Job descriptions
Head of SEO Job Description
Full head of seo job description: responsibilities, requirements, KPIs, reporting line and typical salary band, plus a…
What a e-commerce seo manager actually does, what employers require, how the role is measured, and a template you can adapt — written to be useful to hiring managers writing the advert and to candidates decoding it.
Runs organic search for a catalogue: category architecture, product indexation, and the revenue that comes from both.
E-commerce SEO is where technical and commercial SEO meet hardest. The core problems — faceted navigation, thin and duplicate product pages, out-of-stock handling, seasonal demand, international catalogues — are structural, and solving them requires influence over merchandising and platform decisions, not just optimisation work.
The single highest-return change you can make to an SEO job advert is publishing the salary range. Postings with a visible range attract a larger and better-qualified applicant pool, and they save both sides the wasted stages that end in a compensation mismatch.
A well-scoped e-commerce seo manager role covers the following. If an advert lists substantially more than this, it is probably two jobs; if it lists substantially less, check where the rest of the work actually sits.
Formal qualifications rarely appear on this list for a reason: SEO hiring weighs demonstrable results above credentials. Our guide to whether you need a degree for SEO covers the evidence, and the skills gap analyzer will score you against this list.
Clear success measures are the fastest way to tell a serious role from a vague one. These are the measures most commonly attached to this position.
| Measure | Typical cadence |
|---|---|
| Organic revenue by category | Monthly |
| Indexed product and category pages versus eligible | Monthly |
| Organic conversion rate by template | Monthly |
| Non-branded organic share of e-commerce revenue | Quarterly |
Reporting line: Head of SEO, Head of E-commerce or Digital Director. Seniority: Senior (5–8 years).
The typical United States band for this role is $90,000 – $130,000 in base salary, before bonus, equity or benefits. That band widens considerably by sector, company size and market.
For location-specific numbers, the salary by location hub benchmarks 24 markets on the same scale. To position yourself inside a band, use the SEO salary calculator, and read the compensation guide for how packages are actually constructed.
Copy, adapt and publish. Replace the bracketed sections; delete anything that does not apply rather than leaving it vague. Everything below is written to be specific enough that a candidate can self-select accurately.
JOB TITLE: E-commerce SEO Manager REPORTS TO: Head of SEO, Head of E-commerce or Digital Director LOCATION: [City / Hybrid / Remote — state the geographic pay band] LEVEL: Senior (5–8 years) SALARY RANGE: $90,000 – $130,000 [publish the range — postings with a range attract significantly more qualified applicants] ABOUT THE ROLE Runs organic search for a catalogue: category architecture, product indexation, and the revenue that comes from both. WHAT YOU WILL DO • Own category and subcategory architecture as the primary organic surface, and defend it against merchandising churn. • Solve faceted navigation: what gets indexed, what gets canonicalised, what gets blocked. • Handle product lifecycle in search — launches, variants, out-of-stock, discontinued lines and their redirects. • Own product and category structured data, including offers, availability and reviews. • Drive internal linking between category, product and editorial content. • Manage international catalogues, hreflang and market-level duplication. • Forecast and report organic revenue by category, and feed that into merchandising planning. • Work with the platform team on template performance and Core Web Vitals at catalogue scale. WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR • Direct e-commerce SEO ownership with revenue accountability • Faceted navigation and parameter handling experience on a real catalogue • Platform fluency — Shopify, Magento, Salesforce Commerce, BigCommerce or custom • Product and category structured data implementation • Comfort working with merchandising and buying teams NICE TO HAVE • Marketplace SEO (Amazon, eBay) alongside owned site • International and multi-currency catalogue experience • Feed management and Shopping campaign coordination • Programmatic page generation at scale HOW SUCCESS IS MEASURED • Organic revenue by category (Monthly) • Indexed product and category pages versus eligible (Monthly) • Organic conversion rate by template (Monthly) • Non-branded organic share of e-commerce revenue (Quarterly) WHAT WE OFFER • [Salary range, bonus structure, equity if applicable] • [Pension / retirement contribution, healthcare] • [Learning budget, conference allowance, tool access] • [Working pattern, flexibility, holiday allowance] HOW TO APPLY [Process, number of stages, expected timeline, who they will meet]
The question that reveals the seniority of an e-commerce SEO role is who decides the category structure. If merchandising can restructure navigation without consulting you, the role is remedial. If you are in that decision, it is a real ownership job.
Once you have decided a role is worth applying for, the resume scorer checks your application against how SEO screens actually read, and the interview preparation guide covers the stages that follow.
No formal qualification is required. Employers screen for demonstrable results, tool fluency and the specific competencies listed above. Free certifications from Google, HubSpot and Semrush help an application clear an initial screen but rarely decide an offer. See which SEO certifications are actually worth it.
Typically $90,000 – $130,000 in the United States, varying widely by sector, company size and location. Benchmark against your own market on the salary by location hub.
Most commonly Head of SEO, Head of E-commerce or Digital Director. The reporting line is one of the most reliable signals of how seriously a company takes organic search: a role reporting into growth or marketing leadership usually has influence, one buried three levels down usually does not.
It depends on what the role actually owns rather than what it is called. Look for scope you do not already have — a channel, a budget, a team, a technically harder problem. Our SEO career path guide maps how the roles connect, and the career path matcher suggests directions based on how you prefer to work.
Figures on this page are aggregated market estimates compiled from the sources above and are intended for orientation, not as an offer, guarantee or valuation. See our salary data methodology.
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