50 hot SEO Interview Questions

Technical / Tactics

Every SEO prefers certain tactics over others, but familiarity with many could indicate a deeper understanding of the industry. And while every SEO doesn't need to have a web developer background, having such skills can help set someone apart from the crowd.

Give me a description of your general SEO experience.
Can you write HTML code by hand?
Could you briefly explain the PageRank algorithm?
How you created any SEO tools either from scratch or pieced together from others?
What do you think of PageRank?
What do you think of using XML sitemaps?
What are your thoughts on the direction of Web 2.0 technologies with regards to SEO?
What SEO tools do you regularly use?
Under what circumstances would you look to exclude pages from search engines using robots.txt vs meta robots tag?
What areas do you think are currently the most important in organically ranking a site?
Do you have experience in copywriting and can you provide some writing samples?
Have you ever had something you've written reach the front-page of Digg? Sphinn? Or be Stumbled?
Explain to me what META tags matter in today's world.
Explain various steps that you would take to optimize a website?
If the company whose site you've been working for has decided to move all of its content to a new domain, what steps would you take?
Rate from 1 to 10, tell me the most important "on page" elements
Review the code of past clients/company websites where SEO was performed.
What do you think about link buying?
What is Latent Semantic Analysis (LSI Indexing)?
What is Phrase Based Indexing and Retrieval and what roles does it play?
What is the difference between SEO and SEM?
What kind of strategies do you normally implement for back links?
What role does social media play in an SEO strategy?
What things wouldn't you to do increase rankings because the risk of penalty is too high?
What's the difference between PageRank and Toolbar PageRank?
Why might you want to use nofollow on an internal link?

Analysis

A big part of SEO involves assessing the effectiveness of a campaign both relative to past performance as well as to competing sites.

Are you familiar with web analytics and what packages are your familiar with?
From an analytics perspective, what is different between a user from organic search results vs. a type-in user?
How do you distinguish the results of your search optimization work from a seasonal change in traffic patterns?
How do you evaluate whether an SEO campaign is working?
What does competitive analysis mean to you and what techniques do you use?
If you've done 6 months of SEO for a site and yet there haven't been any improvements, how would you go about diagnosing the problem?
How many target keywords should a site have?
How do *you* help a customer decide how to their budget between organic SEO and pay-per-click SEM?
You hear a rumor that Google is weighting the HTML LAYER tag very heavily in ranking the relevance of its results – how does this affect your work?
Why does Google rank Wikipedia for so many topics?

Industry Involvement

Is SEO just a job to pay the bills? Nothing wrong with that, but some senior positions can benefit from more enthusiasm and interest that can be measured by work done outside of the office.

If salary and location were not an issue, who would you work for?
In Google Lore – what are 'Hilltop', 'Florida' and 'Big Daddy'?
Have you attended any search related conferences?
Google search on this candidates name, (if you cannot find them, that's a red flag).
Do you currently do SEO on your own sites? Do you operate any blogs? Do you currently do any freelance work and do you plan on continuing it?
Of the well-known SEOs, who are you not likely to pay attention to?
What are some challenges facing the SEO industry?
What industry sites, blogs, and forums do you regularly read?
Who are the two key people – who started Google?
Who is Matt Cutts?
If you were bidding on a contract, what competitor would you most worry about?

Open-Ended

These questions are more about how an answer is given rather than the actual answer. They often scare interviewees, but with no wrong answer they're actually a good opportunity to shine.

Tell me your biggest failure in an SEO project
What areas of SEO do you most enjoy?
In what areas of SEO are you strongest?
In what areas of SEO are you weakest?
How do you handle a client who does not implement your SEO recommendations?
Can you get "xyz"? company listed for the keyword "Google"? in the first page?
What do you think is different about working for an SEO agency vs. doing SEO in-house?
Why are you moving from your current position and/or leaving any current projects?

Posted in: Interview Questions General | Tags: interview questions and answers interview meta seo pagerank algorithm pr digg sphinn meta tags optimize seo tools nofollow analysis google rank wikipedia seos open-ended

PHP interview questions and answers, from Yahoo!

1. Which of the following will not add john to the users array?

         1. $users[] = 'john';
         2. array_add($users,'john');
         3. array_push($users,'john');
         4. $users ||= 'john';

2. What’s the difference between sort(), assort() and ksort? Under what circumstances would you use each of these?

3. What would the following code print to the browser? Why?

      $num = 10;
      function multiply(){
            $num = $num * 10;
      }
      multiply();
      echo $num;

4. What is the difference between a reference and a regular variable? How do you pass by reference & why would you want to?

