SEO Specialist CV Example & Template
A complete two-page CV for an in-house SEO specialist working on an e-commerce site in the UK, followed by what heads of marketing check first. Use the layout, then replace the traffic, ranking and revenue figures with your own, because anyone hiring in SEO will ask what changed after your work.
Last reviewed October 2026
Example SEO Specialist CV
Callum Rees
SEO Specialist, e-commerce, technical and content SEO
Manchester, UK
Profile
SEO specialist with five years' experience, the last three in-house at a home and garden retailer. I own technical audits, category page strategy and content briefs, and report on organic revenue each month. I grew organic revenue by 64% in two years and prefer clear experiments to guesses. Looking for a senior SEO role in a team that values testing and good reporting.
Experience
SEO Specialist
Mar 2022 – Present
Gardenly (online retailer, 140 staff) · Manchester
- Grew non-brand organic revenue from £1.9m to £3.1m a year (+64%) across 2022 to 2024 by rebuilding category pages and fixing internal linking.
- Cut the number of indexed duplicate URLs from 38,000 to 4,200 through canonical tags, robots rules and faceted navigation controls.
- Moved the median LCP on mobile category pages from 3.8 to 2.2 seconds, working with two developers and tracking the change in Search Console.
- Wrote briefs for 120 buying guides and category copy; 31 reached the top three for their main query within six months.
- Built a monthly Looker Studio report on clicks, rankings and revenue, which the board now uses for planning.
SEO Executive
Jun 2020 – Feb 2022
Northlight Digital (agency) · Manchester
- Managed organic search for eight clients in retail, travel and professional services, with monthly reporting and quarterly reviews.
- Ran technical audits with Screaming Frog and Sitebulb and delivered prioritised fix lists to client developers.
- Increased organic leads for a law firm by 48% in nine months by restructuring service pages and adding local landing pages.
- Launched a link-earning campaign built on original survey data that won 26 links from news and trade sites.
Content and Social Assistant
Sep 2019 – May 2020
Brightway Marketing · Leeds
- Wrote and published 40 blog posts and optimised metadata for a 300-page site in WordPress.
- Set up Google Analytics and Search Console for six new clients and trained their teams to read the basic reports.
- Researched keywords in Ahrefs and Semrush and proposed a content calendar that the account team adopted.
Education
BA (Hons) Marketing, 2:1
2016 – 2019
Manchester Metropolitan University
Skills
Technical SEO audits · Keyword and intent research · Content briefs and optimisation · Internal linking and site architecture · Core Web Vitals · Google Search Console · GA4 and Looker Studio · Screaming Frog and Sitebulb · Ahrefs and Semrush · Link building · SEO experiments and reporting
Projects
- Speaker, Manchester SEO meetup, 2024: faceted navigation and crawl budget
- Runs a small travel blog as a testing ground, 18,000 organic visits a month
Why this SEO Specialist CV works: what shortlisters check first
Results tied to revenue or leads
Traffic alone is a weak measure. Hiring managers want to see organic revenue, leads or sign-ups, plus the period and the share that came from your work. Say whether the figure is brand or non-brand, and what you changed. Without that, a claim of 'increased traffic by 200%' could mean almost anything.
Technical depth you can explain
Name the problems you solved: crawl budget, duplicate content, canonicals, site speed, JavaScript rendering or migrations. Give the scale, such as thousands of URLs, and the effect. An interviewer will ask how you found the issue and how you proved the fix worked, so keep to examples you can defend.
Content and keyword strategy
Show that you understand search intent, not only keyword volume. Mention the number of pages you briefed, the types of content, and how many ranked. If you write copy, say so. If you commission it, show how you manage writers and keep quality high across a large set of pages.
Tools and reporting
List the platforms you use daily: Search Console, GA4, Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, Semrush, Looker Studio. Then show the report or dashboard you built and who reads it. Reporting is a core part of the job because others make budget decisions from your numbers.
Testing and working with developers
Good SEO specialists run experiments and learn from them. Mention tests, hypotheses and what you did when a change did not work. Also show that you can get work shipped, by writing clear tickets, working with developers and handling a site migration without losing traffic.
Key skills recruiters look for
How to write each section of a SEO Specialist CV
Profile
Give your years in SEO, your focus (technical, content or both), your sector and one headline result. Add the type of role you want, such as senior or technical SEO. Avoid claims like 'passionate about Google' and give a result instead.
Experience
For each role, give the type of site, the size of the team and your scope. Then use three to five bullets with an action, the metric and the timeframe. Keep client names out unless they are public and you have permission.
Skills and tools
Split technical skills, content skills and tools. Use the same names as the advert, such as Screaming Frog or GA4. Leave out outdated claims such as 'keyword density' or 'meta keywords', which tell a reader you may be behind.
Projects and side sites
In SEO, a site you run yourself is useful evidence, because the numbers are yours. Give the niche, the traffic and what you tested. Be honest about the scale, and do not pass off a tiny blog as a large publisher.
Cover letter
Look at the company's site before you write. Name one issue or opportunity you spotted, such as thin category pages or slow templates, and say how you would approach it. It shows you can audit, which is the best proof for the role.
More example bullet points
Strong SEO Specialist CVs lead with measurable impact. Here are examples of the kind of bullets that make recruiters stop scrolling:
Increased organic traffic by 340% in 12 months through technical audit remediation and content cluster strategy
Built and executed link building program acquiring 200+ referring domains from DA 50+ sites
Recovered 60% of lost traffic after Google core update through systematic content quality improvements
Common SEO Specialist CV mistakes
- Quoting percentage growth with no baseline, period or revenue figure.
- Claiming rankings or traffic that came from a brand campaign or a seasonal peak.
- Listing every tool ever opened, without showing what you did with them.
- Mentioning outdated tactics such as keyword stuffing or buying links.
- Leaving out who you worked with, when SEO depends on developers, writers and product teams.
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How to tailor your SEO Specialist CV for each application
Every SEO Specialist job posting is different. The skills they prioritize, the seniority they expect, the setting — all of it shapes what your CV should emphasize. A CV that gets an interview at one employer can miss at another, even for the same job title.
The fastest way to tailor your CV is to paste the job description into NextCV. The AI reads the posting, maps it to your experience, and rewrites your bullets to match what the employer is scanning for. 1 free preview, no signup required — you only pay when you want a clean PDF download. Sign up free for 3 more.
SEO Specialist CV FAQ
What should an SEO specialist CV include?
A short profile, experience with metrics such as organic revenue, rankings, indexed pages and speed, your tools, education and any side projects. Group skills into technical, content and analytics. Two pages is enough, with the strongest results on the first.
How do I show SEO results without breaking client confidentiality?
Describe the sector and the size instead of the name, for example a UK online retailer with 20,000 products. Use percentages and ranges if exact figures are private. Ask your employer what you can share, and keep one or two examples you can talk through fully.
Do I need SEO certifications?
Rarely. UK employers care much more about results and tests than about certificates. Free courses and Google's own training can show you have learned the tools, but they sit near the bottom of the CV, below real work and projects.
How can I get an SEO job with no experience?
Build a small site, track it in Search Console and write up what you tested and learned. Offer to audit a local business for free, and keep the audit as a sample. Then apply for assistant or executive roles at agencies, where training is common.
Should an SEO CV be keyword-optimised?
Use the terms in the job advert naturally, since applicant systems and recruiters both scan for them. Include phrases such as technical SEO, link building and Search Console where true. Do not stuff them in, because an SEO manager will notice at once.