Best SEO Classes Near Me: Find In-Person & Virtual Training

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Search Engine Optimization is the process of building online content that accounts for the ways in which search engines (particularly Google) rank webpages and return results. Whenever a user queries a search engine, a complex behind-the-scenes algorithm assigns a score to relevant webpages and returns a search result that ranks these pages. As such, the difference between showing up 3rd and 13th on a specific Google query can represent a massive difference in web traffic. SEO specialists work to build content that is responsive to search engine algorithms to have their pages produce higher results than they otherwise would.

SEO is a foundational skill in digital marketing, and strong SEO skills can make you a better marketer, business owner, and entrepreneur. Search engine optimization is incredibly relevant today as a common starting point for research for products or services is the search engine. Think about the last time you looked to purchase a product or service online—it probably started with a search on Google. Search engines aggregate information from across the web to deliver users the most relevant and helpful results.

On the side of the marketer, business owner, or entrepreneur, it is our job to show Google that we are the most relevant and helpful place for the specific information, product, or service the customer seeks. It starts with understanding the search engine and the keyword data to develop a strategy for success. Once we know what keywords we are looking to optimize, we can start adjusting our site with our keyword plan in mind. By mastering SEO, you can start driving organic traffic to your site to increase sales at a low cost.

Many marketers and entrepreneurs often look towards paid marketing like social media ads or Google Ads. Still, SEO can enable you to drive consistent and long-term value for your business. With paid marketing, you will continue to pay for every customer you bring in, lowering your profit; with SEO, you can start driving low to no-cost sales and increase your profit. SEO is challenging, but if you learn the techniques and put in the effort, you can begin to see the fruits. Once you see the results from your SEO effort, you'll see the long-term benefit you are getting from that investment. Your site will be better for the users, provide more useful content for users, have more recognition from other websites, and drive continuous traffic to your site.

Why Learn SEO?

Learning SEO skills can be vital for the success of a business that relies on web traffic to generate interest and attention. Given how many people utilize search engines like Google every day (precise numbers are hard to come by, but Google processes billions of search results every day), learning how the system operates and how you can better position your webpages ranking in that system can represent a massive difference in terms of long-term success. Your projects and products will have massively improved visibility by learning to design content that accounts for how search engines rank and return search queries. You will know how to construct future webpages with these issues accounted for.

SEO is also an important part of understanding well-rounded digital marketing strategies. A digital marketing campaign will hardly have a chance at success if no one sees the webpages being built for it, and SEO training will help you build your digital content in such a way to help ensure that it is being seen by potential customers. SEO training is often taught as part of a more robust digital marketing education, so they will want to consider all the different skills they can pair with their SEO training.

Search Engine Optimization isn’t solely used in the context of digital marketing. Anyone running an advocacy campaign, working for a nonprofit, or working as part of a government agency or institution knows that you still need to ensure that your services and content are seen when people utilize search engines. For instance, reputable charity organizations want to make sure that their webpage shows up near the top of any given search related to their field, and colleges and universities will want their program pages to be near the top of a search result when someone makes a generic search.

Career Paths for SEO

In SEO classes, you'll learn the foundational concepts of SEO, like E-A-T and technical, on-page, and off-page SEO, and techniques and strategies that you can implement immediately to see results. SEO is an in-demand skill, and there are a handful of career opportunities for those who understand the search engine well.

Given its importance in the economy today, SEO specialists are able to access a relatively wide variety of SEO-related jobs across the country. After all, companies in virtually every industry have recognized the value of maximizing their search engine presence, leaving SEO management a high-demand career field in most major cities.

According to recent listings on Indeed and salary figures from Glassdoor, professionals versed in SEO are foremost able to qualify for positions like Search Manager or Web Optimization Specialist. These positions, which consider SEO as their primary focus, can pay anywhere from $50,000 to $80,000 per year, depending on the city and company. However, SEO specialists also have many skills that are highly transferable to the broader field of digital marketing, which covers anything from paid search to newsletter and social media marketing. Professionals in these fields can earn similar salaries—anywhere from $50,000 to $75,000 a year, in most cases.

