NJ SEO Consultant Chris Countey A Digital Marketing Blog & Forum
Ruth Burr of SEOmoz was kind enough to share this awesome mentor story with me.
I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.
The one person who really helped me get into SEO would have to be Susan Urban, who is now the President at Urban SEO LLC. When I graduated from college with a B.A. in Theater (having already decided that I didn’t want to do theater – oops), I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I started temping and ended up getting a job as a Marketing Intern at Onvia, where Susan was the in-house SEO. She quickly saw that I could write and was a fast learner, and started teaching me SEO for blogging so I could begin creating content for their corporate blog.
it was like unlocking a whole world of information
Before I met Susan, I didn’t even know that SEO existed – it was like unlocking a whole world of information. I was fascinated, and I loved doing it. When Susan decided to leave Onvia, she didn’t want to leave them without an in-house SEO, so she sat me down and taught me everything she knew during what is still one of the most intense 3-week periods of my life, and I ended up staying on at Onvia as their in-house SEO for another 4 years. That one temp job turned into the beginning of my entire career. Since then, Susan has continued to be active in the Seattle SEO community – I love that she has kept sharing the huge amount of SEO knowledge and passion she has.
Susan doesn’t blog much on SEO topics – she’s too busy creating great content for her clients.
Susan doesn’t blog much on SEO topics – she’s too busy creating great content for her clients. For the real inside scoop from her, I’d recommend seeking her out at a conference or industry event – Seattle SEOs will see her all over town at various events.
Ruth Recommends
The one website or page I would (and do) recommend to someone just starting out in SEO would have to be SEOmoz’ Beginners’ Guide to SEO. It’s a comprehensive and up-to-date source of information. I know so many people who have started out in SEO and are using old and outdated advice/blog posts as a starting point; it’s really important to have an up-to-date resource.
Do you have a mentor story you want to share? I’d love to hear it!
Thanks for sharing your story, Ruth!
I feel like such a proud SEO momma!
I interned with Susan when she was running PayScale’s SEO program. She gave me a great foundation of knowledge and helped me figure out that this was indeed the field I wanted into. Pity about the “no-time-for-blog-posts” policy!