Hiring for an Enterprise Team — Craig Harkins // CoStar

Craig Harkins, Director of SEO and Content at CoStar, discusses scaling your enterprise SEO team to support both product and content. When SEO and content are under marketing, there can be some difficulty getting SEO recommendations implemented. However, when they are under product, it becomes a lot easier to work directly with developers to drive the ideal user experience. Today, Craig dives into how Apartments.com leverages SEO within their organization.
About the speaker

Craig Harkins

CoStar

- CoStar

Craig is Director of SEO and Content at CoStar

Show Notes

  • 02:02
    What makes an enterprise SEO team
    Enterprise SEO involves SEO tactics that are scalable across millions of pages and other websites. For CoStar, SEO isnt a siloed activity and partners with other teams.
  • 03:51
    CoStars SEO strategy ecosystem
    While each vertical has its own SEO team and strategy, they still share the tactics that are working with each other. Each team can contribute and determine how to apply winning strategies to their market.
  • 05:28
    Enterprise SEO and determining where to focus efforts
    Start by identifying the product areas where youd like to grow. Its really about looking for opportunities to improve the experience of users on the site.
  • 08:18
    The significance of SEO testing
    The world of search is always changing, so its sensible to run testing before committing to anything. It also enables data-driven SEO and better business decision making.
  • 11:18
    SEO and content within product management
    When SEO and content is under product, theres no need to wait on content to be done. And that makes it integrated because everything happens within product.
  • 12:49
    The advantages of having content and technical SEO components in product
    When youre in product, you get that integration into the roadmap. Because enterprise sites rely heavily on SEO and technical features, they need to live in product to accomplish their goals.
  • 15:45
    Building an enterprise SEO team
    On the technical side, theres the product manager and analyst roles. The content side includes UX writers and product content writers helping to create the user experience.
  • 18:29
    Job vacancies at Apartments.com
    Apartments.com is looking for an SEO analyst and SEO product manager or SEO strategist. Interested parties can reach out to Craig Harkins via LinkedIn.

Quotes

  • "Enterprise SEO isnt siloed. You are working and partnering with other teams like UX design, product management, marketing, executive leadership." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

  • "Each CoStar vertical has their own SEO team and strategy. But we share what's working for us or what tactics we're testing, so that it's not just one team and one set of knowledge." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

  • "You don't just deploy straight to product. We run testing first because, even though things make sense, sometimes they don't work out the same way." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

  • "Being able to write up a business case and say, we're going to AB test it from an SEO perspective, to get that real data, it makes the decisioning so much better." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

  • "Enterprise sites rely so much on SEO and technical features. So, we have to be in product to get those things accomplished." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

  • "You can create all the recommendations and have your site audit. If it isnt getting implemented, you're not accomplishing anything." -Craig Harkins, Director of SEO & Content, CoStar

About the speaker

Craig Harkins

CoStar

- CoStar

Craig is Director of SEO and Content at CoStar

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