SEO Specialist

One path for those proficient in SEO is to become an SEO specialist or SEO manager. As SEO is a critical component to many online businesses, there are positions available within companies to come on as an SEO expert and help boost site ranking and optimize for search to help grow the business. A company primarily focused on ecommerce can benefit from SEO expertise, and they might find great success from investing in an SEO specialist. In that role, you could explore gaps in the current SEO strategy, find new keywords to go after, connect with related sites to build links and create new content related to your target keywords. So many companies rely on or can benefit from SEO, and if you master the skills, you'll be able to add a lot of value to those companies.

Digital Marketing Specialist

For those proficient in SEO and other digital marketing channels, there are opportunities in broader digital marketing roles like Digital Marketing Managers or Specialists. In these roles, you would likely lead or manage multiple digital marketing channels for a company. This might include social media, search engine marketing, SEO, or whatever else the company is focused on.

There are also opportunities to work as a Marketing Analyst or a Content Marketer. As a Marketing Analyst, you'll work to drive insights from marketing to improve marketing performance. For example, you might look at Google Search Console and find keywords that could be optimized or use Google Analytics for pages that could perform better. You can also look at Google Ads campaigns to combine paid and unpaid search data to create a combined search strategy. Marketing Analysts also work with the social media team or other marketing channels to create omnichannel marketing campaigns. You can advise on content marketing and determine what content might be useful for both SEO and general marketing purposes.

Entrepreneurship

There are also a handful of ways to apply SEO skills for those who want to go the entrepreneurial route. You could use your SEO skills to start consulting for businesses and help them boost their SEO. This allows you to apply your skills across many companies while running your own business.

Another opportunity is to use your SEO skills towards an independent business venture. Say you want to launch the next big software company, use your SEO skills to get found organically and draw in new customers. You can find long-tail keywords related to your product, get backlinks from relevant websites, and come up with creative ways to make SEO work for your business. Having the SEO skills to get your company found will eliminate one more critical thing off your plate as you look to get started. The SEO skills and implementation can propel your business forward and push you ahead of your competitors.

Depending on the industry, competitors may not invest fully in SEO, which can leave a gaping hole for your business to flourish. You can start small by finding particular keywords to target and rank for, and over time, as you build your domain, you can begin competing for broader and more competitive terms.

SEO Training Classes

In today’s digital economy, it is incredibly important for companies to take a proactive approach to being easily discovered through search engines like Google and Bing. After all, since the vast majority of users find a website through a search engine, appearing near the top of relevant search results can be one of the most valuable marketing assets a business has. To try and maximize the impact their site can have on search engines, companies often turn to SEO specialists to draw audiences and maximize engagement.

While anyone can learn SEO, taking an SEO class will provide you with essential training in which techniques are most effective for you. SEO classes will teach you which tools to use to find keywords and how to use keywords on your website once you've determined the right words to use. You'll learn other strategies that affect SEO performance such as having a mobile-friendly website and regularly updated content. The algorithms that sort and rank webpages are constantly evolving and updating. SEO training will also help you learn how to predict future trends in SEO habits so that your content isn’t left behind in the event that Google tweaks the way its algorithm weights certain aspects of a webpage.

Students will also learn less technically driven skills. Writing SEO-friendly headlines, using images to optimize SEO, and incorporating meta tags are just a few popular strategies you will learn in SEO classes. At the same time, more comprehensive programs will combine other digital marketing channels to come up with a full digital marketing plan.

Noble Desktop offers a Digital Marketing Certificate program for students seeking a well-rounded education in running successful online advertising campaigns. In this class, students will learn the basic skills that SEO professionals use to help bolster their webpage ranks, including conducting keyword research and writing headlines and content with SEO in mind. Students will also learn how to plan digital marketing campaigns, utilize online advertising services, and market products on social media. This career-focused training program aims to prepare graduates for a future in digital marketing. The lessons involve practical, hands-on instruction in real-world digital marketing skills that students can apply once they leave the program. In addition, students enrolled in the class will receive professional development support services, including portfolio development seminars and one-on-one career mentorship.

