é explicada por Michelle McCalden, que trabalha como consultora de SEO para várias empresas diferentes.

Para as mulheres que requerem trabalho flexível e equilibram as responsabilidades familiares com uma carreira, como eu, a indústria de SEO pode ser demasiado centrada nos homens. Como resultado, passei a maior parte da minha carreira como freelancer e não como parte de uma agência ou como empregada interna. - ela admite.

Sem dúvida, um modelo de trabalho em que a maioria das tarefas pode ser realizada a partir de casa é propício à vida familiar.

Contratações de mulheres especialistas em SEO. Há mais mulheres juniores na indústria?

No grupo inquirido, a maioria das mulheres trabalha na indústria entre 5 a 10 anos. É possível confirmar que não há falta de mulheres experientes em SEO, embora os homens ainda predominem entre os especialistas com muitos mais anos de experiência. E o que se verifica em posições júniores?

Constata-se que, entre os júniores, com até um ano de experiência, as mulheres predominam, ocupando até 60% das posições, enquanto que os homens ocupam apenas 40%. Ora, isto pode indicar que uma nova geração de mulheres está a entrar na indústria e que a proporção de mulheres para homens irá-se equilibrar com o tempo.

Quando se pergunta se é difícil para as mulheres iniciar tal carreira, a freelancer sénior Beata Szőke responde que é mais difícil para as mulheres do que para os homens. Entre as qualidades que podem ajudar um começo bem sucedido, contudo, ela menciona a busca constante do auto-desenvolvimento. De acordo com ela, numa indústria que muda praticamente de um dia para o outro, é possível utilizar a volatilidade das tendências para rapidamente ganhar a sua posição no mercado. 

Penso que a dificuldade que mulheres têm de entrar na indústria de SEO pode estar apenas nas suas cabeças, já que este é um ambiente estereotipado - um pouco de TI, um pouco de marketing, onde predominam sobretudo os homens. As mulheres, contudo, não carecem de nenhuma das qualidades necessárias para se tornarem uma SEO ideal.

 

- confirma Magdalena Bród, co-proprietária da CLUEGROUP.

Andrea Fórián, chefe de operações na empresa SEO101 (UNELTE SEO), dissipa o mito de que somente conhecimento técnico adquirido ao longo dos anos é necessário para entrar no jogo de SEO. Mais importante é a vontade de continuar a aprender. - É impossível saber tudo. É preciso estar sempre pronta para mudanças. - diz Lisane.

A indústria SEO foi durante muito tempo governada por homens, mas nos últimos anos tem havido uma mudança notável. Cada vez mais mulheres entram na indústria, trazendo uma perspectiva única e uma contribuição imprescindível.

 

- nota, por sua vez,  Stephanie Solheim, CEO e fundador da Grow With Meerkat.

É evidente que os jovens (ou neste caso, as jovens) estão começando na indústria em posições especializadas, ou seja, ofertas de emprego como Junior Content Writer ou Junior SEO Specialist. Uma em cada quatro juniores mulheres também começa como freelancer. 

Mas será que tais começos no setor de SEO afetam apenas as mulheres?

 - Eu não faria uma distinção de gênero aqui.  - diz Andreea Paleologu, Diretora de Contas da Sag Media Communications. Ela acredita que qualquer pessoa começando na indústria enfrenta desafios semelhantes. A chave do sucesso, acredita ela, são a perseverança, a consistência, a paciência e a curiosidade, e não o gênero.

Os caminhos que levam para a indústria de SEO parecem ser diferentes entre as mulheres empresárias e diretoras. Elas começam mais frequentemente no mundo empresarial (mais de metade tem experiência anterior como CEO ou proprietária de negócios). Apenas 3 por cento começou como especialista na parte mais baixa da escada corporativa. 

O caminho na direção oposta (de empresária a especialista) é raro, o que não quer dizer que não aconteça. 

Só me atrevi a promover-me como especialista depois de ter testado as minhas capacidades com o meu próprio dinheiro. Eu disse a mim mesma: "Se eu posso desenvolver meu próprio negócio de comércio eletrônico e obter resultados arriscando meu próprio orçamento, então posso ousar fazer isso pelos outros." Depois que me tornei a número um em várias palavras-chave, foi fácil me promover sabendo que poderia gerar resultados significativos.  

 

- menciona Mihaela Istrate, uma especialista internacional em SEO que trabalha na indústria médica.

Como podem ver, embora se fale muito sobre a revolução que se aproxima na indústria de SEO, a realidade é que mulheres com conquistas impressionantes já existem. Os problemas com a aceitação de mulheres em tais cargos vêm tanto de fora quanto, talvez mais surpreendentemente, dos próprios envolvidos, que ainda subestimam suas habilidades.

Teto de vidro - tem certeza? Salários e oportunidades de progresso para as mulheres na indústria de SEO

Em resposta às nossas perguntas, a maioria das mulheres expressou satisfação com os seus ganhos na indústria de SEO e sobre a crença em promoções (76% das entrevistadas responderam "definitivamente sim" e "sim" quando questionadas sobre as perspectivas de promoção).

 A diferença salarial foi quebrada e as mulheres são pagas da mesma forma que os seus colegas masculinos quando desempenham os mesmos papéis.

 

- explica MJ Cachón Yáñez, diretora administrativa e consultora de SEO na LAIKA.

Ao mesmo tempo, cerca de 77% das entrevistadas acreditam que o gênero é importante na determinação da remuneração e na tomada de decisões de contratação. 

Houve momentos em que perdi contratos apenas por ser mulher, porque os empresários achavam que seu campo de trabalho era "masculino demais" para ser compreendido pelas mulheres. Mas estas são excepções. Trabalhamos com uma grande variedade de empresas que cobrem muitas áreas, incluindo algumas fortemente técnicas.

 

- admite Anca Alexandra Dobrescu, fundadora da PePrimaPagina.ro

No entanto, há também o outro lado da moeda, uma vez que 63% das mulheres em SEO acreditam que, façam o que fizerem, ainda não têm voz ativa para decidir se recebem um aumento ou uma promoção. Na opinião delas, o gênero as limita.

Ainda vemos e sentimos que sempre temos que fazer mais do que os homens para conquistar nosso espaço.

 

- explica Andreza Ferrari, Gestora de SEO da Corebiz.

Que é fácil ser pessimista no início da carreira confirma Natalia Witczyk, uma freelancer que trabalha como consultora de SEO. É assim que ela se lembra os seus primórdios:

-Tinha uma equipa 100% masculina e chefes masculinos. Nunca imaginei que pudesse chegar tão longe na minha carreira, simplesmente devido à falta de exemplos. Eu estava convencida de que não havia outras mulheres trabalhando em SEO. - admite Natalia. Contudo, ela acrescenta imediatamente que, na sua opinião, é agora muito mais fácil do que costumava ser para as mulheres começarem a trabalhar em SEO.

As especialistas têm algumas dicas para ajudá-la a começar no setor. 

Eu sou uma grande defensora da marca pessoal para fazer da SEO uma carreira: A visibilidade ajuda a posicionar-se e encoraja outras mulheres a entrar na indústria SEO.

 

- menciona Lucía Rico, consultora de SEO da agência Lucía y el SEO.

Há cada vez mais mulheres no setor, de fato sempre houve, mas muitas delas permaneceram anônimas até agora. Felizmente, cada vez mais mulheres têm a coragem de se tornarem públicas.

- concorda Noelia Regalado, CEO da SeoForce Agency.

Num mundo obcecado por celebridades, as conhecidas caras femininas de SEO estão a ajudar a difundir a indústria como um potencial caminho de carreira para as meninas. As mulheres já têm os seus próprios podcasts (Kate Toon e The Recipe for SEO Success), livros (A Arte de SEO: Mastering Search Engine Optimization, co-autoria de Jessie C. Stricchiola) ou tutoriais no Youtube (guia de SEO Britney Muller no canal de Anthony Miyazaki).

Uma questão de gosto. Prós e contras da indústria de SEO através dos olhos das mulheres

Quando perguntamos a representantes femininas da indústria sobre as vantagens e desvantagens de tal trabalho, a grande maioria citou entre as vantagens a possibilidade de trabalhar num setor fortemente em crescimento e em constante mudança. Isto traduziu-se em variedade de tarefas diárias, oportunidades de aprendizagem contínua e satisfação geral no trabalho, que também estavam no topo da lista de respostas.

Para mim, esta é a mais interessante e desafiante das "experiências web".
 

- diz Limor Barenholtz, diretora de SEO da Similarweb, sobre SEO.

Gostei da complexidade do SEO desde o início, vi como um desafio e uma oportunidade de crescimento, então gostei muito de poder aprender constantemente.  
 

- acrescenta Georgina Ujhelyi, diretora de contas da BP Digital.

Tenho trabalhado em muitos campos ao longo dos anos, mas quando descobri SEO, foi como se de repente tivesse encontrado o que  estava destinado para mim....  .
 

- resume Noelia Regalado, CEO da SeoForce Agency.

E o que é que as mulheres pensam que poderia ser melhorado na indústria de SEO? A mesma coisa! 44% observa que a mudança constante é, no entanto, difícil de acompanhar, o que constitui um grande desafio. As respostas também incluíram:

Como se pode ver, os pontos mais problemáticos das mulheres na indústria de SEO, no entanto, são principalmente questões práticas, não relacionadas a questões focadas em gênero. - Ajuda (...) ter curiosidade e vontade de aprender. O SEO muda com bastante frequência e você precisa se manter atualizada.

- conclui Natascha Bauwens , que trabalha como especialista em SEO na agência Essent.

Uma grande vantagem é que há uma demanda maior por especialistas no mercado, e muito se fala em SEO! A desvantagem da situação atual é que as jovens se tornam especialistas muito rapidamente e, logo, estão longe do conhecimento especializado exigido há alguns anos.
 

- menciona Klara Anna Witkowska,especialista em SEO e UX Designer na agência Digitly.

A maior surpresa para nós, porém, é a opinião de mulheres do setor sobre o clima que reina em suas equipes.  96 por cento afirma ser muito ou bastante positiva, mostrando que construir relações amigáveis mesmo numa indústria tão difícil não só é possível, como também importante para o dia-a-dia dos negócios. Também contradiz o estereótipo de um programador ou profissional de marketing sentado sozinho na frente de um computador. 

 A líder da minha equipa e a maioria da equipe de SEO eram mulheres. Mesmo quando mudei de emprego e era a única mulher no departamento de SEO, não me sentia 'menos': menos profissional, menos competente, etc. Todos se apoiaram mutuamente e foram amigáveis
 

- recorda Olga Zhukova,  consultora de SEO que trabalha por conta própria.

Nossos especialistas também confirmaram a tendência de mulheres se juntarem em grupos de apoio relacionados a esta indústria. - Quando em dúvida, prefiro buscar a opinião dos meus amigos SEO ou fazer a pergunta diretamente em uma comunidade tipicamente feminina. - diz Agata Gruszka, International SEO Manager na agência WhitePress®. Suas palavras refletem a má opinião entre as mulheres de grupos de suporte online de SEO. A masculinidade tóxica domina ali, e provocações desagradáveis não são raras.

Talvez a atmosfera geralmente boa (juntamente com as finanças) explique por que, embora uma em cada três mulheres em SEO às vezes considere outras carreiras, metade das entrevistadas não planeja mudar de emprego. Ao mesmo tempo, a hipótese de mudar de emprego num futuro próximo é classificada como baixa ou zero tanto pelas mulheres juniores como por aquelas com 5-10 anos de experiência no setor.

Acho que a situação em que as mulheres em SEO se encontram depende de qual é sua especialidade, quanta pesquisa fazem fora dessa especialidade, quão motivadas estão para ir além do que sabem e que atitude têm em relação a suas carreiras (se SEO é realmente sua carreira ou apenas um trabalho no momento).
 

