is it easy to find a job in seo? my niece wants to take an seo course.?

[Mark]

how much does a company pay for someone to do seo, and how easy is it to find a job in that profession?

[Uncommon Sense]

SEO is usually a joke.

[Doodled]

SEO is a massive growth industry so there are plenty of jobs going. I updated my CV on monster last year and accidently set it live. The phone went mad!

Companies spend big bucks on SEO and they will spend big bucks on someone who knows what they are doing but as with any industry you have to start from the bottom and work up.

Note there are no end of "cowboy courses" around because SEO has become so popular. Many are run by amateurs who give misleading and damaging advice so try to get some truely independent reviews of the course or the person/company giving the course before you part with your money.

Now when it comes to being hiring I look for passion. That means I want to see the person actively takes part in forum discussions (and is respected on them), makes interesting and thought provoking blog comments - perhaps even has their own blog, and of course some proof that they have done SEO that works unless they are coming in as a trainee.

The reason for being active on forums/net/blog is that SEO is a fast evolving business in which you constantly need to retrain. Discussing changes with other professionals, adding to what other people write and writing your own thoughts on recent developments all show you understand how this works.

Regarding the other answer "SEO is a joke" - who knows why they wrote it but find me a large international company that believes the same! To them it is no joke at all.