SEO is a huge part of my job, as Digital Marketing Manager at Tecmark. But that doesn’t mean to say that I turn off my computer at 5:30 and just forget about it. In fact, I have a theory that for anyone to actually be successful in SEO, it can never be ‘just a job,’ and here’s why.

Updates, Updates, Updates

SEO is never static. It doesn’t stand still and wait for everyone to master the art. Nope! Google is always changing its algorithm – hundreds of updates a year with only the biggest ever publicised. In order to make sure you are completely and utterly up to date with everything new that is happening, you have to be constantly reading and testing. This takes time – more time than there is in a working week.

I find myself constantly reading up in my own time. I don’t feel ‘obliged,’ though. I genuinely enjoy it.

Rankings Checks

Anyone in SEO will know how important some keywords can be. And we’ve probably all got a handful of keywords we check very, very, very regularly. I admit to checking the rankings of some keywords every single morning before I even leave for work.

Again, I don’t feel as though I have to – I feel as though I want to!

Google Doesn’t Close at Weekends

Google, Bing and the other search engines are open for business 24/7. That means changes (positive o negative) can happen at any time of the day or night. A drop in rankings probably won’t do you the courtesy of waiting until Monday morning to happen and sometimes you need to respond immediately. By the same token, great rankings improvements can happen late at night too.

Nobody’s suggesting you should be working constantly. But in certain cases, we need to be prepped to react whatever hour of the day things happen.

I suppose in essence, SEO has to be a hobby as well as a job if you’re going to do it well. You have to get a kick out of seeing positive movement, a real buzz from stealing competitors’ rankings and to genuinely enjoy it if you are to stand any chance of being as immersed enough as you need to be. In an industry that changes constantly and where you can never, ever know everything there is to know, you have to be passionate about it to stay motivated enough to keep on keeping on!

This post was contributed by Stacey Cavanagh of Tecmark.co.uk. Stacey’s an iPhone addict, self confessed SEO geek and lover of bad jokes… really bad jokes.