- diz  Judith Lewis, fundadora da Decabbit Consultancy.

Previsões, ou o futuro da indústria SEO através dos olhos das mulheres

Isso conclui os pensamentos dos especialistas sobre o papel do gênero no mundo SEO. Por fim, resolvemos aproveitar para questioná-las sobre as perspectivas do próprio setor. 

Na nossa investigação, a opinião mais comum entre as respostas foi a crescente importância dos fatores comportamentais na SEO do futuro. Trata-se principalmente de uma análise ainda melhor do comportamento dos usuários dos sites e aplicativos.

Perfil analítico é o mais importante. Desde análises de audiência para entender nuances dos conteúdos que tiveram melhor performance, comparar com a concorrência, saber quais dados das ferramentas de SEO não condizem com a realidade, até entender o público-alvo de uma forma mais completa e user first.
 

- explica Ana Heloísa Costa, diretora de SEO da Webedia Brasil.

Por sua vez, Rosi Ghalachyan, SEO Account Manager na uSERP, propõe outra forma de compreender o papel crescente do comportamento humano para SEO.

O trabalho de um especialista em SEO geralmente envolve trabalhar com muitas partes interessadas, incluindo clientes, desenvolvedores e equipes de marketing. Fortes habilidades de comunicação são essenciais para comunicar estratégias de forma eficaz e colaborar com outras pessoas.
 

- afirma Rosi.

Sandra Julia Heirbaut, gestora de operações de divulgação na agência Vime Digital, vê as coisas de forma ainda diferente, dizendo:  - Analisar e compreender a minha equipa a um nível em que possa apreciar o estilo individual de cada um me permite trabalhar de uma forma eficiente em termos de tempo, manter uma dinâmica e deixar espaço para a criatividade. 

As opiniões estavam mais divididas em relação ao futuro financeiro da indústria. A investigação mostra que é impossível prever se os orçamentos das agências irão aumentar ou diminuir. Existem muitos fatores em jogo, como o papel crescente da IA ou a imprevisibilidade dos algoritmos.

No entanto, 68 por cento dos entrevistados são geralmente otimistas sobre o desenvolvimento de SEO, acreditando que a indústria só crescerá em importância. Esperemos que o mesmo se aplique às mulheres empregadas nesta área.

46 mulheres especialistas em SEO

Além das participantes que responderam às perguntas do formulário, bem como das mulheres que participaram da pesquisa CAWI, convidamos 45 especialistas de todo o mundo (incluindo Brasil, Ucrânia e Romênia) para a entrevista. Elas tiveram a gentileza de compartilhar conosco seus pensamentos sobre as mulheres em SEO. Abaixo você encontrará seus perfis.

 Ewelina Podrez-Siama, CEO, Fox Strategy sp. z o.o.

SEO specialist for nearly 14 years. Founder and CEO of the Fox Strategy agency, where she works with a team of experienced specialists and promotes implements self-organization.

Blogger and author of three best-selling keto cookbooks and the book "SEO for bloggers, influencers and personal brands".

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

For more than 13 years I’ve been observing how the SEO industry in Poland is changing – from strongly masculinized to more open to diversity. It happened slowly, step by step. However, I am glad that there are more and more women on the conference stages and more women-specialists sharing their knowledge.

I think there is still a lot of work to be done when it comes to inclusivity. This applies not only to the SEO industry. It is a two-sided job. It requires a constant change of attitude in men (I appreciate more frequent intercession for diversity on stage and I would like it to become a standard), but also in women (I know from numerous conversations with the event organizers that it is still more difficult to convince women to appear in podcasts or give lectures). I think we can learn a lot from each other if we keep mutual openness.

I have seen a lot of dynamics of change over the last few years, both in the industry and in the world. The difference is also visible in the survey I conducted in the industry (https://foxstrategy.pl/materialy/Ankieta-Znaczenie-Plci-Raport.pdf). I deeply believe that we are on the right path to a permanent change.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I was lucky to start working in SEO in a diverse team. Later, when I started building my personal brand and appearing on events, things were not so great. In those days there was more social acceptance of discriminatory jokes and comments - I wrote more about it in an article that discussed the results of the survey on a blog of an agency More Bananas: https://morebananas.pl/blog/boimy-sie-rozmawiac-o-dyskryminacji

I want to believe and I really hope that nowadays such situations are marginal, but from conversations with colleagues in the industry I know that they still happen.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

My career started so many years ago that it is difficult for me to speak on behalf of younger women-specialists. I hope it's at least a little bit easier.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

The character attributes that help me to be an SEO specialist are: stubbornness, fierce search for solutions and love of working in an environment full of changes (algorithm or work standards).

When it comes to being a leader, it is empathy and open communication, combined with consistent pursuit of the goal (although I still have to work a lot on the latter).

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Precisely because of my love of working in the changing environment. An important role in this decision was also played by the possibility of combining a marketing and business perspectives with technical work.

Natascha Bauwens, SEO specialist, Essent

For 7 years I have been supporting various companies and entrepreneurs, both in-house and freelance, in realizing their online ambitions in SEO.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Being thoughtful is quite a useful trait. You don't want to just say things that are ultimately wrong. It also helps to be eager to learn and curious. SEO changes quite often, and you need to stay up to date. In addition, you must also be able to collaborate and communicate well; you often have many different stakeholders.

Andrea Fórián, CEO, SEO101 (UNELTE SEO)

I started as a copywriter in 2010, then gradually learned and fell in love with the SEO profession, both have continued ever since: both love and learning.

I fell into this world from a completely offline field - journalism - I could say that I was in the right place at the right time, I could experience that the perception of the SEO profession is changing before my eyes, and I was also able to grow up to the task together with the SEO101 agency.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

12 years ago, when I entered the world of SEO and the industry was almost in its infancy, at least there were not so many small sub-tasks, as there are today. Nevertheless, it was very attractive, it was a completely unknown field, I wanted to know everything I could, later I had to realize that it was an eternal learning process. There is no such thing as knowing everything, because you must always be ready to accept and adapt to change and, most importantly, make new things useful for the customer.

Carlota Rincón Muñoz, Head of Content, Vime Digital

Carlota Rincón is the Head of Content at Vime Digital where she leads the content strategy for their clients’ portfolio. With a vast experience in different fields of the content creation process, Carlota has specialized in devising and developing multi-channel content campaigns and narratives that tackle content marketing strategically.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

The SEO industry is booming, although I think it is still a pretty much male-centered industry. Nowadays, I see more and more women getting interested in SEO and being key speakers in events that keep on shaping the industry. There are so many interesting profiles we can learn from that have been helping developing the industry and have established their names as THE women in SEO.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think it is difficult for a woman to start a career in industries that could be related to a more technical field, in general. This is not because we are incapable of but because these industries are more male-centered. However, I see the change, I am part of the change, and I love the ride!

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I consider myself a data-driven person; I like to track progression, test results and improve those results to achieve excellence.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

This one is very much related to the previous one. I love the constant stimulation of learning new things, investigating and keep on applying new ways of work that drive long-term results.

Lisane Andrade, Founder and CEO iana.ai

Lisane Andrade has been a Digital Strategist for 14 years. Specialist in SEO and Metrics. Founder of Agência Blast Marketing and iana, the 1st SEO Tool with Artificial Intelligence and Automations in Brazil.

She has been a professor in MBAs, Influencer Marketing at Semrush for 7 years, a member of the Latinas en SEO Committee and an Ambassador for Women in E-commerce in Europe, where she lives.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

In Brazil, there are many good SEO specialists, but we still don't have the same opportunities or equal salaries. The market is still predominantly male. I believe that, for several reasons, we ended up questioning each step in detail. Often out of fear of making a mistake. Making mistakes is part of development, and that's how we gain experience. But, if I were to make a comparison with the market 5 years ago, today, there are many women conquering their space.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I started in SEO in 2009. At that time, there was no content available on the internet and no experienced professionals to learn from. I learned that SEO existed when I read a marketing book that cited an e-commerce case at Google. This beginning made me learn and evolve a lot as a professional. I had to turn around, go after, test, understand and resolve. Since then, we have continued to study a lot. SEO doesn't stop, it's always learning.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I believe there are several issues beyond SEO. The first is to believe in yourself, to trust in our potential. This stops many women from job interviews and speaking engagements. But, we know a lot!

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I'm a curious person, I go after and I'm not afraid of making mistakes. And of course, the female ability to do 10 things at once (and well).

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Since the first time I read about SEO, I was fascinated. "What do you mean, optimize a website and appear well positioned on Google? Is it witchcraft? lol" And that made me want to understand the details. I started learning logic, then content, code, user experience... in SEO, there are always new things, it's constant learning. This made me choose and stay in this market. There is always something to evolve.

 Katarzyna Baranowska, Vice-president in Fox Strategy

She has been working in the SEO industry since 2010. She works with both local businesses and e-commerce. She specializes in audits and creating optimization recommendations. With clients, she goes through the entire process of working on the project - starting from the initial analysis, through developing the strategy, its implementation and setting further development goals. An admirer of open and honest communication and individual customer service. Since 2017, co-owner of the Fox Strategy agency.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Ten years ago, relatively few women worked in the SEO industry in Poland. Over time, I see how much it changes. I also meet more and more fantastic women who work in senior or managerial positions. Still, at conferences, online events, trainings or webinars, the speakers or main guests are very rarely women.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

In 2010, when I started, I was the only woman in the SEO department of a large agency, but that quickly began to change. I also have a memory that a decade ago, many women started their careers from junior or assistant positions and worked for a long time to get promoted. Most often, the main tasks commissioned to them included optimization of content or writing texts, i.e. activities bordering on SEO-copywriting, very rarely girls dealt with technical SEO, strategy development or link building.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think it's easier now than it was ten years ago. In my opinion, on the one hand, SEO has ceased to be associated with IT and the typically male industry, and on the other hand, many women found themselves in such work very well and with their successes set an example and encouraged other women to also try their hand at SEO.

Marianna Krupa, Head of SEO MaxROY.agency

She is in the industry for so long that she remembers the sweet days of pretzel texts. She started as a copywriter in ancient times. Today she is Head of SEO and Content at MaxROY.agency. She has a SEO team of a dozen under her wings, she takes care of its development, entertainment, processes and the quality of solutions provided to clients.

She cooperates with large brands, advising them both in terms of SEO, Content Marketing, as well as broadly understood branding. Good strategist. She likes to plan based on data, write and read good content, explore new areas of internet marketing. She believes that the real magic happens in interdisciplinary teams.

She trains in Content Marketing, publishes a lot and brings good news to the world as an academic lecturer. She teaches creative writing, branding and storytelling. She's a full-time Content Guy!

Privately she loves the comfort of her home. She admires really good and unusual advertising campaigns, peace of mind, reports, Harry Potter, tv series, design straight from PRL and travels. She can do keyword research without tools, has never run a marathon and is the biggest fan of the Backstreet Boys (team Brian).

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Well. I started working in the industry at a time when dinosaurs walked the Earth, and a woman in SEO was a real phenomenon. The industry was dominated by men. At first, I had to try very hard to be heard. And believe me, I'm a loud-talker.

Today, after so many years, I head one of the most committed SEO teams in my country. The team, which in the time of dinosaurs consisted only of men, and today they are mostly women. It's a team, a whole. It was only for the purposes of this study that I began to count how many women and how many men I have under my wings. Because on a daily basis, the most important thing is that we cooperate, have fun, develop and - regardless of gender - support and listen. More and more women appear at industry conferences in Poland and abroad. It makes me happy and means that for several years now I don't have to shout to be heard. I just am present.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I will not beat around the bush: it was hard. I faced many problems: my ideas were ridiculed and then sold as someone else's ideas. I had to start a sentence with: hello, I'm here to be listened to. I was afraid to speak on industry forums or ask something in closed SEO groups. I was terrified of being laughed at. After all, things like that happened all the time. They're probably still there.

