Technical SEO Jobs: Skills, Tools, Salaries and Getting Hired

If you’re eyeing technical SEO jobs, you want specifics: what you’ll do, the tools to learn, and how to show evidence you can ship outcomes, not just audits. We build and fix search infrastructure for ecommerce and SaaS teams — here’s the straight answer from production work.

Short answer: technical SEO jobs are applied problem‑solving roles focused on crawlability, indexation, site speed, structured data and platform constraints. You’ll use crawlers, logs, performance tooling and a bit of scripting to remove blockers that stop pages being discovered, rendered or ranked — then prove impact with clean metrics.

What technical SEO jobs actually involve

Day to day, you’ll be finding and removing friction between search engines and a site’s code, architecture and hosting. Expect to:

• Run crawls (Screaming Frog, Sitebulb) to spot broken architecture, weak internal linking, duplicate content and parameter bloat.
• Analyse server logs to see how Googlebot really crawls vs how you think it crawls. Prioritise high‑value URLs and trim waste.
• Improve Core Web Vitals with practical fixes (image dimensions, critical CSS, script deferral, server/cache tuning).
• Ensure JavaScript content is discoverable: server‑side rendering or hydration limits, pre‑rendering, or moving key content into HTML.
• Implement structured data that actually matches templates and inventory (Product, Article, FAQ, Breadcrumb).
• Fix international SEO (hreflang), canonicals, pagination, sitemaps, robots directives, 301/410 strategies.
• Support migrations and replatforming (Shopify, headless builds on Next.js/Vercel, CMS swaps) without losing revenue.
• Tie everything back to data: Search Console, GA4, Looker Studio/BigQuery, and error budgets for engineering changes.

It’s not just audits. You’ll open issues in GitHub/Jira with reproducible steps, propose the simplest safe fix, and verify changes post‑deploy with monitors.

Core skills hiring managers look for

You don’t need to be a full‑stack dev, but the best technical SEOs are comfortable with code, data and ops. The shortlist we hire for:

• Crawling and indexing: strong Screaming Frog/Sitebulb use, understanding of crawl queues, canonicalisation, robots.txt, meta robots.
• Log analysis: can process logs to quantify crawl waste and missed content. Bonus if you’ve used BigQuery, Logstash, or GoAccess.
• Core Web Vitals: can move LCP/INP/CLS with specific, testable changes. Knows PageSpeed Insights, Lighthouse CI and CrUX.
• JavaScript SEO: SSR vs CSR, hydration limits, how Next.js/Nuxt/Shopify sections render, lazy‑loading pitfalls.
• Data skills: decent Excel/Sheets, regex, SQL basics, and light Python (Pandas) for dedupe/joins. Git for versioning.
• Structured data: can map templates to schema.org types; validates in Search Console and Rich Results Test.
• International and ecommerce quirks: hreflang, variants, faceted navigation, Shopify collection rules, indexable search pages.
• Communication: can translate tech debt into commercial risk, write crisp tickets, and set clear acceptance criteria.

If you can explain how you cut crawl waste by 40% or shipped a 1.2s LCP improvement — and show the diff — you’ll beat candidates who just list tools.

The tooling stack you’ll actually use

No single tool wins. Build a stack you can automate and trust.

• Crawling: Screaming Frog SEO Spider (enterprise mode + API), Sitebulb for visualisation.
• Search data: Google Search Console (UI + API), Bing Webmaster Tools, Ahrefs/Semrush for link and keyword context.
• Performance: PageSpeed Insights, Lighthouse CI, WebPageTest, Chrome DevTools Performance tab, CrUX Dashboard.
• Logs and data: BigQuery, Postgres, GoAccess, Logstash, Python (Pandas), SQL, regex.
• Automation: n8n for low‑code jobs (e.g. daily sitemap checks), GitHub Actions for scheduled crawls and Lighthouse runs.
• Delivery: Git, GitHub/GitLab, Cloudflare (rules, cache, Workers), Vercel/Netlify for headless builds.
• Ecommerce: Shopify Admin API and GraphQL for product/collection data, theme audits in Liquid, metafields and section schema.
• Reporting: Looker Studio on GA4 + GSC + BigQuery; Uptimerobot/StatusCake for endpoint monitoring.
• SERP QA: SerpAPI for structured result checks at scale.

Learn two deep (Screaming Frog + GSC) and have working literacy in the rest. Automate anything you repeat twice.

Real project examples and outcomes

A few from recent UK projects to show what hiring managers want to hear.

• 200k‑URL retailer, crawl budget triage: consolidated parameters (15 → 4), blocked faceted traps, and split sitemaps by type. Log analysis showed 47% crawl waste; we cut this to 18% in 4 weeks. Result: +32% more valid indexed URLs and +14% clicks on long‑tail PLPs in GSC.
• Core Web Vitals on Shopify: moved hero images to width/height attributes, preloaded fonts, deferred non‑critical apps, and used Cloudflare Polish for image compression. LCP improved from 3.4s → 2.0s on mobile; INP 280ms → 160ms. Revenue from organic sessions up 11% over 6 weeks (like‑for‑like).
• JavaScript rendering on a Next.js SaaS site: product docs loaded behind client‑side fetch. We server‑rendered summaries and deferred code‑samples. Indexed pages up 26% and impressions +19% in 30 days.
• Migration to Shopify: mapped 12,400 URLs, created 3,200 301s, fixed collection canonical conflicts, and implemented Product + Breadcrumb schema. Post‑migration organic sessions dipped 6% week 1, recovered by week 3, and were +9% by week 6.
• Internal linking with automation: weekly n8n job reads top orphan URLs from GSC API and posts a GitHub issue with 5 suggested internal link placements based on keyword overlap. Average crawl depth for target set improved from 4.3 → 2.1; clicks +17% over 8 weeks.

