SEO Salary in India in 2024 [Manager, Executive, Analyst & More]

Thinking of getting into the SEO industry and wondering what is the range of SEO salary in India?

The growth of digital penetration in India and e-commerce boom have led to an ever-increasing demand for skilled Digital Marketing professionals. This industry attracts fresh graduates as well as seasoned professionals and has plentiful opportunities to offer to individuals with varied skill-sets.

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According to emarketer.com, Global digital advertising spend is predicted to reach over $375 billion by 2022. 

SEO is gaining increasing traction in the field of Digital Marketing, and rightly so. Search Engine Optimization primarily focuses on driving organic traffic to a website using a combination of best SEO practices, including content marketing, building backlinks, on-page optimization, competitor analysis, and so on.

It is SEO practices and strategies that play a pivotal role in determining your rank in SERPs (search engine result pages) and how visible you are to your target audience. SEO is undoubtedly a powerful tool to increase your search engine visibility.

Hence, SEO professionals have emerged as one of the most highly valued professionals in the Digital Marketing domain. So the value of SEO professionals is increasing every year, so are their salaries. Let’s have a look at different types of SEO job profiles and SEO salaries in India.

Various Job Profiles & SEO Salaries in India

With SEO taking an essential place in the industry now, SEO job roles have become quite diverse and varied. In the past few years, the growing demand for SEO skills and talent has further spiked the SEO salary in India. Most SEO job profiles come with decent compensation packages, as well. Here are some of the top-ranking job profiles in SEO, along with their respective salary packages:

1. SEO Trainee

An SEO Trainee is the ground-level job profile in the SEO domain. They usually work under the supervision and guidance of SEO Executives. SEO Trainees begin their career by learning about the functioning and usage of various SEO concepts and techniques.  Generally, an SEO executive guide and overlook the tasks of the SEO trainee to make sure he goes in the right path to success. Beginner level projects can help you land as an SEO trainee in top firms. Read more about Digital Marketing Project Ideas for Beginners.  

Key tasks of SEO Trainee:

• Build relevant links for the website.
• Track various SEO metrics weekly/bi-weekly and report to the SEO Manager/Executive.
• Perform keyword research in accordance with the business requirements.
• Brainstorm new and innovative ideas to increase the viability of the website.

Salary scale – Rs. 96,000 – 1,44,000 per year

2. SEO Trainer

As the name suggests, an SEO Trainer trains SEO Trainees. They teach them about the fundamental concepts of SEO; how to design effective content for SEO; what search engines expect for SEO; how to pair social media with SEO, and how to use SEO monitoring and reporting tools, among other things. 

Key tasks of SEO Trainer:

• Provide training to subordinates in SEO techniques
• Resolve the doubts and handling query sessions
• Deliver live and video lectures
• Design assignments to the team to improve their practical knowledge

Salary scale – Rs. 6,00,000 – 8,40,000 per year.

3. SEO Analyst

An SEO analyst is usually well-versed with performing keyword searches and identifying the trending keywords in the industry. They continually work to create informative and quality content for the website that can be accessed easily by people as well as search engines. SEO Analyst also has to optimize landing pages for users and search engines to rank and perform better. 

SEO Analyst Primary Responsibilities:

• Design and Implement SEO Strategies.
• Track organic metrics and analyze regularly to improve the overall project.
• Implement the right tools, keyword research, backlink building and analysis.
• Performing competitive analysis and identifying gaps in our content or areas of improvement in our web design
• Providing recommendations and design strategies for content development.

Salary scale – Rs. 2,40,000 – 3,24,000 per year.

Source: payscale.com

Location wise, New Delhi pays the highest for SEO analysts while Coimbatore the lowest.  Bangalore, is paying 17% more than the rest of India.

4. SEO Strategist

An SEO Strategist is responsible for analyzing, reviewing, and implementing the changes required for website optimization. They must try various combinations of SEO strategies and practices to boost search engine rankings and increase website visibility. The SEO Strategist regularly analyzes the performance of the website and modify the strategy of the website in order to get more visibility and conversion. The strategist closely works with the analyst to executive the suggestions he/she provides. 

 Primary tasks of SEO Strategist:

• Design and implement strategies to tackle targets.
• Work on content optimization and competitor analysis.
• Report the performance of the campaign to the SEO lead.
• Preparing detailed strategy reports.
• Designing link building strategies.
• Finding powerful keywords to drive more traffic and conversion to the site.

Salary scale – Rs. 3,00,000 – 3,60,000 per year.

source: payscale.com

5. SEO Consultant

 An SEO Consultant plans, implements, and manages a company’s/client’s overall SEO strategy. They perform a wide range of duties, including website optimization, content strategy planning, web marketing, web analytics, link building, and developing keyword strategies, among other things.

SEO consultants are not like regular employees but more like a third party advisor who consults the company. The SEO consultant must have worked on multiple projects and have a wide knowledge of various SEO tools, scenarios to give efficient solutions to the challenges faced by the company. 

Key Tasks of SEO Consultant:

• Prepare and share reports on a regular basis.
• Collaborate with web designers and developers to implement needed SEO changes.
• Plan, develop and implement the strategy.
• Developing a good relationship with clients.
• Monitoring key APIs and taking steps to improve them.

Salary scale – Rs. 3,30,000 – 6,00,000 per year.

source: payscale.com

SEO consultants salary in India increases with experience. The number of projects handled in the past, achievements decides how much a consultant can earn.