Today - after so many years - I would say to Marianna from 2013: you know what, you have a lot to say. There are no stupid questions, there are stupid answers. Do not be afraid! They can question your analytical judgment, they can get smarter about Google tools and tweets. It’s not a big deal!

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I have a story that once, on a closed SEO group on Facebook, I noticed a post by a girl who wrote what she knew and wanted to become a SEOwoman. I hired her right away. She started as an intern, then was a junior, today she is a specialist. I was amazed by her courage. Courage that I didn't have at the beginning of my career :)

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I am stubborn. I can say that I don't know something - but I also know how much I know and what I can do. I can learn from others. I like testing. Being open helps a lot. Seriously.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

It was really a coincidence and love at first sight the moment I looked into key phrases :)

Beatriz Abrantes, Head de SEO Web Estratégica

I chose SEO because it has always been an area that arouses a lot of curiosity for me. It is extremely interesting to understand how a person's mind works when answering a question, wanting to buy a product or just looking for inspiration on the internet.

It is through the process of understanding how people think that we can achieve the results of large or small corporations and adapt to them. This whole process is intermediated by the Google robot, but understanding it is just a means to reach another individual.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Brazil is one of the most sexist countries in the world, and this is only repeated when we are talking about an extremely niche profession when it comes to gender. In all the companies I've worked for, there are more men than women, but maybe that's not even the big news.

I believe there is also an important factor which is how much these men appear or are in a position of visibility. Events, lectures, podcasts. For each type of call always the same names in the SEO community, with little opportunity for minorities or members of the operation who have a lot to add.

There is little space for these women to position themselves, tell their stories and participate more actively in these communities.

Today, I'm very proud to say that I work more with women at Strategic Web than with men, because that's how I'm inspired to see amazing professionals growing in SEO and inspire me to do better for them.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

When I started in the SEO area, there were no female partners on my team. I was just an intern, surrounded by men, who were much more knowledgeable than I was. At first it was quite intimidating, but I started to really enjoy what I did in my day to day life. Soon, the issue of gender became secondary to me and I wanted to learn more. It was a few months before I had more colleagues in the area who were women too, but I feel that I got closer to them than the other members.

Not only because they are women and starting their careers, but there was always a noticeable male group of tech men in every company I worked/worked for.

Unfortunately none of these women at the beginning of my career made it into the SEO field. Some just preferred different paths, but today I see the lack of inclusion in which they were welcomed, in addition to few female inspirations to mirror.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

For sure! Being a woman, it is already more difficult to start a career regardless of the profession. But in SEO I felt more pressure.

First, technical SEO requires some programming knowledge, which is more common to find men who understand the subject. The term "programmer person" as a gender-neutral name for the role is extremely recent.

Women who arrive in the market without this in-depth knowledge are usually discounted for "not having chased after" the loss, and little gets involved with the opportunities that have been offered to them up to that point.

In addition, a predominantly male work environment generates little identification when it comes to looking for someone to look up to or be inspired by in their daily lives.

Even the business lunches turn into men in their plain black shirts and smartwatches walking in front and the women walking in the back.

It may not seem like a very significant thing, but when we pay attention to the details we can notice a little more segregation between men and women in the area every day.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I believe that I had to take advantage of a more active communication in my daily life, putting my ideas and opinions as much emphasis as men in my work. I know that I have a genetic attribute to speak loudly and speak quickly, which ends up giving me privileges in my very energetic speech.

Still, it's quite common for me to be interrupted by men in the area in a leadership meeting. There were times when I put myself down, saying that I hadn't finished my speech, but I confess that I don't always do that. I was always very afraid of appearing incisive or aggressive, which is very common for women who put themselves forward.

Also, I had to study a lot more than some coworkers who have fewer degrees than I do but are in a position of greater authority.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I chose SEO because it has always been an area that arouses a lot of curiosity for me. It is extremely interesting to understand how a person's mind works when answering a question, wanting to buy a product or just looking for inspiration on the internet.

It is through the process of understanding how people think that we can achieve the results of large or small corporations and adapt to them. This whole process is intermediated by the Google robot, but understanding it is just a means to reach another individual.

Beata Szőke, senior Freelancer

Bea first tasted search engine optimization in 2006 (the good old days). From 2018, you can contact her on the haladjunk.hu agency website, and from 2021 on her individual website dealing only with SEO. Since 2019, she has been conducting SEO testing of algorithms in collaboration with international teams. She provides advice, consultations, and training regarding technical, on-site, and off-site problems with Hungarian, English, Spanish, and German websites.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I find it okay, I don't see any difference between the genders.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

Lots of learning of new tactics. I did a huge amount of SEO tests and I was sooo lucky, that I found an awesome testing mastermind group with great people.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Not more challenging than for a man, I reckon.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Constant self-development, to help customers with comprehensive online marketing guidance. I believe, that SEO has its place in the online marketing channel, but it has to be used properly.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Prior work experiences. I love to learn. :D

Stephanie Solheim, CEO/Founder Grow With Meerkat

Stephanie Solheim is a dynamic leader in the digital marketing and SEO industries, known for her exceptional work as the owner of Grow With Meerkat (Previously Toledo Web Designers), a full-service agency with clients across the United States. With a passion for creativity and innovation, Stephanie has helped her agency win the prestigious "Toledo City Paper's - Best of Toledo Award" three times in a row, earning her recognition as one of the top professionals in the field.

As a founder of Women in Marketing, a global networking group of over 50,000 women in the marketing space, Stephanie is dedicated to empowering and supporting women in a male-dominated industry. Alongside Kari DePhillips of the Content Factory, she co-parents the women's group called Sisters in SEO, which provides education and resources to help women advance in the field.

Stephanie's friendly and approachable personality shines through in everything she does, including her hosting of Digital Marketing events under the Mastermind Mansion Brand, where top SEO experts such as Kyle Roof, Ted Kubaitis, Steve Toth, Craig Campbell, and Holly Starks have shared their secrets in a fun and engaging environment. As an active Big Sister and Speaker in the sorority "Attagirl" founded by Brittany Gibbons and Meredith Soleau, Stephanie is dedicated to mentoring and inspiring the next generation of women in the industry.

And let's not forget about Stephanie's humorous side! Her posts of hilarious memes, especially in her group "I mean who doesn't," showcase her playful and down-to-earth personality. With a passion for AI content and a talent for prompt engineering, Stephanie is a valuable addition to any team looking to stay at the forefront of technological advancements. With a goal to get people to know, like, and trust her, Stephanie is a fun and worthwhile person to pay attention to, both in her professional and personal life

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

The SEO industry has been ruled by men for quite some time, but there has been a noticeable shift in recent years. More and more women are entering the industry, bringing a unique perspective and making valuable contributions. However, despite this progress, there is still a long way to go in terms of achieving gender equality in the field.

One of the most exciting developments in the SEO industry is the sisterhood of support that exists among women.(Like Sisters in SEO!) Women in the industry often come together to share knowledge, support each other's careers, and push for greater representation in the industry. However, this sisterhood is not without its challenges. Women's voices are sometimes suppressed or silenced by pushy, domineering men who have long dominated the industry.

Despite these challenges, the increasing number of women entering the industry is cause for celebration. Women are making their mark in SEO, bringing fresh ideas, perspectives, and approaches to the field. There is also a growing number of women speakers at industry events, providing important visibility and representation.

But, there is still a need for more women to attend SEO events, both as speakers and as attendees. Increasing the presence of women in the industry can help to break down the barriers that have long prevented them from succeeding. As more women enter the field, they can inspire and support each other, creating a more diverse and inclusive industry for all.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

When I first entered the SEO industry, I have to admit, I was incredibly intimidated. As a woman, it can feel like you're constantly fighting an uphill battle against the male-dominated field. But, I was lucky enough to find a supportive network of both men and women who were dedicated to helping me learn and grow. They were incredibly inclusive and always hyped me up, even when I didn't feel confident in myself. Those people who helped me in the beginning are still some of my favorite and most admired colleagues. I'm so grateful for the other women in the industry, especially Kolleen Shallcross, Kari DePhillips, and Kayle Larkin for their unwavering friendship and support through it all. Without their guidance and encouragement, I wouldn't be where I am today.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

As a woman in the SEO industry, I've faced my fair share of challenges. It's no secret that this is a male-dominated field, and sometimes it feels like we have to work twice as hard to be taken seriously. 

It is also more intimidating to ask questions, especially in the larger of the SEO Groups because of the nasty mysoginistic and crass messages you can get. It is either crass or someone selling you services that will only tank out your rankings and drain your bank account. It is really hard to know who you can trust, and what information is good information.

Women's voices are often silenced or overlooked, and it can be difficult to find a seat at the table. There's still a lot of work to be done in terms of achieving gender equality in the industry, but I'm proud to see more and more women entering the field and making their mark. It's important that we continue to support and uplift each other, and push for greater representation and inclusivity in the industry.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

There are a few character attributes that have really helped me in my day-to-day SEO work. Audacity is a big one. I strive to have the confidence and audacity of an average man every day. This industry can be tough, and it's important to have that boldness to speak up and take risks. Tenacity, persistence, and curiosity are other traits that have helped me to succeed. SEO is always evolving, and it can be challenging to keep up, but with persistence and curiosity, I'm able to adapt and stay ahead of the curve. Lastly, I've learned that it's important to let criticism roll off of you, which can be difficult in such a competitive and fast-paced industry. By remaining focused and keeping a positive attitude, I'm able to help others while continuing to grow and improve my skills.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

It's great to have family members who are also business owners, as they can offer valuable insights and support and job opportunities. I was able to help my family while also practicing my new career. About 5 years ago, I decided to change careers from marketing and finance to something that was more flexible, mentally stimulating, and always changing. I started with copywriting and then began dabbling in website design. It was a natural evolution for me to move into SEO, as it was a crucial part of creating the best website copy and driving traffic to my sites. Being able to adapt to new challenges and learn new skills is what keeps me engaged and motivated in the industry, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to do what I love every day

Eva Varga, Founder, Valodiertek.hu - Varga Eva EV

Founder and manager of Valodiertek.hu - SEO and Google Ads expert. Working with small and middle-sized companies in Central and European Region.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Women in Hungarian SEO Industry have to find their speciality.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I was very lucky, since I could start my SEO career with my first project, that generated revenue in the next 6 months. It was hard to learn the technical background, but I enjoyed it.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

This is not about SEO. This is about how you start a business or how you start your career in your lilfe. You must spend lot of time to learn and gain your skills and be an expert of your field. Most of the time young ladies try to start their online marketing business without spending required time to gain a deeper knowledge of marketing and SEO.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Professional, problem-solving (even if it is out-of-scope of SEO) customer oriented.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I wanted to focus on growth and effectiveness of the onlioe marketing rather than building nice and zero-revenue generating websites.

Mónika Maksa, SEO specialist, Marketing Astro Kft.

Although I have only been working as an SEO specialist for a few years, I have been able to gather a lot of experience, since the coronavirus has transformed our lives. I started working in the industry in 2020, and now we are facing new challenges with ChatGPT and other AI software. I look forward to what the future will bring!