Students looking for a more directed program can enroll in the SEO Bootcamp, which teaches students SEO best practices, how to write and create keywords, tags, and content that utilizes SEO training, and how to use SEO to gain valuable knowledge of your competitors' practices. This accelerated skills course is designed for students who want to pick up important SEO knowledge without enrolling in a career-focused certificate program. Students will still receive robust SEO training and instruction. Still, if they don’t have prior digital marketing training or experience, they will need additional instruction to parlay their SEO knowledge into a career.

Many training providers offer accelerated SEO courses for students looking to learn the basics of search engine optimization and how to apply those skills to their current professional lives. For example, Ledet Training offers a Search Engine Optimization Essentials course for students looking to write and create content prioritized by search engines like Google. Students’ training will be based on real-world examples of search engine optimization techniques and working with actual search engine algorithms to build their skills.

BrainStation offers an immersive Digital Marketing Certificate program for students looking to learn SEO, social media marketing, paid web advertising, and other important skills for an online marketer. Students will learn how to write SEO-attentive content, utilize common search keywords, and the differences between paid and organic search marketing. This course aims to prepare students for a career in digital marketing.

Certstaffix Training offers a live online instructor-led SEO class. Their hands-on course will cover the concepts and trends of SEO to make it less confusing and complex for you. In the course, you’ll learn how to develop a day-by-day strategy for developing, managing, and measuring a successful SEO plan. Your instructor will review essential SEO tools as well as how to troubleshoot common SEO problems. This course is also offered to teams that are interested in onsite training.

Certstaffix Training also offers its SEO course in an on-demand format as part of its SEO e-learning bundle. This bundle includes the courses Online Marketing 101, Digital Marketing: SEO Strategy, The Ultimate SEO Blueprint, Advanced Google SEO, and The Complete WordPress SEO Blueprint. Students who purchase the course will have instant access to materials such as lectures. Students who work through the bundle will finish with a deeper understanding of digital marketing and SEO principles.

For a lesson in SEO tools, sign up for NYC Career Centers’ Google Analytics Bootcamp. The 6-hour course provides an introduction to Google Analytics, a popular tool used to track metrics that help determine how a website is performing. Over the course of a day, you’ll become familiar with the tool, learn about key performance indicators to track, navigate the different report types that Google Analytics offers, and learn the various other ways that Google Analytics can help you improve your company’s search engine visibility.

General Assembly’s online SEO Bootcamp Workshop is geared toward individuals with a website or business that they’re looking to apply SEO principles. Students will learn the basics of analyzing and improving their organic search engine results on Google. The course includes lessons in both onsite and offsite methods. The hands-on workshop will prepare students to develop a long-term SEO strategy.

In-person or Online

Students looking to learn SEO skills will need to decide whether they want to attend classes at a dedicated training center or they would prefer to learn in a digital classroom. No matter what route a student takes, they can work with a live instructor who can provide personalized feedback and assistance on their SEO work. Still, there are noteworthy differences between the two delivery methods.

Students learning in-person at a dedicated training center will benefit from working in a dedicated classroom space designed to help facilitate learning goals. Students will work directly with their instructors in a distraction-free environment, and they will be able to take advantage of the hardware and software provided by their training center. Students may also enjoy working alongside a cohort of like-minded classmates, building valuable networking connections along the way. The drawback to these classes is that students can only attend local classes since they will have to select a course they can physically attend. This can be restrictive for students not located near a major city since this is where most training centers are located.

Live online classes are an alternative to in-person training. In these courses, students will enter a digital classroom hosted on a teleconferencing platform like Zoom and work with a live instructor teaching material in real time. Students enrolled in these courses will still be able to receive personalized feedback and assistance from instructors, but they will be able to do so from the comfort of their own homes. These courses are also ideal for students who don’t want to commute to a class or don’t live near the facility that teaches the course they are hoping to take. The drawback to these courses is that students need to do more work to ensure they are motivated and distraction-free. Students will be responsible for setting up and maintaining their own technology.

Trying to decide on the best option for your personal learning goals can be dizzying at best. To help students make this important decision, Noble Desktop has created a tool that allows users to search and compare SEO classes available both in-person in their city and live online. While Ledet Training’s classes are typically fully in-person, Certstaffix Training offers a hybrid model combining remote teaching with in-person access to facilities needed for the class. Both of these providers offer two-day classes covering the basics of SEO best practices, which are particularly suited to beginners in the field.

