What Jon Cole-Dalton doesn't know about SEO isn't worth knowing

Jon Cole-Dalton has worked as Head of SEO at First Internet since 2021.

What can you tell us about your work at First Internet?

As a successful full-service agency that keeps on winning awards, it’s not surprising that since joining First Internet, I’ve been very busy.

Alongside the usual tasks that an SEO professional expects such as technical improvements and content optimisation for our client’s websites, I’ve also been working on building our relationships with our clients and coming up with new creative campaign ideas.

I’ve also spent a lot of time with the SEO team at First Internet, looking at ways we can improve the way we work, implementing new processes and a new client management system, and ensuring that we all contribute to improving each others’ knowledge of SEO, ensuring we give more value to our clients.

What have you learned since working at First Internet?

I’ve been working in the world of SEO for quite a few years now, and I’ve seen the job of an SEO change from simply making technical improvements to a website and ensuring it’s keyword optimised, to encompassing elements of roles that used to be entirely separate. Nowadays, you’re not just an SEO, you’re also part-developer, part-UX designer and part-digital PR professional.

Outreach is something I’ve had experience with previously, but at First Internet, it’s become a much more integral part of what I do. I’ve learned so much by building outreach campaigns at First Internet that are essentially PR campaigns, but I gained so much insight from attending talks from industry-leading professionals at conferences such as Brighton SEO on how to create and implement successful outreach campaigns.

What do you love about working at First Internet?

This is going to sound cliched, but it’s the people that work here. Everyone is friendly and a joy to be around, but most importantly of all, everyone is very supportive and encourages you to succeed in your role and work on your professional development. I feel that working at First Internet has allowed me to not only show how knowledgeable I am about SEO, content and digital marketing in general, but also that I’m motivated to keep growing my skills and knowledge and keep adding value to the company.

Oh yeah, and pizza during company meetings is a nice perk too.

Any highlights?

Although it’s great to see our clients happy with the work we’re doing and being appreciative of the increases in SEO metrics, conversions and overall revenue, I’ve been getting a kick out of the work I’ve been doing with Julaine and the rest of the team on proposals. I wouldn’t consider myself a salesperson, but I love our open and transparent approach to proposals, talking about what we do at First Internet, how we can add value to our clients, and of course, having new websites to work on.