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think - as in the case of other professions - that fortunately more and more women are represented in the profession. At Marketing Astro, for example, most of my colleagues are women, as are the junior and SEO specialist colleagues. I find this encouraging, but I think we still have a long way to go in breaking down stereotypes.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I only had a very basic understanding of SEO when I started working with search engine optimization as a junior, and I see that the knowledge gained in practice could be much more useful than if I had only started learning about the profession in theory. I entered the profession right when the coronavirus arrived, so I immediately started from a special situation: home office, uncertain clients.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

In my opinion, it is not that difficult to start as an SEO nowadays, even as a woman, since companies are increasingly careful to treat the sexes equally. Of course, it still happens - unfortunately, too often - that when two applicants with the same skills have to be chosen, companies prefer to hire men.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I can adapt to almost any situation quite quickly, so I trust that this ability will also help me in the changing SEO world. There is a lot of uncertainty about AI chatbots right now, but I believe that SEO will not go away, it will just transform.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I used to work as a journalist, and during my university years I was involved in literature, so it is clear that the world of texts really appeals to me. I wanted to switch from my previous profession and SEO seemed challenging enough, yet it had some familiar elements.

Lidia Velicu, SEO Director DWF

Lidia Velicu has an experience of over 7 years in the SEO industry. In this time, she managed about 500 campaigns, half of those being international English-based websites. 

At the moment, she is the SEO Director of DWF, the biggest Romanian Digital Marketing Agency where she is responsible for more than 200 accounts and over 50 employees. 

She believes her strongest suit is her empathy and, when she's not in a meeting, she loves to play D&D and read graphic novels.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

When I first started working in SEO, 7 years ago, I was happy to have chosen a field where I can work alongside smart, capable women. My manager, at the time, was a woman 3 years older than me, and her manager was a woman my age. Working at the office, you felt safe, you felt heard, you felt like you will only need to make yourself seen through skills alone. That was back when I was a content writer and, shortly after, a manager for the content division. 

The more I rose in ranks, the more I realized that, while middle management is usually riddled with women, top management is still quite a predominantly male environment. Most SEO companies are led by men, and most top management positions are occupied by them, as well. I don't necessarily see it as being a choice they made, if that were the case, I would not have had a seat at the table, but it is harder to make yourself seen when most conventions, retreats, business-talks happen in a male-centered context. 

Quite recently, I heard about a top player in the industry that celebrated his birthday with an all-male party that also served as a networking opportunity.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

As previously stated, I started my career in SEO through content writing. It actually took a couple of months to move up the company ladder and be promoted to manager. There were other men in the team, most of them were working with the company for far longer than I, but I was chosen due to my strong organization skills and attention to detail. 

Looking back, it was more difficult to deliver constructive feedback to some of the male members. And while the company was 70% female, it was led by a man, and there was a general feeling of leadership through fear, not example. It's where I learned what people earn more in a leader, and, spoiler alert, it's not feeling anxious before a meeting, but being heard. It's always important to learn from every interaction, even if some of them teach you how not to do something.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

No, I don't think it's difficult at all. Crawlers don't care if you're a woman, neither do the users that will access the websites you optimize and grow. 

Starting your career is the easiest thing. Learning how to use SEO to increase a website's visibility in SERP, now that is a long but rewarding path. And I will always encourage everyone with an analytical mind to embark in this journey because nothing compares to the feeling you get when you see your hard work turn into organic visits.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

As an SEO Director, I am in charge of almost 200 ongoing campaigns and the 50-ish people involved in the process. I need to be organized, I need to be able to think on my feet when something goes wrong, to correctly and promptly communicate with both the team, and the clients, all of this while making sure that the small army of content writers and their very capable (female) leader are delivering their materials on time. 

I strongly believe that any person involved in the SEO industry needs to be analytical, have excellent critical thinking skills, have a great attention to detail, a hungry mind (you gotta keep up with those updates), and, most importantly, be empathetic. You can't create user-friendly content if you can't think like a member of your target audience.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Because I strongly believe that SEO is one of the last remaining Marketing practices that still make the Internet a better place. 

That and I was a Compared Lit major and a friend recommended me for a Content Writer job while I was still fresh out of college. I fell in love with what it means to make user-friendly content from the first article I wrote.

Júlia Neves, Global Head of SEO Day.io

With a degree in marketing, she worked for large national and international companies and today she works as Global Head of SEO, in addition to teaching two courses in SEO and sharing content on the subject on Instagram every day.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Despite coming from many years of inequality, I see that we have more and more women standing out in the area. A salary survey carried out last year showed that almost 50% of professional respondents in Brazil were female.

What I see as the biggest problem even today is the issue of leadership positions. I see very few women as specialists, managers or in middle/high management.

I also see that women are often placed in the content SEO box, taking away the skills and potential of the technical part, which actually does not work that way in practice, since we have more and more women in technology and SEO.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

As I said in the previous question, I was very much placed in the box of content. I was lucky in my process as an SEO because I took a front that brought me a lot of visibility and that was always present in my life, which was the SEO culture, in a very strong part of education, training... So I managed to stand out as a analytical and strategic person. But, before achieving this visibility, I see that I got into this box of content a lot, with the main day-to-day tasks being to think about the content and keywords.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Not so much nowadays, although we suffer from prejudice (like any woman, in any area). I think women who stand out today serve as inspiration for those who are starting out, reinforcing a lot that it is possible and not only women can be in the area, but they can be successful in it.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

The main thing that helps me a lot in my career is communication. SEO is the area of Marketing that most depends on other areas to be successful. If we don't know how to talk, negotiate, bargain and maintain a good relationship, a lot doesn't work. Another strong characteristic that I have and that helps me is that of being very questioning. In SEO, as it is a very analytical area, you constantly need to question actions and strategies, thinking about all the possibilities.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I joke that I didn't choose SEO, SEO chose me. I was an intern at B2W taking care of the product information architecture. When the selection process for SEO opened, I got lucky! But, what chose me to stay (it could have been just one more passage within an internship period) was the plurality of the area. It's a very vast area, which you deal with a challenge every day, it never gets boring. I really like these challenges, always seeking to overcome their results and increasingly improve their strategies.

Andreea Paleologu, Account Director, Sag Media Communications

Andreea Paleologu has over 15 years of experience in marketing and communication. He worked for two of the largest e-commerce groups in CEE, Studio Moderna Fashion Group and InspiGroup, as Group Marketing Manager and Country Manager, before co-founding Sag Media Communications, an agency specialized in integrated marketing communication ( online communication, direct & online marketing, PR campaigns and à la carte advertising) for start-ups as well as established businesses. Learn more about Sag Media Communications at www.sagmediateam.com.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Romania is a market where the parity of SEOs is balanced between genders, whether they work as freelancers or in agencies.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I think the first notions about SEO were also in other countries, not only in Romania, viewed with caution by clients. The evolution of the understanding of the concepts of search engine marketing and search engine optimization was not a smooth one at all - how to make a client understand that SEO does not mean only an agglomeration of keywords in a text?! This is in the beginning; with changes in search engine algorithms and self-education of entrepreneurs in the often basic notions of the concept, came other challenges. However, I believe that the openness of many clients, many entrepreneurs to receiving outsourced consulting or even bringing in-house SEO specialists to their marketing teams is to be appreciated.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I wouldn't contextualize by gender here. It is difficult for a specialist to explain the scaling of SEO results in a time horizon that many clients do not accept out of the desire to burn bridges and get to "rank 1 in Google" as quickly as possible. Another challenge is represented by the so-called specialists who sell such slogans to gullible customers, entrepreneurs.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Perseverance, consistency, patience, curiosity.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I am part of the Sag Media Communications team, a MarCom agency established in 2011 that offers integrated marketing and digital communication services, including SEO, to start-ups and SMEs.

The agency develops for its collaborators MarCom (marketing and communication) campaigns that generate both brand awareness and conversions, as well as consulting for access to new markets, such as, among others, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Switzerland, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal.

Natalia Witczyk, Freelance SEO Consutant

Natalia Witczyk is an independent SEO Consultant. She specialises in Technical and International SEO, working on SEO strategies for SMEs and startups from all over the world. Originally from Poland, Natalia is currently based in Barcelona where she is an active member of Mujeres en SEO (Women in SEO community).

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think that the visibility of the women in the SEO industry has improved hugely in the last few years. That being still, we're still yet to see equal representation, especially in the most ludicrous places like management spots and the top conferences.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I had a 100% male team and male bosses. I did not picture myself getting as far as I did in my career, simply due to the lack of examples. I was convinced there were no other women working in SEO.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think it is much easier these days.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I think I am quite outspoken, confident and impulsive, meaning I am rather a doer than a thinker. That's why I say yes to mant speaking opportunities and it allows  me being visible and taking the challenge on.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I enjoy learning all about new products, services, and industries. My natural curiosity really pays off in the SEO industry, as I can immerse myself in the new projects quite quickly. I also enjoy the combination of tech and people skills needed for the job.

Anca Alexandra Dobrescu, Founder, PePrimaPagina.ro

Anca Alexandra Dobrescu is the founder and Managing Partner of PePrimaPagina.ro, an online marketing agency with focus on SEO services. Anca has a +14-years experience in digital marketing. Before starting her company, she has developed successful strategies for several fundraising programs and product launches in the early days of the Romanian online environment, but also in the UK and Israeli market. Anca and her team aim to take SEO and online marketing on the highest level, battling it out with fierce competition and a win-or-die mentality. This vision has helped PePrimaPagina's clients to gain outstanding results and to gain and maintain the desired online visibility.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Women in SEO in Romania are few and most of them usually handle the content SEO creation. I am probably the only female entrepreneur who has its own SEO agency. I have lost contracts just for being a woman, as business owners considered their domain "too manly" to be understood by women, but these are the exceptions. We are working with a large area of companies, which cover many areas, including some highly technical ones.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

My early days were challenging, as there were no courses available and the information was scarce. I have learned by myself and by closely working with several web development teams. Even nowadays, in Romania, there is still a lot of misinformation on many SEO topics and even some best selling online courses/webinars are completely outdated or too superficial.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Everyone is welcomed. I don't think gender is a problem in SEO industry more than in others. However, women in Romania are misrepresented in executive/high positions.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Resilience and ambition. There is no perfect formula which works every time, so applying the right tactics and the best strategy takes a lot of research, experimentation, tests and implementation on a large scale. It is more challenging as the online competition is becoming more fierce.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I love SEO due to its technical part, due to the fact that it's a difficult domain and I thing it suits my abilities and my work ethic. SEO is based on performance, not necessarily on budget, therefore I consider it a fair competition, where the best one wins.

Lucía Rico, Consultora SEO, Lucía y el SEO

Lucía Rico, known in the marketing sector as Lucía y el SEO, is an SEO disseminator, marketing consultant specialized in web positioning and content creator.

She is devoted to brand work to achieve better SEO, since 2012 she has helped companies and entrepreneurs to develop digital businesses that work, improving their visibility, reputation and facilitating the achievement of clients.

Lecturer in the Digital Transformation degree at the University of Extremadura, awarded with the Business Woman distinction in 2016 in Extremadura, she lands the complex concepts of web positioning and aligns them with the development of digital businesses so that the digital divide between companies based on its resources are dwindling.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Fortunately, there are more and more women who make the decision to dedicate themselves to SEO, however this is not always represented in positions of responsibility within SEO or in talks and congresses. Little by little things are changing and, although there is still a long way to go, we are on the right track.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

The truth is that I feel a very lucky person because since I started I have not had many difficulties. It is true that, in my case and as a consequence of my brand name, I have had to face the typical jokes regarding the relationship between my brand and a film. Even that has had a good part because it helps me segment by type of profile. Beyond that, my beginnings have been like those of any other beginning in any industry: some fears, insecurities... the normal thing.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think it is getting easier and I am a great defender of personal branding to make SEO a professional path: visibility helps to position yourself and encourage other women to enter the SEO Industry. Yes, it is complicated, I am not going to tell you otherwise, but here you can make decisions about where you want to position yourself. It's a business decision: if the market doesn't make room for me, I make a market for myself.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

The strategic part helps me a lot to see further. Having studied Business has helped me to have a global vision of what it means to work on SEO. Knowing how to interpret numbers and understand the story that the data tells us helps me a lot. A soft skill is that of communication. Since I was little, I have really liked reading and that has allowed me to develop very useful communication skills in my daily work.