Corporate & Onsite SEO Classes

Noble Desktop also offers onsite and virtual corporate training sessions in SEO to companies of all sizes. These customizable classes are ideal for companies that are building or expanding their digital marketing teams. Employers can supplement these training opportunities by purchasing group vouchers for their teams to attend Noble Desktop classes at a major discount.

Currently, companies can schedule an SEO Bootcamp for their employees. Over 12 hours, enrolled employees will get hands-on experience with SEO and competitive keyword analysis. Before the bootcamp begins, you’ll have the chance to consult with an instructor to ensure that the course content meets your team's needs.

To learn more about corporate training opportunities, please contact Noble Desktop.

How Hard is It to Learn SEO?

Learning SEO can be difficult when starting with no foundational skills. Many learners' difficulties when starting out with SEO include feeling overwhelmed and unfamiliar with search engines and all that they entail. These hurdles can, fortunately, be overcome with enough time, patients, and practice. Additionally, there are several things you can focus on to make the learning process easier.

Build Foundational Skills

Look to build a basic foundation in SEO. Find tutorials or enroll in classes that can teach you how to do the essentials of SEO such as collecting data, tracking campaign progress, and adjusting your campaign if it’s not working.

There is a wide variety of SEO tools that SEO specialists use that you should figure out when first learning SEO. These tools provide you with data and alerts about your website and can help you determine how successful your website is. They are used for things like analytics, keyword search, rank checking, and on-page SEO. Mastering popular tools such as Google Analytics, SEMrush, and MOZ Keyword Explorer early on in your SEO journey will make the learning experience easier in the long run.

Create Your Own Projects

The more practice you gain with SEO principles and tools, the easier they will be to use. You can gain practice in a hands-on live course or when teaching yourself SEO. However, it’s recommended that you try to gain additional experience with SEO to make the learning process easier. This may involve creating a project that aligns with your interests or could be something that you do for a company or brand as a side job.

Figure Out Your Learning Style

Figuring out your learning style can make learning SEO easier. If you do well in a classroom environment and like learning under the guidance of someone else, taking an in-person SEO class will probably ease the learning process for you.

If you’d like to learn under someone’s instruction but don’t require a traditional classroom setting to succeed, you may prefer to enroll in a live online SEO class. These courses are more flexible but don’t provide a traditional learning environment. The remote learning process is great for those who prefer to learn from the comfort of their home or office.

You may be the type of person who prefers learning on their own. If this applies to you, you may want to consider self-teaching. Motivated learners who prefer to figure things out themselves can look for books, online tutorials, and even asynchronous SEO courses to learn SEO. This learning style is not for everyone but can be effective for those who require more time to digest information than a class allows.

How Long Will It Take to Learn SEO?

Learning SEO can be a daunting task if you have no prior experience. It takes most people between one to three months to learn the foundations of SEO. This includes understanding the tools and techniques used in the SEO process. Perfecting your SEO skills will take longer. Most people spend about six months to a year perfecting their skills by practicing.

The amount of time it takes you to learn SEO will depend on several factors.

Time to Study

The amount of time you can dedicate to studying SEO, the sooner you will learn it. For faster results, it’s recommended that you spend several hours a day learning SEO. If you only have a few hours per week to learn SEO, the learning process will go much more slowly. Learning includes reading books, watching online videos, and reading blogs.

Live Classes Vs. Independent Learning

How you choose to learn SEO will also impact the speed with which you learn it. Taking an SEO class is one of the most thorough and efficient ways to learn. In an SEO class, you’ll have access to an expert instructor who can answer your questions and provide you with feedback. Classes will provide you with hands-on experience and, oftentimes, project-based training.

You can also learn SEO on your own. There are free tutorials online that you can watch that cover the foundations of SEO and explore more advanced-level skills and techniques. There are also blogs online written by individuals who have learned SEO and would like to share their learning experience, along with tips and tricks, with others.