These are the stories to put in your CV and portfolio: the problem, the method, the numbers, and the rollback plan if it went wrong.

Building a portfolio that gets interviews

You don’t need permission to start building evidence.

• Publish a crawl teardown: pick a mid‑size site (5–20k URLs), run Screaming Frog, and write a concise report with three fixes you’d ship tomorrow. Include exports, deduped in Sheets/Python, and your prioritisation matrix.
• Ship a mini automation: use n8n to check sitemap availability, lastmod freshness and response codes daily. Send a Slack alert when >2% of URLs drop to 404/410. Put the workflow JSON on GitHub.
• Log sample analysis: take anonymised logs (many guides include samples) and prove you can calculate bot frequency, waste, and missed sitemaps. Visualise in Looker Studio or Data Studio with BigQuery.
• Structured data at scale: build a validator notebook that flags mismatches between Product schema and inventory (price, availability, SKU). Show before/after Rich Results coverage.
• Performance fixes with a diff: fork a demo site, add preconnect/preload, compress and resize imagery, and capture Lighthouse CI before/after. Keep the workflow in GitHub Actions.
• Ecommerce edge case: clone a Shopify theme, fix duplicate content from pagination and tag URLs, implement canonical rules in Liquid, and document the results.

Link to these deliverables in your CV. Hiring managers trust artefacts over adjectives. If you want a second pair of eyes on a portfolio piece, we’re happy to help — or take a look at our own approach to Technical SEO.

Where the jobs are and what they pay (UK)

Indicative ranges we see hiring across the UK. London skews higher; remote has widened options.

• Junior Technical SEO: £28k–£35k
• Mid‑weight: £35k–£50k
• Senior: £50k–£70k
• Lead/Head of Technical SEO: £70k–£95k+
• Freelance day rates: £350–£700 depending on remit, deliverables and platform knowledge

Roles cluster in:

• Agencies (delivery across multiple sites; faster exposure to varied stacks)
• In‑house (deeper platform expertise, more stakeholder work, longer roadmaps)
• Product/platform teams (Shopify apps, headless frameworks, hosting/CDN providers)

We’re based in Bournemouth and see strong demand from ecommerce on Shopify and headless storefronts, plus SaaS teams consolidating site speed and documentation SEO.

Interview prep and take‑home tasks

Expect one or more of the following. Treat each like a mini‑eng engagement — concise, evidence‑driven, with clear assumptions.

• 60‑minute site audit: prioritise three issues that move the needle. Provide reproduction, impact estimate and a low‑risk fix.
• Data task: clean a messy crawl export or join GSC data to a URL map. Explain your joins and show the SQL or steps.
• Performance review: identify the LCP element, show how you’d measure before/after in Lighthouse CI, and note trade‑offs.
• JS rendering: confirm whether critical content is in HTML on first response. Recommend SSR, static export or selective hydration.
• Migration mapping: propose redirect logic for a sample set, including canonicals and pagination. Note edge cases and tests.

Preparation tips:

• Build a 30/60/90 plan template you can adapt to any role.
• Keep a bank of annotated screenshots (GSC, DevTools, WebPageTest) you can reuse.
• Practise explaining issues to non‑SEOs: one sentence, one risk, one fix.
• Have one failure story with what you learned and the safeguard you’d add now.

Career paths and specialisms

Technical SEO isn’t a dead‑end; it branches nicely.

• Platform SEO Engineer: embedded with devs, writing tickets, testing, and occasionally committing. Strong in Git, CI and frameworks.
• SEO Ops and Automation: n8n/Airflow, GitHub Actions, Search Console API jobs, weekly reporting and anomaly detection.
• Ecommerce SEO Specialist: Shopify Admin API/GraphQL, collection logic, variants, pagination, filters and app performance.
• Analytics‑leaning: GA4/BigQuery models, measurement plans, attribution sanity checks, Looker Studio dashboards that execs actually read.
• Migration Specialist: replatform playbooks, redirect automation, and post‑launch monitors to catch 404s and cannibalisation.

Pick a lane that aligns with what you ship best, then stack complementary skills. For example, combine Shopify theme knowledge with CWV tuning and you’ll never be short of work.

If you’re weighing options or want feedback on your next step, book a free discovery call. We’re happy to share what’s landing roles right now.

FAQ

What does a technical SEO actually do each day?

You’ll run targeted crawls, review Search Console coverage, check performance metrics, write tickets with reproduction steps, and validate fixes after deploys. On bigger weeks you’ll map redirects, analyse logs and join planning sessions with devs and product.

Do I need to code to get a technical SEO job?

Basic literacy helps: HTML/CSS, how JS rendering works, and the ability to read diffs. Light Python/SQL/regex will lift you above the pack. You don’t need to build apps, but you should automate repetitive tasks and use Git confidently.

Which certifications help?

They’re optional. Google Analytics (GA4) and Cloudflare fundamentals are practical. More important is a portfolio: a public crawl teardown, a Lighthouse CI workflow, and a log analysis notebook beat certificates every time.

Agency vs in‑house — which is better for learning?

Agencies expose you to multiple stacks quickly (Shopify, headless, legacy CMS). In‑house gives depth on one platform and bigger roadmaps. Do two years agency to build breadth, then specialise in‑house or as a freelancer depending on your goals.