Another issue that is not directly related to SEO is learning to manage emotions and not take anything personally or get carried away when the waters are rough. Temperance is a good thing.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Because I'm very easy to learn, and I'm creative, that makes me get bored with things when I understand them deeply. SEO provides me with so many changes, it has so many variables that I don't get bored. Furthermore, each company is different, a sector, a market segment... I really enjoy SEO.

Andreza Ferrari, SEO Manager, Corebiz

I have 10 years of experience in Search and SEO, with comprehensive knowledge of the online industry across Global and Latin American markets. I’m a technical and holistic SEO consultant and a content, UX/usability enthusiast. I have 5 years of experience in managing teams members working in digital marketing.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think it is better than last years, when I started in this industry.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

Many things have changed, there are more women working in the SEO market, but I still see and feel that we always have to do more compared to men to conquer our space.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It's no difficult nowadays.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Resilience to solve problems and otimism to find best way to solve It.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Because It is a dinamic industry always change and so do we.

Noelia Regalado, CEO, SeoForce Agency

I am Noelia Regalado, CEO of SeoForce Agency and SEO consultant. In addition, I am a teacher in various national and international masters, as well as a trainer in business schools. I have participated in various events as a speaker, such as some official WordCamps at a national level.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

There are more and more women in this sector, they really have always existed but many of them have remained anonymous until now, but luckily more and more women are encouraged to launch themselves publicly

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I remember that when I started in the world of SEO I felt overwhelmed, there were a lot of professionals working in the sector and I felt that I had to learn a lot and very quickly. But the truth is, my entire career has been very beautiful and I would do it again without a doubt.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Not today, I think it's more and more normalized, although it's true, like everywhere... There are cases in which for a woman, depending on the situation, it can be more complicated, but I personally have to say that I've never felt So.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Well, I think my patience, my curiosity and my obsessive part hehehe. I am a person who needs to have everything under control, and that is very necessary in SEO

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

How to explain it... For many years I worked on many things but when I discovered SEO it was as if I had suddenly found what I was destined for... It sounds very romantic, and I feel that way... I fell in love with SEO as soon as I started to know it.

MJ Cachón Yáñez, Managing Director & SEO Consultant, LAIKA

SEO consultant since 2008 and Director of laikateam.com, co-director of the SEO Master of webpositeracademy.com. She is an enthusiast of data analysis and the use of tools such as Screaming Frog, SISTRIX, Rstudio, ...

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

We have come a long way and more and more women are seen as speakers at events, but there is still a long way to go, especially in regard to labor aspects:

• That women SEO manage to occupy spaces of real responsibility
• That in training spaces, they are not fully occupied by men and women are relegated to "learn" and not to "teach"
• That the wage gap is broken and women are paid the same as their male colleagues when they are in the same roles.

In general, all progress is good, but much remains to be done.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I spent a lot of time learning SEO in a self-taught way, where I barely had female references beyond a couple of isolated cases.

Once I was advancing in experience and knowledge, I also suffered that salary gap

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Currently I believe that starting in the SEO world is not difficult, neither for women nor for men, but if you come from a completely different sector, it is difficult to get someone to give you the first opportunity.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Perhaps I would highlight perseverance and daily work, because in this sector, things happen every day and we have to be aware of them to understand how they impact our projects. SEO is a dynamic game in which both the board and the participants are constantly changing. Adapting to that and moving forward is the most important thing.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

It was love at first sight, back in 2007. I studied a master's degree in digital marketing and when we got to the search engine part, I was so interested that I finally quit my job at a bank to try to dedicate myself to SEO whatever it was.

Agata Gruszka, International SEO Manager, WhitePress®

Responsible for SEO of the WhitePress brand in Poland and on foreign markets, associated with the industry for over 5 years. Privately, a lover of exotic plants, linguistics and Eastern European literature.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

In Polish SEO, you can get the impression that men definitely prevail. At least they are the ones who mainly participate in industry groups, and they are more willing to comment on new events. The nature of these groups does not encourage women to participate. Anyway, having doubts myself, I prefer to seek the opinion of my SEO friends or ask the question directly in a typically female community.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think that starting a career in SEO is not difficult for both women and men. Marketing agencies are still looking for people for positions of SEO specialists and are willing to teach such people from scratch. It may be difficult to spread your wings and build your position as an expert. In order to appear on the SEO scene, apart from knowledge, the ability to pass it on and share it is very important.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Definitely accuracy and inquisitiveness. Optimization results are not visible overnight, and the repair of each error and oversight may take longer than we would like. In recent years, Google has been increasingly willing to share information about its algorithms and their updates, but still a huge part of what we know remains in the area of guesses, theories and predictions. Only by investigating and analyzing the results of our activities or the activities of competitors, we are able to create and confirm new theories.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

From the beginning, I was attracted to SEO by constant changes, which often push others away from this industry. Not everything can be predicted and that, in my opinion, is the beauty of SEO. We can never be sure that what works today will work in a few months or years. We have to strive for perfection all the time, and we never rest on our laurels, because there is always something to do :)

Judith Lewis, Founder, Decabbit Consultancy

Judith is a renowned international MC, keynote speaker, writer, trainer, blogger and digital media consultant specialising in applying strategic understanding of digital technologies to help businesses innovate and optimise their effectiveness within the new, networked communications environment. Her honours degree in psychology, combined with her background in programming and in law has made her uniquely insightful when dealing with companies of different sizes.

She is a regular speaker and trainer around the world on SEO, content strategy, link building, paid media, and digital strategy, and has been recognised by her peers as one of the most influential people in the UK digital industry. Her skills in digital marketing, as well as her business-mindedness, gives her a unique insight when consulting for businesses.

Judith judges the industry leading Search Awards around the world, and has every year since their inception. She has worked with market-leading global businesses including Google, NatWest/RBS, National Gallery, Fidelity, GalaCoral, NBC Universal, Readers Digest, Bayer, Amadeus, AMD, AmEx, Virgin.com, Virgin Startup, LoveToKnow, Wicked Uncle, Zopa & more.

She has over 25 years of experience, predating Google in her entry into the market, and now runs her own consultancy. She has worked both in-house and agency-side. Judith also blogs about wine, tourism, and chocolate, has contributed to books on SEO, and wrote the Econsultancy Best Practice Guide to SEO.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I span a few countries so while I can see the situation of women in several EU and North American countries at once, I can say it is not universal. I think a lot of the situation that women in SEO find themselves in has to do with what their specialism is, how much research they do outside that specialism, how motivated they are to push beyond what they know, and what attitude they take towards their career (if SEO is indeed their career or just the job of the moment).

There are women in SEO who have really pushed beyond a direct vertical specialism to take on other challenges and develop beyond just SEO into full marketing roles, women in SEO who have gone from content to technical or vice versa, women in SEO who have made it to the top of their profession, and women in SEO who have been happy to just specialise and do their thing.

Conversely, I have met women in SEO who do not take a positive can-do attitude towards things and as a result face significant challenges or headwinds which frustrates them.

When I mentor people (men and women), I emphasise the positive side of each challenge, finding teaching moments in everything from the morning coffee session to debugging a particularly complex bit of code or untangling a weird tech issue, or helping them grow as a team leader or business leader. It is as varied and complex as any industry and there are successes and failures as in any industry. The key thing for women or men is understanding the important part of any job is not doing it absolutely perfectly for the ultimate tool response, but perfecting it for the best business outcome.

Women face more headwinds than men for sure - as I have and as others have - but nothing worthwhile is ever easy and triumphing in the face of challenges is one of the best feelings. The successful women I know and have mentored grow their network, build their strengths, understand their weaknesses, and celebrate their wins.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

The early days of the SEO industry for me were the early days of the industry. I started before I knew it had a name (I don't think it did) and my first job out of spamming for a living for myself was straight in at manager level. The early *digital* (not just SEO) industry was (and is) a great collection of passionate people who were working to make the world a better, more fun place. Everything and everyone was equal and while yes being a woman still meant it might have been often more difficult to get a job, I had a background that included the adult industry. That doesn't mean I wasn't sexually harassed - far from it! I was sexually assaulted, assaulted, sexually harassed, and more *HOWEVER* I was also supported, helped, invited to participate, lauded for my knowledge, assisted by those who encountered me and sought out women's networks in and out of my niche (for example, in the areas of banking, general technology, etc). Men protected me at the bar when other men were grabbing my body, men supported me when others sought to pull me down, and I found my tribe which included a lot of men who spoke to me as an equal, not as a favour to a woman.

Look for pain and you will find it; focus on the positive and the world suddenly opens up with possibilities.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think it is difficult to start any career and those in SEO are no exception. I think it's a good idea to aspire to be a "T" shaped SEO a first, progress to "M", and then branch out beyond SEO if you are that way inclined. I'd also suggest choosing a niche with while you have an interest and affinity - don't try and go into finance SEO if you hate banks, and don't try and go into B2B SEO if you find the business world dull. Find your happiness and then you will find it easier to understand that industry which will only serve you better when doing SEO and trying to branch out.

Find a community and learn all you can. Join the Women in Tech SEO group, or Women in Technology, or We are the City, or Savvitas, or any of a number of other women-led organisations.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Every day I think my passion, drive, positivity, and tenacity help but so does my amazing network of friends and peers who keep me positive when I feel a bit down. None of us can be all that every day and so when I feel like I am just not hitting it, the men and women in my network are amazing support,

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I did not choose SEO, SEO chose me.

Olga Zhukova, Freelance SEO consultant

Olga is a Freelance SEO Consultant with love for clean websites, great content, and strategies that make businesses more successful. She specializes in on-page optimization, but won't have technical SEO issues stay unnoticed. When away from her computer, Olga enjoys free time with her husband and two kids, theater plays with friends, and traveling near and far from her hometown in Lithuania.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think that there are a lot of intelligent and talented women in SEO, and with time more and more of them become willing to share their experience and knowledge with a larger audience, build their personal brand, and ask for adequate compensation :)

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

My team leader and most of the SEO team were women, and even when I changed jobs and was the only woman in the SEO department, I didn't feel "less" : less professional, less competent, etc. Everyone was supporting and friendly

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

No, I think it is not. At least in my experience

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Curiosity (to find and use new advice, and ideas) and patience - helps with routine tasks

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Primarily by accident, as I wanted to become an IT specialist, but "temporarily" accepted an offer for SEO position. Then I grew to enjoy working in SEO and decided to stay.

 Michelle McCalden, Freelance SEO Consultant

Michelle McCalden is a UK based freelance SEO consultant. She has been working in SEO for over 15 years and she has a strong interest in technical SEO, content SEO and generally helping small to medium business increase their search visibility using SEO.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

For women who require flexible working and juggle family responsibilities alongside their careers like myself, I have found the the SEO industry can feel very male-centric - or at least, is not well set up to fully allow for this. As a result, most of my career has been spent freelancing rather than as part of an agency or as an in-house employee. The downside of this is that being self-employed can make it hard to connect with others in the industry. Fortunately the emergence of women's SEO support groups both online and in person, as well as large conferences actively encouraging women speakers to take the stage is helping women feel more confident to be a part of the SEO world.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I don't think it's any harder for a woman to get started in SEO if they can make use of online resources to learn, and have support available to help them progress. I think a lot of people, regardless of gender, tend to discover SEO almost by accident and then become passionate about the field! The catch is though, that I still don't think enough women are aware of SEO as career field that is available to them due to lack of representation of women in SEO at a high leadership level over the years.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Resilience, curiousity and having a great interest in analytical data and website experimentation. It also helps to have the determination not to give up when things get difficult. I also think being friendly and a bit of a people-person has really helped me reach out and connect with potential clients. As a solo freelancer, my work requires me to pitch to clients, handle sales calls and them implement the work and present it too. Luckily, I enjoy all of these aspects of my job.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I started out building and designing websites to help me put my Computer Science degree learning as a university student at the time, into action. I installed Analytical software and quickly became obssessed with discovering where visitors were finding my site - and this quickly led to an interest in optimising websites for search engines. I quickly took on my first few web design and SEO clients, ranked them on page 1 of Google (plus Yahoo! and MSN back them) and was so fascinated with being part of the SEO world I never looked back.