5. What functions can you use to add library code to the currently running script?

6. What is the difference between foo() & @foo()?

7. How do you debug a PHP application?

8. What does === do? What’s an example of something that will give true for ‘==’, but not ‘===’?

9. How would you declare a class named “myclass” ? with no methods or properties?

10. How would you create an object, which is an instance of ‘“myclass’??

11. How do you access and set properties of a class from within the class?

12. What is the difference between include & include_once? include & require?

13. What function would you use to redirect the browser to a new page?

         1. redir()
         2. header()
         3. location()
         4. redirect()

14. What function can you use to open a file for reading and writing?

         1. fget();
         2. file_open();
         3. fopen();
         4. open_file();

15. What’s the difference between mysql_fetch_row() and mysql_fetch_array()?

16. What does the following code do? Explain what’s going on there.

      $date='08/26/2003';
      print ereg_replace('“([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)'‚¬?,\\2/\\1/\\3,$date);

17. Given a line of text $string, how would you write a regular expression to strip all the HTML tags from it?

18. What’s the difference between the way PHP and Perl distinguish between arrays and hashes?

19. How can you get round the stateless nature of HTTP using PHP?

20. What does the GD library do?

21. Name a few ways to output (print) a block of HTML code in PHP?

22. Is PHP better than Perl? – Discuss.

Posted in: Interview Questions | Tags: interview questions and answers interview php yahoo sort ksort web foo

top 10 Giant list of XML interview questions and answers

1. What is XML?

XML is the Extensible Markup Language. It improves the functionality
of the Web by letting you identify your information in a more accurate,
flexible, and adaptable way. It is extensible because it is not
a fixed format like HTML (which is a single, predefined markup language).
Instead, XML is actually a meta languageÃ¢â‚¬â€a language for describing
other languagesÃ¢â‚¬â€which lets you design your own markup languages
for limitless different types of documents. XML can do this because
it’s written in SGML, the international standard meta language for
text document markup (ISO 8879).

2. What is a markup language?

A markup language is a set of words and symbols for describing
the identity of pieces of a document (for example ‘this is
a paragraph’, ‘this is a heading’, ‘this
is a list’, ‘this is the caption of this figure’,
etc). Programs can use this with a style sheet to create output
for screen, print, audio, video, Braille, etc.
Some markup languages (eg those used in word processors) only describe
appearances (’this is italics’, ‘this is bold’),
but this method can only be used for display, and is not normally
re-usable for anything else.

3. Where should I use XML?

Its goal is to enable generic SGML to be served, received, and
processed on the Web in the way that is now possible with HTML.
XML has been designed for ease of implementation and for interoperability
with both SGML and HTML.
Despite early attempts, browsers never allowed other SGML, only
HTML (although there were plugins), and they allowed it (even encouraged
it) to be corrupted or broken, which held development back for over
a decade by making it impossible to program for it reliably. XML
fixes that by making it compulsory to stick to the rules, and by
making the rules much simpler than SGML.

But XML is not just for Web pages: in fact it’s very rarely used
for Web pages on its own because browsers still don’t provide reliable
support for formatting and transforming it. Common uses for XML
include:
Information identification because you can define your own markup,
you can define meaningful names for all your information items.
Information storage because XML is portable and non-proprietary,
it can be used to store textual information across any platform.
Because it is backed by an international standard, it will remain
accessible and processable as a data format. Information structure
XML can therefore be used to store and identify any kind of (hierarchical)
information structure, especially for long, deep, or complex document
sets or data sources, making it ideal for an information-management
back-end to serving the Web. This is its most common Web application,
with a transformation system to serve it as HTML until such time
as browsers are able to handle XML consistently. Publishing the
original goal of XML as defined in the quotation at the start of
this section. Combining the three previous topics (identity, storage,
structure) means it is possible to get all the benefits of robust
document management and control (with XML) and publish to the Web
(as HTML) as well as to paper (as PDF) and to other formats (eg
Braille, Audio, etc) from a single source document by using the
appropriate stylesheets. Messaging and data transfer XML is also
very heavily used for enclosing or encapsulating information in
order to pass it between different computing systems which would
otherwise be unable to communicate. By providing a lingua franca
for data identity and structure, it provides a common envelope for
inter-process communication (messaging). Web services Building on
all of these, as well as its use in browsers, machine-processable
data can be exchanged between consenting systems, where before it
was only comprehensible by humans (HTML). Weather services, e-commerce
sites, blog newsfeeds, AJaX sites, and thousands of other data-exchange
services use XML for data management and transmission, and the web
browser for display and interaction.

