🔍 Why are 70% of SEOs men and why do they get paid so much more than women?

Aug 25, 2020

Good morning, Search Marketer. I don't have the answer to the question I posed in the subject line, but there's not a legitimate justification for it anyway.

More than 70% of SEOs in the U.S. are men — that's according to data compiled by Nicole DeLeon, founder of North Star Inbound, and first published on Moz's blog. What's more, that figure hasn't budged in five years. And, unfortunately but unsurprisingly, pay gaps exist across the board: men make roughly 14% more in local SEO and as much as 67% more for project work, an injustice that's even greater for agencies charging by project.

Diversity, especially within leadership, can create an atmosphere that nurtures innovation and the revenue growth that often accompanies it. So, next time your team is hiring, don't just consider whether a candidate fits into your company's culture — think about if they can actually add to it.

The events of the last six months seem impossible to cram into that time period, yet here we are. Since the outset of all these marketing disruptions, we've prioritized providing insights that might help you, the members of our community, adapt and be as productive as possible.

We looked back on all that's happened — from COVID, to social justice movements, data regulation and algorithm updates — on a special season wrap-up of Live with Search Engine Land, featuring our own editors, Ginny Marvin, Greg Sterling, Barry Schwartz and myself. Our discussion covered stats associated with COVID's impacts, takeaways from marketing experts as well as what we've learned covering the industry as it found new, and often ingenious, ways to meet the challenge. Watch the full video here.

And, early bird pricing for Search Engine Land Awards submissions ends this Friday, August 28, at 11:59 p.m. PT. We usually celebrate our winners on stage as part of SMX Advanced, and despite that not being a possibility this year, agencies, organizations and professionals still have the opportunity to get their achievements recognized by the industry with an accolade that may even help them stand out to new clients. Submit your applications by this Friday to save $100 off. You can learn more right here.

George Nguyen,
Editor

Social Shorts

Retailers won't increase spend for display ads this year, despite record e-comm growth

In a new forecast, eMarketer estimates that overall U.S. retail sales will decline by 10.5% this year and that retailers will increase their display ad spend by only 2.3% this year, despite the massive e-commerce boom.

"Notably, retail advertisers—which make up the largest share of display spending—will boost these investments by just $300 million this year, in spite of increased ecommerce spending by consumers. We estimate total US retail sales will fall by 10.5% this year," eMarketer reported.

Read more »

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Search Shorts

Links from Wikipedia have no SEO value, says Google.

Links from Wikipedia. Google's John Mueller on the topic of links from Wikipedia, "randomly dropping a link into Wikipedia has no SEO value and will do nothing for your site. All you're doing is creating extra work for the Wikipedia maintainers who will remove your link drops. It's a waste of your time and theirs. Do something that's useful in the long term for your site instead, build something of persistent value."

Meta descriptions and Google. "The description meta tag is generally used for the snippet that's shown in search. Not everything has to be a ranking factor in order to be useful," John Mueller of Google said.

SEO content formula. John Mueller from Google said there is no formula for writing content for SEO, he said "the general idea is to write naturally. There is no limit. There is no formula to focus on. Write your content for users."

Enter the 2020 Search Engine Land Awards before this Friday!

Submit your most impressive search marketing campaigns for your chance to win industry-wide recognition, boost team morale, and impress new clients! The Early Bird period ends this Friday August 28 at 11:59pm PST – don't miss out!

Enter now! »