Mihaela Istrate, International SEO Expert, Pharma field

SEO strategist with 8+ years of experience in the field, I work with companies from Europe and the US on both national and international SEO campaigns.

I have taken specializations and courses in SEO, digital strategy, online consumer psychology and crowd psychology offered by educational institutions in the US. I constantly participate in mentoring sessions with the best SEO experts in the world. At the same time, I have over 10 years of experience in direct sales and over 50 active trainings in persuasion and sales. I work with businesses in various niches and have significant experience in international SEO projects in the medical, healthcare and pharma fields. I currently work in English, French and Romanian.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

There are quite a few women in the SEO industry in Romania. Most specialists are men.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

My situation was different. After I finished the SEO courses (offered by a great international SEO expert) for the first time, I created a fashion brand in Romania, from scratch, together with another colleague. I didn't dare to promote myself as a specialist until I tested my skills with my own money. I said to myself "If I can grow my own business in e-commerce and bring results risking my own budget, then it means I can dare to do it for others." And after it became number 1 on different keywords, it was quite easy to promote myself and know that I can deliver results. In a short time, projects from various industries began to appear.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It's not difficult. I don't think there is an inequality between women and men in the SEO field. I just think that some women are less prepared and do not have enough expertise and vision for such a thing. When you are a good specialist, you perform well whoever you are, wherever you are. Companies are looking for you for results, not for the fact that you are a man or a woman.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Punctuality, organization, ability to concentrate, vision, communication skills, ability to adapt to people and situations.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

For pleasure. It is the industry with which I resonated the best, and the time spent at work is always a pleasure.

Limor Barenholtz, Director of SEO, Similarweb

Limor is the Director of SEO at Similarweb, and has been SEOing for the past 20 years. She specializes in all aspects of Technical SEO - From JavaScript SEO & rendering, through mobile & multi-device optimization, all the way to page experience metrics - She loves the challenges it presents, clean codes makes her smile & creating scalable SEO strategies makes her happy.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think that in my country women in SEO have equality at most places.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

It was hard to find proper resources for learning on one hand, on the other hand I think it made more of us learn hands on. 

Personally i did not feel any issues with being a woman.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

No

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Curious, analytics, data-driven, highly competitive

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I found it the most interesting and challenging of "Web experiments".

 

 Magdalena Bród, Co-owner, CLUEGROUP

Magdalena Bród. In SEO since 2009, she's gone through all the major and minor Google updates and still loves what she does. Analytical mind delving into technical SEO. Privately, a mother, traveler and blogger.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

In my opinion, the situation of Polish women in the SEO industry is quite good. In addition to the fact that there are far fewer of us women than men, we are treated rather equally (of course, there are male exceptions who do not take us too seriously).

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

My SEO career began in 2007, when I was writing texts for SEO. Very quickly I wanted to know why who needs so much content, I started digging into the topic and eventually I started to implement SEO more and more. A few years later, I was already an SEO specialist. However, it must be admitted that then SEO looked completely different, it was much easier - links were much easier to get, and the content on the website worked wonders.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

I think that the difficulty of women entering the SEO industry may lie only in their heads, because it is entering a stereotypical environment - a bit of IT, a bit of marketing, in which men dominate. Women, however, do not lack any of the qualities needed to become the perfect SEO specialist.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I think an analytical mind, an open mind and a lot of patience. You can't do it without it - without constant analysis and thinking about what to do, without ideas for experiments and tests, nothing will be done. And this patience - because we know very well that all this can only bring results after a long time.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

When I decided to go in the direction of SEO, I was just finishing my studies in Polish philology. It was not a direction that would give me any form of development. And since I was already getting into the world of seocopywriting, it seemed to me very interesting, developmental and that this work gave results. And that's what I like about SEO - that hard work shows that you can develop your business very much.

Julia Nesterets, CEO, co-founder, JetOctopus.com

Julia Nesterets is the co-founder and CEO of JetOctopus. With 10+ years in marketing and sales, she helps to identify our clients' needs to the fullest. She can explain complex ideas by simplifying them which makes her a very valuable asset to JO. She is also a very social person. You can catch up with Julia on Digital Olympus, BrightonSEO, and Slush conferences for some small talk. You can also find Julia on Twitter (https://twitter.com/JNesterets) and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/julia-nesterets-bab6a68/).

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I am from Ukraine. I have never felt any limitations in terms of a gender in Ukraine working in different spheres. The same with SEO. But telling the truth, there are more male SEOs than female ones but the tendency is changing for the last 3 years. There are more and more females.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

The early days (5 years ago) were thrilling:) as nothing was understandable for me becoming a CEO and the Lead Marketer of a cloiud-based TechSEO platform. But the road will be mastered by the walking. The deeper you dive in the more understandable SEO becomes. It always works.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Absolutely not!

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Communication skills. You have to not just know what to optimise, you have to persuade the stakeholders to accept it and prioritise the resources for these optimisations.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Because we've laucnhed our SEO Saas product jetoctopus.com

Ana Heloísa Costa, SEO Director, Webedia Brasil

SEO specialist with an editorial focus, I have been working in the area for 10 years out of a total of 16 years of experience with digital content. My traditional background is in journalism but everything I learned about SEO was put into practice, with some mentors and a lot of self-taught knowledge. Reinforce strategic thinking and use of data to support decision-making on a daily basis.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I'm a journalist and I started working with SEO editing and planning content strategies for Brand Publishing projects. In 8 years working with Brand Publishing with a focus on SEO, I have served more than 50 brands from different market segments, with different budget and objective challenges. My initial focus was on building SEO relevance with evergreen content. Working with clients from different realities was very enriching for me to become a more versatile professional, with a focus more on analysis of results and audiences than on the irrational reproduction of good practices.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Analytical profile is the most important. From audience analysis to understanding nuances of the content that performed better, comparing with the competition, knowing which data from SEO tools do not match reality, to understanding the target audience in a more complete and user first way.

Georgina Ujhelyi, Account Director, BP Digital

Gina earned a master's degree in marketing and started her career as an online marketer. He joined the team of the BP Digital SEO agency 4 years ago, where as Account Director he has now gained insight into the marketing strategies of hundreds of businesses. This experience helps you develop an effective SEO strategy for your various clients and achieve the best results during your projects. He likes to find solutions to problems and think creatively. He is most motivated by the fact that the agency can help their partners succeed in the online space through coordinated work.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

According to my experience, there is not as much of a gender shift in the marketing profession as there is already in many other industries. On the other hand, I still feel that women are underrepresented in management and decision-making circles.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

When I started focusing on search engine optimization as a project manager of the BP Digital SEO agency, I already had a good insight into the use of different marketing tools. From the beginning, I liked the complexity of SEO, I saw it as a challenge and an opportunity for development, so I really enjoyed the learning process. The more I understood its connections, the more I became interested in the players of different industries and markets, as well as in solving their unique problems and realizing their goals.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It's just as hard as any other industry :)

If you find out what career path you would like to take, you can achieve your goals with enough perseverance, study and work. As in other areas of life, so in marketing and SEO.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Understanding the clients' business goals and adjusting the SEO strategy to this is the most important thing that I have learned from the projects of the past years. In this process, a business approach, appropriate communication and problem-solving skills help.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

As an online marketer, I was looking for a field that is exciting, complex, constantly changing and challenging. Through SEO, I can get to know the marketing strategies of many brands, I encounter a new decision-making situation in every project, so I can also constantly develop and learn.

Sandra Julia Heirbaut, Outreach Operations Manager, Vime Digital

Sandra Julia Heirbaut is the Outreach Operations Manager of Vime Digital in Barcelona. She is responsible for the day to day business of the Outreach department, approving publications in compliance with her clients' SEO strategies and collaborating with the in house content department. Having built and led a team of Quality & Compliance Analysts in a previous role she joined the SEO world in 2022. Being well versed with handling numerous clients, managing larger teams and being keen on increasing the team's efficiency she quickly stepped up as Operations Manager. Sandra is a 31 years young, trilingual, ambitious business woman from Bonn(Germany) and mother.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I believe Barcelona is unique in many ways and the local SEO bubble is not short of women at all. The city is full of creative, ambitious and intelligent young women. 

In fact, Vime is mainly female lead and the majority of my Outreach Specialists and applicants are feminine.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I consider myself a through and through analytical and level-headed woman which has made my work as a former Quality Analyst and currently Outreach Operations Manager a breeze. 

I love juggling around with the numbers, budgets, metrics, SEO tools and content guidelines to get our clients the quality and quantity they want in an efficient manner. 

Also speaking from a management perspective, I believe both attributes are vital for a smooth management of the Outreach team. Analyzing and understanding my team to the level that I can appreciate everybody's individual style allows me to work in a time efficient manner, keep things dynamic and leave room for creativity.

Klara Anna Witkowska, SEO Specialist & UX Designer, Digitly

Master of Management in Trendy&Design in Marketing, lecturer in computer graphics, design and e-commerce at the WSB University in Wrocław. On a daily basis, a website positioner and creator of creative creations. Founder of the Digitly Interactive Agency.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

There are much fewer women in the SEO industry in Poland. This is the industry predominantly represented by men, which does not mean that women are doing worse! Women tend to be great as positioners, as well as developers.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

It was hard to start an SEO career a few years ago. There was not as much demand as there is now, and the demands were much greater. From my point of view, a lot has changed at this point. A huge plus is that there is a greater demand for specialists on the market, and SEO is finally in the news! The downside of the current situation is that young people quickly become specialists, and they are far from the specialist knowledge that was required a few years ago.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It doesn't matter whether you are a woman or a man, what counts here is the range of skills, especially the technical ones.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

In everyday work, you definitely need to be focused, meticulous and have a jam. SEO is not as simple as many people think. Every day, we face many problems that do not have one simple solution. So we also have to drill, stick to the goal, be patient, but also keep our nerves in check. There is no room for hasty decisions in SEO.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I chose SEO because I like challenges and solving difficult puzzles.

Sofie Koevoets, SEO & Content Ops Manager, Superside

Sofie is a well-experienced SEO & Content manager with over 7 years of SEO experience in several industries. Professionally trained in journalism and the entertainment industry with Editing, Journalism, Creative Writing and SEO degrees, she is the perfect spider in the web to create Content Strategies which tie in SEO to bring the best of both worlds together.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I am from the Netherlands but live in South Africa, where I feel a lot of women are still seen as 'not knowledgeable enough', especially regarding TechSEO issues.

While the analytical skills of many women are -in my opinion- what creates the best SEO knowledge and expertise. To be able to 'see the bigger picture' is essential in anything SEO related, because everything is related to each other. I feel this is sometimes hard for women to explain to male peers or superiors, who sometimes lack that vision.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I am very organized, making reporting and keeping track of stats a lot easier. My overview of the bigger picture makes me a specialist in my field, and thanks to that I am able to keep course across teams and strategies. Helping the bottom-line of the business in the long-run.

Ola Gościniak, CEO Jestem Interaktywna, Jestem Interaktywna/ Imagospot

Ola Gościniak. Originator of the brand Jestem Interaktywna, WordPress expert, mentor of online businesses in Interaktywna Paczka, blogger, entrepreneur, academic lecturer, author of e-books, books, e.g. of the best-selling book Stay Online and online courses at the Interactive Academy of WordPress, organizer of the Interactive Conference, author of a respected podcast awarded by Forbes Woman. Author of the course / e-book "Master SEO in 14 days", in which you will learn more about SEO step by step, take care of your position in Google, gain new recipients and increase your profits.