6. SEO Manager

 An SEO Manager is responsible for coordinating and implementing SEO and SEM (search engine marketing) campaigns/programs for clients. They oversee and coordinate with the content, design, social media, and marketing teams and also manage offsite and onsite optimization projects. SEO Managers get the higher range of SEO salary in India.  SEO manager is responsible to coordinate SEO efforts, both onpage and offsite optimization. SEO manager develops and executive SEO strategies with the help of his team of SEO specialists. He/she also needs to have basic knowledge of web design and development. 

Primary tasks of an SEO Manager:

• Execute SEO projects and campaigns to improve website leads/purchase.
• Analyze, report the performance of the projects and campaigns.
• Overlook the performance of other team members, and guide them to work efficiently.
• Optimize the website landing page, fill the content gap and track KPIs.
• He should have excellent communication skills to help him collaborate with other team heads.
• Guiding the team for the challenges they face and recommend suggestions to fix problems.

Salary scale – Rs. 3,60,000 – 5,40,000 per year.

SEO Managers with more than 5 years of experience gets ₹535,000 and managers with more than 10 years of experience charges ₹740,000 salary in India per annum.

source: payscale.com

Pune is paying highest for Managers than any other Indian city with 18% more than the rest of India. Delhi is paying the lowest salary with 24% lower than the average.

7. SEO Director 

SEO Directors are usually the department heads. They set SEO goals and ensure that they are accomplished. They also plan the strategies for SEO campaigns, keeping in mind the shortcomings of previous SEO campaigns. Essentially, SEO Directors administer and oversee the overall functioning of the SEO department.

The director has to assess the overall performance of the organic campaigns and regularly monitor on the macro level. The director has to set long term goal for the team and guide the team to achieve on given time. SEO director is expected to have knowledge of various channels, strategies, and tools.  

Primary tasks of SEO Director

• Design strategies to improve the overall performance of the SEO.
• The SEO Director needs to ensure the strategies are in line with the goal of the business and everyone in the team is aware of the importance and their role to play.
• Monitor industry trends and news. Encourage team members to discuss, share, implement new studies and experiments to improve their knowledge as well as organic performance.
• Collaborate with other teams and stakeholders for inter-teams projects.
• Hire and guide a team of SEO analysts, strategists, and trainees to facilitate health organization.
• The SEO Director reviews the content on a regular basis to identify content gap, opportunities, creative solutions to improve the overall performance of the business.

Salary scale – Rs. 9,60,000 – 18,00,000 per year

source: payscale.com

SEO directors being top in the hierarchy, get handsome package range between ₹9,60,000 – 18,00,000 per year. 

Also Read: Must Read SEO Interview Questions & Answers

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What is the Average SEO Salary in India?

The average SEO Salary in India is ₹237,156.

The salary is based on a lot of factors. Let’s go one by one so you will have a clear idea of the affective factors.

SEO Salary Based on Cities

source: payscale.com

If we want to find SEO salaries in India by cities, as you can clearly see, Bangalore – The Silicon Valley of India pays 49% than the rest of India (national average). Chennai and Mumbai are also on the top lists. Among the tier 1 cities, New Delhi pays 16% lesser than the national average. Ahmedabad being the last spot holder pays 38% lesser than the rest of the country.

SEO Salary based on Company’s size and Revenue

MNC companies, obviously, spend more on their organic resources. When joining a company one has the look for the revenue status of the company as working in a company with good growth help your internal growth as well. The company which is growing would be ready to spend on organic, content and other channels which would improve your knowledge and fuel your internal growth.

SEO Salary based on Your Skills & Past Performance

You can get more or lesser than the average SEO salary of your designation based on your knowledge, skills and past performance. If we talk about tools, knowledge of Search Console, Google Analytics, etc. helps you in the interviews. [Check out Google analytics Interview Questions and answers guide to understand more]  I know there are a lot of people who charge a bomb even though with less experience because of their past achievements and how they build their skills regularly.

SEO Salary on Other Countries

US: SEO Specialists average annual salary is $52,000

Source

UK: SEO Specialists average annual salary is £26,000.

Source

Why Should You Choose SEO?

• High Demand for SEO Services: Importance of Digital marketing is increasing every year. When more and more companies want to be active on the digital medium, SEO is unavoidable.
• You can work from anywhere. You can make this your full time/part-time/freelancing work.
• The opportunities for SEO in India is only increasing every year. SEO Salary in India is increasing with demand.
• If entrepreneurship is your cup of tea, you can start your company without a need of huge investment.
• It doesn’t require any specific degree. You can join a good digital marketing course after any undergraduate degree and you can work in SEO.
• Last but very interesting one, SEO is a very fast pace industry. You always learn something new and exciting. There won’t be any boring day in your career.

Salaries of Marketing Related Roles Compared to SEO

Let’s look at the average salaries of other marketing related roles compared to the SEO salary in India.

Web Analyst average salary in India: ₹367,000
Digital Marketing average salary in India: ₹353,000
Content Writer average salary in India: ₹290,000
Digital Marketing Analyst average salary in India: ₹307,000
Marketing Executive average salary in India: ₹290,000
Digital Marketing Associate average salary in India: ₹290,000

source: payscale.com

Conclusion

Going by the salary scale of these top-ranking SEO jobs, we can safely conclude that SEO salary in India is quite well. While freshers can earn around Rs. 1.8-2.8 LPA, professionals with over 5-8 years of SEO experience can make around Rs. 3.5-6.6 LPA. As for senior-level SEO salary in India (for job roles that demand over ten years of experience), the annual remuneration is even higher, ranging between Rs. 15-30 LPA or more, depending upon the company size, location, and skill set.

If you are reading this article, most likely you have ambitions towards getting into Digital Marketing. If you’re interested to learn SEO & all other digital marketing channels,  check out upGrad & MICA’s Advanced Certificate in Digital Marketing & Communication.