When deciding which learning method will help you learn SEO the quickest, you should consider your learning habits. Most individuals learn more quickly by taking SEO classes because they are working under the guidance of someone else. Motivated individuals who have busy schedules may opt to self-learn. This learning method will require you to set time aside in your schedule to both teach yourself SEO and to practice.

Practice

One of the most important aspects of learning SEO is dedicating enough time to practicing. The amount of time you can spend practicing will dictate how quickly you become skilled in SEO. Gaining plenty of hands-on experience with SEO principles will be invaluable. As you practice, you’ll learn what does and does not work.

What Will I Need to Learn SEO?

Possessing certain technical skills and personality traits can help you in the process of learning SEO. You’ll need to know a wide variety of SEO Tools to become exceptionally skilled at the process. Having a creative side and the ability to critically think are also necessary for succeeding in SEO.

SEO Tools

The more you understand commonly used SEO tools, the easier it will be for you to perfect your SEO skills and begin a career in SEO/web optimization. It’s not necessary to know how to use these tools before learning SEO, but thoroughly understanding these tools will take you far in the SEO process.

SEO tools are used by SEO Specialists to analyze and track data that impacts their campaigns. With these tools, SEO professionals can also identify their target audience, keep an eye on their competition, and figure out the best keywords for their company’s digital content. Tools to consider learning include Google Analytics, SEMrush, SEOquake, and Sitechecker.

Curiosity

Curiosity is one of the top traits associated with successful SEO professionals. You should be curious about how search engines work and how to utilize them to your advantage. This curiosity will fuel your drive to learn. It should also encourage your enthusiasm for learning; curious learners are more likely to do additional research on SEO and practice more in their free time.

Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is your ability to analyze something and make judgments. This is an important component of common SEO tasks, so those with strong critical thinking skills find more success in SEO than those without.

Critical thinking skills are needed to interpret website data and make judgments. SEO Specialists are responsible for interpreting website data and determining if the website performs well. They decide what keywords should be used on the website, what content will attract their target audience, and how to get the best results.

Written & Verbal Communication

SEO Specialists should have excellent written and verbal communication skills. These skills aren’t exactly necessary for keyword searches, but they can impact your ability to start a web optimization/SEO career. Companies look for SEO Specialists who can explain complex information simply to internal teams and clients.

What Should I Learn After SEO?

SEO is just one component of digital marketing. Learning SEO will allow you to develop a skill set that transfers well to a content marketing, social marketing, or web development career.

Content Marketing

Content marketing is a marketing strategy that uses digital content to attract an audience. Content Marketers are responsible for developing and managing a company's content strategy. They create content such as videos, blog posts, and emails, to construct a voice for the company and promote it to their online audience.

Content Marketers are expected to know how to use SEO tools like Google Analytics, SEMrush, and MOZ Keyword Explorer to ensure their content receives the best placement on search engines. Content Marketers also develop and execute a publishing schedule for their company’s digital team that ensures they are publishing content on a basis determined by data collected with SEO tools.

Social Media Marketing

Knowledge of social media marketing can help improve your SEO skills. The two strategies are necessary for improving a company’s digital presence. Because of this, they tend to share some of the same goals, including driving sales and engagement through online channels.

Social Media Marketers are responsible for developing and delivering a social media strategy. They run a company’s social media accounts, which also requires them to post, follow trends, and drive engagement. The work done by a Social Media Marketer helps amplify content, improve brand awareness, improve reputation, and increase local SEO through customer reviews.

Web Development

After working with SEO, you might become interested in web development. Web Developers are responsible for coding and maintaining websites. They use client-side and user-side coding languages to make functioning and user-friendly websites that are also visually appealing.

There are three types of Web Developers who specialize in different areas: Front-end, Back-end, and Full Stack Web Developers.

Front-end Web Developers program the parts of websites that users can see. They ensure that the website is aesthetically pleasing and interactive. Important interactive parts of websites include drop-down menus, images, page text, and forms. Common coding languages used by Front-end Web Developers are HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

Back-end Web Developers maintain the components of the website that users don’t see. They are responsible for testing and debugging the website, as well as maintaining databases. Their work allows websites to operate effectively. Coding languages used by Back-end Web Developers include Python, Ruby, Java, and JavaScript.