Since 2015, she has been helping women from all over Poland to realize their interactive dreams and achieve financial independence on their own terms. She has already trained over 50,000 Polish women. She shows them how to create a website from scratch, how to set up an online store or start an online business. Se successfully creates an engaged community of Jesteśmy Interaktywne.

Winner of the 12th edition of the Success Written with Lipstick Businesswoman of the Year competition in the category of Counteracting Digital Exclusion and LadyBusiness Awards in the category of Entrepreneurial Woman is YOU. Since 2018, in the TOP20 ranking of influential bloggers JasonHunt. Speaker at many industry events, e.g. I <3 Marketing or Blog Conference Poznań, BusinessWoman Live.

A graduate of Computer Science at the Poznań University of Technology, Graphic Design at Collegium Da Vinci and Business Coaching at WSKZ. She created her first website in elementary school 20 years ago. Since then, she has created over 500 of them.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think there are still not enough of them. Breaking through in the industry requires strength and self-confidence, especially when some women in the industry continue to mock and believe that she "fits like a flower on a sheepskin coat". Is it true? Of course not! However, I know very well that this approach can discourage many excellent specialists. I also encountered such an approach - “blonde and makes websites? Probably in her personal journal." "Or she has make-up that's not perfect, which means she doesn't know what she's doing." Women in the industry are judged very harshly, and this evaluation is rarely really about their competence.

I run the Interactive WordPress Academy and my clients are women who learn how to create websites and online stores from scratch and I can see that we are excellent at it, but we still have harmful beliefs in our heads, which we often heard from other people. Just like the ones about SEO being black magic and too hard to grasp. Nothing more wrong!

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

SEO has accompanied me since my school days, when I created the first websites for my own use (and it was over 20 years ago!), I was very interested in this subject then. On the other hand, my business adventure with SEO began several years ago, when I created websites on WordPress as a freelancer for my clients and supported them for better visibility on Google. I was properly optimizing the website for SEO, helping in determining keywords and developing a strategy for publishing content on the blog, and I did training on good practices of self-care of the website so that it achieved good results in search results. As I worked from home, I didn't realize for many years that it was a difficult industry with few women.

It was only when I started my first live broadcasts over 5 years ago on the blog Jestem Interaktywna that I found out that this is inconvenient for some people in the SEO industry. Such repeated situations and hate made me stop in this topic for some time. In retrospect, when I look at it, I feel sorry that other people's harmful beliefs had an impact on it. Now I know it's about those people, not about me.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Currently, it is getting easier every year, but there is no denying that this industry is still dominated by men, due to the fact that better analytical skills are attributed to them in advance. And contrary to stereotypes, women can do it too - and be good at it! In addition, in SEO activities, good organization of work, consistency, meticulousness, patience, soft skills, and even female intuition are necessary. We have it all, we are more and more confident and we boldly reach for our dreams. That is why there are more and more of us in the industry every year. And very well!

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I think that the willingness to constantly learn (after all, Google algorithms are changeable!), patience and creativity, which allows you to look at some issues from a different angle. Flexibility will also be useful for this, thanks to which we will easily test various solutions.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I run my own business "Jestem Interaktywna", where I teach other women to create websites and sales platforms from scratch. Therefore, SEO is extremely important to me for two reasons - it allows me to better promote my website in the Google search engine for phrases most often searched for by my recipients, and it is also an issue that I introduce to my students so that after creating a website, they take care of a better place for their website in search results, reach new audiences and earn even more. To sum up, it is an extremely important element of my work, which I use myself and which I teach others.

Lauren Rock-Perring, SEO Manager, Green park Content

After earning my Bachelor of Commerce in Digital Marketing, and graduating with distinction. I entered the world of digital marketing where I’ve spent the large majority of my working career in agency. 

I started my career as an intern where I found a passion for SEO which has afforded me the opportunity to scale my knowledge and experience rapidly, where I am now an SEO Manager.

Additionally, the success of work has been recognised by winning a Good Assegai Award for Search Marketing: SEO and PPC which was issued by The Direct Marketing Association of SA (DMASA).

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Considering that the majority of digital marketing is still dominated by males in the field, I think women looking to start their career in SEO are generally quite intimidated. However, with that being said, I have witnessed slow growth in female interest in SEO, both locally and globally which is fantastic!

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

Me early days in SEO could best be characterised by a lot of learning and self-development (something which I have carried throughout my career). I took the time I felt I needed to develop the knowledge and confidence I needed in order to truly excel in my career. In retrospect, taking the time I did to learn and develop confidence is the reason I’ve been able to experience on-going success in my career.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

No, there are many women in SEO and digital marketing in general. The gender-dominance of a career field shouldn’t intimidate you or stop you from entering it. If you want to enter the world of SEO, even as a women, you have a place! Go for it!

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Outside of being collaborative, dedicated and agile, I’d like to believe that my appetite for knowledge, innovation and exploration, willingness to experiment as well as my future-focused minded allows me to both enhance and maintain my edge in SEO.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Like most, the SEO industry chose me. I was introduced to the ever-evolving world of SEO at my first job, I fell in love with it and had an aptitude for it. I was also given the ability to scale up my knowledge and experience in the field at a rapid pace because of my supportive manager and company at the time.

Mariachiara Marsella, SEO Strategist & Digital Marketing Consultant

From the day of her graduation, in 2000, she immediately began to deal with web marketing, then specializing, over time, in SEO. Thanks to important experiences as SEO specialist in various Italian agencies, she has in fact been able to perfect herself in this sector, dealing with both the technical part and the content part. She has been an SEO consultant and temporary manager for about 6 years. She is a contract professor at the Roma Tre University on digital marketing and SEO issues within the Business Economics course and participates as a speaker in various national and international sector events.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

The early days of pure SEO were quite troubled. It was 2006 and I was in Milan, alone, the only woman among all men. Back then, SEO was not for women :) I had the feeling that my word counted for less than a grain of sand in the desert. But there I met what to this day is my closest friend, Enrico Altavilla. But in this journey I was also helped by two wonderful women: Daniela Trifone and Gabriella Sannino. The first welcomed me every day at the company in Milan with a hot cup of tea and a huge smile to make me feel less lonely. The second watched me from afar, appreciating my online discussions and nominating me, without my knowing her, for Top SEO Woman. It was in Milan that I failed my first SEO project and cried in despair. Seventeen years later, when I look back on that day, I feel a lot of tenderness but I do not deny anything of my experiences because all of them have led me to be, to this day, a consultant fulfilled by her work who helps, in turn, women (and men) who want to venture into this wonderful, crazy job: SEO. And it is no coincidence that, together with other colleagues, we have set up a real SEO collective, Search Foundry (soon to be on these screens...), all of them crazy (maybe more) like me.

Valentina Turchetti, Content Marketing Lead, YourDigitalWeb

She is Content Marketing Lead, driving conversions and growing revenues for companies and brands with Content Marketing DATA-DRIVEN. She is co-founder of YourDigitalWeb, an SEO&Digital agency based in Italy but operating worldwide, and of the Marketing Business Summit, the international event that brings the best Digital Marketing speakers from all over the world to the stage. She is the author of three books: "Social Media Marketing", "Web Content that converts", "Content Now". She is also a speaker: her talks deal with Content Marketing, SEO Content, Lead Generation. She is launching a Content Marketing&Conversion Copywriting course (in both Italian and English), soon to be published.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I tell the truth: on the one hand because SEO is still one of the most popular activities for companies because it brings real, concrete results in terms of increased turnover; on the other hand because I have always been passionate about understanding how people's minds think. What do people search for online? Why? Studying search intentions is very interesting to me.

Laura Copelli, SEO specialist

Laura began her professional career in 1993 in Parma, as an illustrator for children's clothing and subsequently collaborated with advertising graphic agencies. In 2002 you moved to Turin where you collaborated with some of the best agencies in the city. Here she becomes a web designer and brings digital communication to advertising agencies. You have a long experience in teaching, with 10 years at the Institute of Applied Art and Design in Turin. You teach at the Academy of Fine Arts in Novara, at Comics in Turin, you collaborate with Poliedra SpA (Turin), Espero (Milan) as a teacher of digital communication, graphics, web design, SEO and web marketing. Thanks to her experience in teaching she develops a great competence in the management of working groups. Since 2012 she has been deepening her knowledge of digital strategy and becoming an SEO Specialist and web marketing consultant. Thanks to her articulated professional career, Laura achieves technical, strategic and content skills. She currently collaborates with SinerVis and Poliedra SpA as a teacher of web marketing (SEO, Social, email marketing) and web design (graphics applied to the web, html and css, basic javascript).

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I tell the truth: on the one hand because SEO is still one of the most popular activities for companies because it brings real, concrete results in terms of increased turnover; on the other hand because I have always been passionate about understanding how people's minds think. What do people search for online? Why? Studying search intentions is very interesting to me.

 Giulia Bezzi, CEO, SeoSpirito Società Benefit SRL

Entrepreneur in whose veins SEO flows, a digital discipline that studies how to make your website first on Google. Her company is part of the GBS Group of which she is the Head of SEO and CMO. Together with her team, she has created Bloginrete, for companies that have blogs to take care of and bloggers who want to grow in this area, and LeROSA, the community in which we want to grow the cultural and economic independence of the female world. Finally, in order not to miss anything in her life, which is already quite full, she has an event company called & Love srl and which allows her to spread digital culture throughout Italy.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

My early days as an SEO were great because my brother was there to teach me how to become one. It was an amazing time because I discovered that I could earn for my life doing what I was passionate about. And that, like it or not, remains my greatest love. Incredible that it still is.

Erminia Guastella, SEO manager, Social Supervisor & Data Analyst, Il Fatto Quotidiano

Born in 1980, born in Palermo and adopted in Milan, Erminia Guastella began her career as a journalist (professional since 2006) in local Sicilian newspapers and TVs, dealing with news and shows. But it is her encounter with the web that changes her professional path, which turns towards SEO applied to the world of news. In particular, from 2007 to 2012 in Milan, you deal with the expansion of the NanoPress thematic blog network, published by the Trilud company and one of the main online information sources of the 10s. There you combine editorial work with SEO and Social Media Editor. In 2012 she began her adventure in the editorial staff of ilfattoquotidiano.it, where she is responsible for the SEO strategy. Over the years, she has specialized in data analysis and in growing the audience of the Fatto Quotidiano website, becoming Audience Development. Her primary professional objective is to use all possible levers for the constant acquisition of new readers and to remain at the top of the Audiweb ranking of the most read online newspapers.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

I came across this field somewhat by chance, but I immediately fell in love with it. Seo has given me the opportunity to interpret the job of a journalist in a new way, focusing my work on what readers are actually interested in and how this information is searched for on search engines. A challenge that continues every day, because Seo changes, as does the information and the readership. So there is never a dull moment!

