Expert Roundup: How Top Marketers are Building High-Performing SEO Teams in 2025

In 2025, SEO has moved beyond mere keyword placement and the creation of backlinks. As a complex yet multi-disciplinary function, it involves thinking strategically, ensuring technical know-how, executing creative content, and collaborating across teams strongly. To help budding marketers build the perfect search engine optimization team for the presently evolving digital landscape, we spoke with 7 seasoned SEO professionals. Diving into how they are approaching their SEO hirings this year can reveal the best practices to adopt.

How to Build a High-Performing SEO Team?

To build an SEO team that assures high performance, the first thing to do is invest in strategic thinkers. Next to this, prefer agile freelancers along with in-house professionals. Other practices include hiring technical search engine optimization experts, generalists, and more.

1. Prioritize Hiring Strategic Thinkers 

Alex Parker, the Head of SEO at the global agency, Victorious, understands that the most effective search engine optimization teams in 2025 start with strategic leadership. Thus, it is vital to go beyond just tactical hires.

“One of the biggest mistakes I see is companies hiring 2-3 SEO specialists who focus only on execution. Instead, start with someone who can lead strategy and tie SEO goals to business outcomes.”

Professionals like Alex recommend recruiting a senior SEO strategist or even a manager. This should be followed by executive support for outreach, technical expertise, and content.

2. Combine In-House Stability and Freelance Adaptability

In order to build an efficient search engine optimization team, marketers can prefer blending freelance agility with in-house stability. For this, Mei Lin, the former Growth Lead and SEO Consultant at Animalz, has championed a hybrid team model.

“I’ve seen the best results from teams that combine in-house SEO leads—who know the brand and customer journey—with freelancers or agencies who can provide technical audits or link building at scale.”

In the view of Mei Lin, it is ideal to hire a few core in-house team members. This team should be supported by an external yet flexible network. This encourages agility alongside maintaining brand consistency.

3. Avoid Overlooking Technical SEO

When establishing a search engine optimization team, technical optimization should be importantly considered. Tomás Rivera, presently the Technical SEO Lead at Builtvisible, suggests not to sideline technical search engine optimization until subsequent stages.

“In 2025, ignoring technical SEO is a missed opportunity. Things like Core Web Vitals, structured data, and crawl budgets are directly tied to organic success.”

Tomás suggests a company to either hire a technical SEO specialist early or associate with an agency that is comprehensive of the technical landscape. He further adds that AI-based content can frequently fail, especially when on-site optimization practices are poor.

4. Hire a Versatile Generalist for an Early-Stage SEO Team

Jasween Narang, the Senior SEO Specialist at the leading recruitment company – Staffing Ninja, considers it important to hire generalists capable of switching different hats.

“When you’re just starting to build your SEO team, having one well-rounded generalist can be more effective.

For Jasween, generalists with expertise in specific areas are more apt to hire for an early-stage search engine optimization team:

• Keyword clustering and research
• Content planning
• Site audits
• Google Search Console & GA4

He further shares some in-depth insights into the SEO hiring landscape:

“One major challenge is finding candidates who not only understand technical SEO but also communicate those insights effectively to non-technical stakeholders. That hybrid of strategy and communication is rare but essential in 2025.”

Jasween additionally mentions that AI is shifting the role of SEOs from the execution of tasks to strategic oversight:

“AI has made keyword research, content briefs, and audits more efficient—but it has also increased the need for critical thinking. We now need SEOs who can interpret AI outputs, spot inaccuracies, and tailor strategies accordingly.”

In 2025, critical thinking, communication, as well as versatility top Jasween’s checklist for hiring SEO experts.

5. Customize Team Structure for Business Objectives

A business is directed to achieving certain objectives. When hiring search engine optimization professionals, the team building should be synced with the fulfillment of these goals. Rishi Patel, SEO Strategist at Directive Consulting, supports the view that a business model needs to be such that it shapes an SEO team.

“If you’re running an e-commerce site, prioritize someone who understands product page SEO and internal linking. For SaaS, hire a content strategist who gets funnel-driven content.”

Mr. Patel further adds that reverse-engineering the structure of the search engine optimization team is useful. It should be based on requirements like the need for local SEO, technical optimization, and content marketing.

“Your first hire should reflect your biggest SEO opportunity.”

6. Prefer Investing in AI-Literate SEOs

According to Daniela Varga, the SEO Director at Brainlabs, SEOs who know how to leverage AI are yielding the best impact in 2025.

“AI tools are incredible for scaling audits, content briefs, and even internal linking. But the real value lies in SEOs who can combine AI with strategic human thinking.”

Daniela hires search engine optimization professionals who are equipped with the knowledge of using tools such as ChatGPT, Surfer, or Clearscope. Additionally, she prefers investing in experts who consider questioning, refining, and optimizing the output.

“Don’t hire someone who only uses AI. Hire someone who understands how to use it effectively.”

7. Collaboration: The New Must-Have Superpower

To hire the best search engine optimization experts and form a great team, collaboration is a skill that each one of them must have. The SEO Manager at Seer Interactive, James O’Connell, further puts emphasis on cross-functional communication more than raw technical abilities.

“Modern SEO teams collaborate with content, UX, analytics, and even developers. If your SEOs can’t communicate well, they can’t succeed.”

James assesses search engine optimization candidates on their abilities to work while being part of multidisciplinary teams. Alongside, they should be able to contribute beyond what their main functions are.

“Soft skills like storytelling, stakeholder alignment, and reporting are just as important as knowing how to optimize metadata.”

Sample SEO Team Structures to Consider for 2025

Depending on the size of a company and its growth stage, certain team layouts are suggested, created using the top expert insights:

For Startups or Small Teams:

• 1x SEO Generalist (Content+strategy+technical+basic)
• Freelance support, particularly for link building and audits

For Mid-Sized Businesses:

• 1x SEO Lead
• 1x Technical SEO Expert
• 1x Content SEO
• 1x Shared Data Specialist or Analyst 

For Agencies or Enterprises:

• Content SEO team (2 to 3 specialists)
• Search Engine Optimization Manager or Director 
• Outreach or link-building expert
• Technical SEO team (1–2)
• Dedicated SEO Analyst

Final Thoughts: Employ Smarter, Not Just Bigger

The SEO team of 2025 is beyond merely headcount. It’s about aligning, strategizing, and allocating resources smartly. Whether hiring the first SEO team or scaling it, remember to be strategic. Hire professionals who can think critically and collaborate well with one another.

Each expert, as part of this roundup, agrees that search engine optimization success is achieved by building a team well-versed in business goals. Moreover, it should adapt to technology as well as collaborate with various departments.