Full Stack Web Developers deal with both the client and user side of websites. They handle the visual and interactive aspects of websites, like Front-end Web Developers, and the technological components of websites, like Back-end Web Developers. Full Stack Web Developers are in high demand because they’re expected to handle both the front and back-end of a website. As such, they need a wide skill set and an understanding of several programming languages.

How Does SEO Differ from SEM?

SEO is often mentioned in conjunction with Search Engine Marketing (SEM). SEO and SEM are strategies used by Digital Marketers to increase the visibility of their content on search engines. Both techniques can help businesses increase website traffic and boost sales. However, there are several similarities and differences between the two that you should be aware of if you want to begin a career in web optimization.

SEM involves using paid advertisements to increase visibility on search engines. The results from SEM will, therefore, include both organic and paid results. Although SEO and SEM both aim to increase search visibility, SEO focuses on creating and enhancing webpages that will help do that, while SEM focuses on paid advertisement.

Unlike SEM results, SEO results are not immediate. SEO strategies may take several months to a year or even longer to show results. Well-thought-out SEO campaigns rely on building a catalog of high-quality content and accruing backlinks from external sites. All of this works together to ensure a positive user experience for page visitors.

SEM, however, can generate traffic in hours. SEM campaigns require Marketers to do audience research beforehand and create high-quality landing pages. But once the campaign is launched, paid traffic will begin rolling in.

Finally, the costs of SEO and SEM differ. SEM strategies require companies to pay for ads per engagement, which is a short-term cost. Once the budget for SEM has run out, companies either invest more in SEM strategies or else they will see their search visibility drop to pre-campaign levels.

SEO strategies impose long-term costs. Because SEO develops organic visibility, it requires companies to invest a lot of time and effort. Companies often need to hire Content Writers and SEO Strategists to develop content that will help with their SEO strategy. They also may need to invest in SEO tools. Overall, SEO strategies have high upfront costs and a longer wait time for a return on investment.

However, once a company’s SEO strategy is in place and earning them organic visibility, they can receive plenty of web traffic at no charge. This makes SEO more profitable than SEM in the long run. Ultimately, effective digital marketing strategies make use of both SEO and SEM when their budget is not very limited, as both strategies can contribute to the other. Following SEO best practices can assist in developing landing pages for SEM campaigns, and SEM campaigns can help generate traffic which can help companies gain backlinks and improve their SEO.

Top Certificate Programs

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SEO Bootcamp Learn The Skills Guarantee™

Media Training SEO Adv

Media Training SEO Intro

Transmedia Introduction to Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Learn More About SEO Courses

Why Learn SEO?

Career Paths for SEO

SEO Specialist

Digital Marketing Specialist

Entrepreneurship

SEO Training Classes

In-person or Online

Corporate & Onsite SEO Classes

How Hard is It to Learn SEO?

Build Foundational Skills

Create Your Own Projects

Figure Out Your Learning Style

How Long Will It Take to Learn SEO?

Time to Study

Live Classes Vs. Independent Learning

Practice

What Will I Need to Learn SEO?

SEO Tools

Curiosity

Critical Thinking

Written & Verbal Communication

What Should I Learn After SEO?

Content Marketing

Social Media Marketing

Web Development

How Does SEO Differ from SEM?

Top Bootcamp Programs That Include SEO

SEO Corporate & Onsite Training Noble Desktop

SEO Training Map & Top Locations

24 Courses Available Live Online

5 Courses Available in NYC

3 Courses Available in Chicago

3 Courses Available in Los Angeles

2 Courses Available in Boston

2 Courses Available in Denver

2 Courses Available in San Diego

2 Courses Available in Phoenix

2 Courses Available in Houston

1 Course Available in Atlanta

1 Course Available in Austin

1 Course Available in Charlotte

1 Course Available in Dallas

1 Course Available in Detroit

1 Course Available in Minneapolis

1 Course Available in Orlando

1 Course Available in Philadelphia

1 Course Available in San Francisco

1 Course Available in Seattle

1 Course Available in St. Louis

1 Course Available in Tampa

1 Course Available in NJ

1 Course Available in Virginia

1 Course Available in Baltimore

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