Kübra Külünk, SEO Strategist, Legal Templates

After graduating from Bilkent University in 2013, I continued to work at the SEO agency that I started as an intern and gained valuable experience in the field of SEO. After working in the agency environment for a while and seeing different sectors, I continued my business life on the brand side. In my SEO perspective, I focus on content and see content as indispensable. Currently, I continue my working life with Taiwan-based Legal Templates company, where I work remotely.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Women are now taking an active role in the field of SEO in Turkey. Since SEO is still considered from a more technical point of view, the number of men is more, but there is an evolution, I think this evolution will increase.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

In my early days, technical SEO was invaluable. Today, content is very valuable. There were still many brands that thought SEO was a magic wand and thought that they would achieve incredible success with the slightest change. At the same time, it was thought that SEO was not only developing a strategy, but also writing the content, making link collaborations, and fixing the errors / deficiencies on the software side. Therefore, developing a strategy was the easiest part. And when I was a woman, unfortunately, what I said was not taken seriously. Even if we said the same things, there were many customers who approved what my male colleagues said.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It's not difficult right now. There is hardly any discrimination between men and women in the industry. Since men think that they have more command of technical jargon and when we look at the people who are interested in the technical side, the number of men is higher, they can be more proactive when they see a man in front of them, thinking that they speak the same language. But other than that, starting an SEO career is never difficult for a woman.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I can put planned and focused work first. Since there can be too many variables and too many reason points to focus on in SEO, it is necessary to plan all these according to their priorities and examine each point in detail. The reason for the underperformance can be fixed by fixing an overlooked technical issue or it can be spread over a wider area such as content. It is very important to establish the cause-effect relationship well and make inferences. For this, of course, besides the characteristic features, experience and having seen many cases are also valuable.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Actually, my main reason was that it was a branch of marketing. It was a newly developing and well-known area in Turkey. I also enjoyed being one of the first to learn. Over time, it evolved to a point that I couldn't even imagine, and that was very appealing. It is also a dynamic and human-based subject. I was interested in understanding and analyzing human behavior and answering their questions/expectations. According to the content you create and some regulations, the search engine analyzes you, your target audience reads and turns into customers. You are building a bridge between the target audience and the brand. It still feels very motivating to me.

 Beatrice Köhler, Geschäftsführerin, Kampagnenreiter GmbH

Beatrice Köhler is the founder and managing director of the SEO agency Aktionsreiter. She is an expert in local search engine optimization. In your agency, together with your employees, you look after SMEs of different sizes. About 75 percent of your customers are regional companies, the rest are operators of niche online shops.

About SEO she says:

“Search engine optimization is a solid craft. Similar to building a house, the foundation has to be right. If the foundation is stable and built cleanly, the house can withstand storms and wind. Applied to a website, this means that if the basis is correct, a Google update can rarely harm the website operator. On the contrary: If you act cleanly, you will (in my opinion) be rewarded with every update.”

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

I think there are still too few women, especially in technical SEO. In content creation, the situation looks much better. It is also noticeable that women are much calmer and therefore do not come to the fore as much as their male colleagues.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

I started a blog almost 20 years ago. In the beginning I didn't even know that what I was doing there was SEO :-) It was an exciting time back then. However, I am glad that today the quality of websites plays a bigger role than any tricks we have tried to trick the search engines to get better rankings.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

It is more difficult to get into SEO, especially for women who only want to work part-time. Some of my agency colleagues are still of the opinion that only full-time employees are entitled to further training, so the part-time employees, most of whom are women, are left behind. However, this is not only a problem in SEO, but in many other industries.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

Eager to learn, structured, able to think outside the box.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

It's just fun for me to make companies visible with their products and services.

Hilal Canseven, SEO Consultant, Markethinkers

I graduated from Dokuz Eylül University, Department of Economics in 2020. Psychology, what people react to and the underlying reasons have always caught my attention. It has always given me pleasure to try to understand and observe them. When I decided to combine these observations with my career, I became interested in digital marketing. I worked in the field of digital marketing for a short time and developed myself in different areas. In this process, when I met SEO, I realized that I wanted to specialize in this field. I have been working actively in the field of SEO for 1 year. During my work, I had the opportunity to develop myself in a versatile way in every position.

By integrating my interest in psychology and people's demands in this field, I developed and continue to improve my user-oriented thinking ability. I try to keep my strategies fresh by following the developments and updates in the field of SEO regularly. I believe that keeping up with this ever-evolving online world will be possible by thinking innovatively, always researching and questioning.

What do you think about the situation of women in the SEO industry in your country?

Compared to the past, women's employment in the digital sector is increasing all over the world, including Turkey. However, this does not mean that women's place in working life is not approached with prejudice. In this sense, I think it is very important that the number of successful women in the sector, especially in SEO, is high and they set an example. To give an example, there are many successful women in the agency I work for, and one of its founders is a young entrepreneur woman. Being in such an environment makes a serious contribution to reaching the points I have reached in my career, and especially the work I do. I hope this spreads across many organizations in the industry.

Women should take place in the field of SEO as in every sector. For this, women can be supported with trainings where they can gain competency in the sector, and encouraging activities where they can meet SEO and take part in the sector.

How were your early days in the SEO industry? How do you view them in retrospect?

When I started working as an SEO consultant, I was very weak in terms of experience. However, with my interest in SEO and my desire to learn something new, I created areas where I can quickly gain experience. While it was difficult to understand the small parts at first, I started to make sense of the parts and see the big picture by following the agenda closely, experiencing new things, taking trainings and keeping myself up to date. I learned to make mistakes and discovered how not to repeat them.

Looking back, I can say that I came from a path full of mistakes and questions. It's a cycle of learn-try-make-correct-do not repeat, learn something new-make new mistakes-fix-do again. Asking lots of questions, searching for answers and trying are the keys to my career advancement.

Do you think it's difficult for a woman to start a career in SEO?

Digital marketing and SEO are among the sectors that have increased in popularity and intense competition around the world recently. At this point, when we look at it from the perspective of gender equality, I think it is important to be equipped and open to development, regardless of gender. SEO is a dynamic career journey and it still contains many concepts that we need to learn with the developing technology. Many people who do not follow the online world, cannot keep up with technological developments, do not know their users, cannot produce solutions according to their needs and are not open to development, may have difficulties in building their SEO career.

In order to increase the number of women working in the field of SEO, it is also an important issue to increase the working environments where supportive and equal opportunities are offered. I believe that when given the chance, regardless of the sector, women can break out of the mold and show their success.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

An SEO professional spends most of his day in Google Search Console, Analytics and various analysis tools. For this reason, an expert must have the ability to use analysis tools, read and interpret data. He must understand where to look for what he is looking for, what results he encounters, why he encounters these results. And if there is a problem, he should have an idea about how to solve it and be able to produce alternative ways. Having these features facilitates many of the work I do within the scope of SEO. In addition, my high motivation to learn also affects my studies quite a lot and allows me to keep up with the dynamism.

Why did you choose to work in the SEO industry?

Psychology, understanding how people react to what they do and why they do what has always caught my attention, and I have always enjoyed observing this. When I realized that I could use it in SEO, I decided to do this business. It is very enjoyable for me to analyze and get to know users, to be able to understand and answer their questions, and to observe their reactions to the work done. And being able to experience this in different languages and sectors adds a lot to me in terms of the diversity it creates. The fact that SEO is a dynamic sector was also effective in my preference for this constantly evolving and changing field.

Vivienne Goizet, Editorial Lead SEO, BILD

In 2013 I started a student job at hamburg.de and at the time it felt to me like they would take on anyone willing to accept the challenge of learning SEO. At the beginning I got 1 on 1 Training from a Freelancer whose work I should take over as he intended to stop working as an SEO Freelancer and embark on a new career path. Then I just started reading a lot about SEO online which I do until this Day. When I left hamburg.de I was the one training the next student to do the Job which felt great.

Many years later I visited my first SEO conference and realized the SEO Industry in Germany is mainly male dominated. It didn't bother me at first. But when I started asking about it the answers didn't feel quite right. 

Why aren't there more famous SEO women? Women are just not that interested in SEO, it's like with maths.

As a woman who likes maths and is interested in SEO I strongly believe there are a lot like me out there. At least as many as men. 

But why then aren't there more women who choose a career in SEO? In personally think two thinks play a major role. First, you kinda of needed to be a protegée of one of the SEO Grandmasters to really learn the ins and Outs of the Business and we naturally choose people who are like us when taking on a mentee. It would be necessary to make a conscious effort to choose a someone who is not only of another gender but maybe even has different taste in music. I think this conscious effort is happening more and more. And there are so many Jobs in SEO on the German career Market right now, I feel gender matters less and less. Companys are just happy when they find someone who knows the trade as there Just aren't so many SEOs out there. Career opportunities are plenty. Which bring's me to the second Point: daring.

We often feel like we need a thousand certificates before we allow ourselves to start doing something. This is certainly because we get asked for proof of our ability more often and not given the same general benefit of the doubt that white men get all the time. However we can dare a little more as there Just aren't so many certificates for SEO. We can trust more in our ability to learn new things quickly and adapt. And go for that new SEO career earlier rather than later.

Because the secret of all SEOs is: No one has studied it. We all just read a lot and test a lot and started somewhere.

Nowadays I work at BILD.de as Editorial Lead SEO and teach journalists how their unique content ranks better on Google.

Rosi Ghalachyan, SEO account manager uSERP

SEO strategist with 8+ years of experience in the field, I work with companies from Europe and the US on both national and international SEO campaigns.

I have taken specializations and courses in SEO, digital strategy, online consumer psychology and crowd psychology offered by educational institutions in the US. I constantly participate in mentoring sessions with the best SEO experts in the world. At the same time, I have over 10 years of experience in direct sales and over 50 active trainings in persuasion and sales. I work with businesses in various niches and have significant experience in international SEO projects in the medical, healthcare and pharma fields. I currently work in English, French and Romanian.

What character attributes of yours help you in your day-to-day SEO work?

I will gladly share some general character attributes that may help me in their day-to-day SEO work:

Analytical thinking: SEO work involves a lot of data analysis and problem-solving. Being able to break down complex data sets and identify patterns can help SEO professionals make informed decisions.

Attention to detail: In SEO, small details can have a big impact on search engine rankings. Being meticulous and thorough when it comes to things like keyword research, meta tags, and site architecture can help improve a site's SEO.

Creativity: SEO requires creative thinking to come up with strategies to improve a site's visibility and increase traffic. Being able to think outside the box and come up with unique solutions can be a valuable asset in the field.

Communication skills: SEO work often involves working with multiple stakeholders, including clients, developers, and marketing teams. Strong communication skills are essential to effectively communicate strategies and collaborate with others.

Patience and persistence: SEO is a long-term game, and it can take time to see results. Being patient and persistent in implementing strategies and monitoring progress can help achieve long-term success.

Metodologia - como foi produzido o relatório?

No relatório, colocamos como objetivo compreender o impacto do ambiente masculino da indústria de SEO no trabalho quotidiano das mulheres. Foi possível conhecer as perspectivas, sentimentos e pensamentos femininos, que temos certeza que lhes interessa - não importa se seu interesse esteja nas tendências da nova indústria tecnológica ou nas questões sociais.

Utilizámos dois formulários online para recolher dados - um dos quais chegou a 200 pessoas e visava recolher dados quantitativos, permitindo-nos descrever estatisticamente a indústria a partir da perspectiva das mulheres. O segundo formulário foi endereçado a aproximadamente 30 mulheres selecionadas, cujas opiniões e pensamentos sobre a indústria acrescentaram uma nova e mais aprofundada perspectiva sobre o tema descrito.

A fim de alcançar o maior número possível de mulheres, os formulários foram disponibilizados através de vários canais de comunicação, tais como as redes sociais, o correio electrónico e os canais de comunicação da empresa. Tendo isso em conta, era importante para nós garantir o anonimato das inquiridas e proteger os seus dados pessoais, os quais só foram obtidos no caso dos comentários das especialistas. Neste momento, gostaríamos de agradecer a todas aquelas que contribuíram para o relatório e concordaram em participar na pesquisa.

A fim de fornecer uma imagem mais unificada da indústria de SEO, também utilizamos no relatório os dados recolhidos na pesquisa anterior da WhitePress® , realizada via CAWI nos anos de 2022/2023. A pesquisa cobriu aproximadamente 1.500 pessoas na indústria de SEO, incluindo 486 mulheres. . Graças aos seus resultados, conseguimos fazer comparações e justaposições entre os sexos, fornecendo uma imagem ainda mais aprofundada e interessante da indústria em 2022 e 2023.