4. Why is XML such an important development?

It removes two constraints which were holding back Web developments:
1. dependence on a single, inflexible document type (HTML) which
was being much abused for tasks it was never designed for;

2. the complexity of full SGML, whose syntax allows many powerful
but hard-to-program options.
XML allows the flexible development of user-defined document types.
It provides a robust, non-proprietary, persistent, and verifiable
file format for the storage and transmission of text and data both
on and off the Web; and it removes the more complex options of SGML,
making it easier to program for.

5. Describe the differences between XML and HTML.

It’s amazing how many developers claim to be proficient programming
with XML, yet do not understand the basic differences between XML
and HTML. Anyone with a fundamental grasp of XML should be able
describe some of the main differences outlined in the table below.

XML
User definable tags

Content driven
End tags required for well formed documents
Quotes required around attributes values
Slash required in empty tags

HTML
Defined set of tags designed for web display

Format driven
End tags not required
Quotes not required
Slash not required

6. Describe the role that XSL can play when dynamically
generating HTML pages from a relational database.

Even if candidates have never participated in a project involving
this type of architecture, they should recognize it as one of the
common uses of XML. Querying a database and then formatting the
result set so that it can be validated as an XML document allows
developers to translate the data into an HTML table using XSLT rules.
Consequently, the format of the resulting HTML table can be modified
without changing the database query or application code since the
document rendering logic is isolated to the XSLT rules.

7. What is SGML?

SGML is the Standard Generalized Markup Language (ISO 8879:1986),
the international standard for defining descriptions of the structure
of different types of electronic document. There is an SGML FAQ
from David Megginson at http://math.albany.edu:8800/hm/sgml/cts-faq.htmlFAQ;
and Robin Cover’s SGML Web pages are at http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/general.html.
For a little light relief, try Joe English’s ‘Not the SGML
FAQ’ at http://www.flightlab.com/~joe/sgml/faq-not.txtFAQ.
SGML is very large, powerful, and complex. It has been in heavy
industrial and commercial use for nearly two decades, and there
is a significant body of expertise and software to go with it.
XML is a lightweight cut-down version of SGML which keeps enough
of its functionality to make it useful but removes all the optional
features which made SGML too complex to program for in a Web environment.

8. Aren’t XML, SGML, and HTML all the same thing?

Not quite; SGML is the mother tongue, and has been used for describing
thousands of different document types in many fields of human activity,
from transcriptions of ancient Irish manuscripts to the technical
documentation for stealth bombers, and from patients’ clinical records
to musical notation. SGML is very large and complex, however, and
probably overkill for most common office desktop applications.

XML is an abbreviated version of SGML, to make it easier to use
over the Web, easier for you to define your own document types,
and easier for programmers to write programs to handle them. It
omits all the complex and less-used options of SGML in return for
the benefits of being easier to write applications for, easier to
understand, and more suited to delivery and interoperability over
the Web. But it is still SGML, and XML files may still be processed
in the same way as any other SGML file (see the question on XML
software).
HTML is just one of many SGML or XML applicationsÃ¢â‚¬â€the one
most frequently used on the Web.
Technical readers may find it more useful to think of XML as being
SGML– rather than HTML++.

9. Who is responsible for XML?

XML is a project of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and the
development of the specification is supervised by an XML Working
Group. A Special Interest Group of co-opted contributors and experts
from various fields contributed comments and reviews by email.
XML is a public format: it is not a proprietary development of any
company, although the membership of the WG and the SIG represented
companies as well as research and academic institutions. The v1.0
specification was accepted by the W3C as a Recommendation on Feb
10, 1998.

10. Why is XML such an important development?

It removes two constraints which were holding back Web developments:
1. dependence on a single, inflexible document type (HTML) which
was being much abused for tasks it was never designed for;
2. the complexity of full question A.4, SGML, whose syntax allows
many powerful but hard-to-program options.
XML allows the flexible development of user-defined document types.
It provides a robust, non-proprietary, persistent, and verifiable
file format for the storage and transmission of text and data both
on and off the Web; and it removes the more complex options of SGML,
making it easier to program for.

Posted in: Interview Questions | Tags: interview questions and answers interview xml markup language html xsl xslt sgml

top 11-20 Giant list of XML interview questions and answers

continue:top 10 Giant list of XML interview questions and answers

11. Give a few examples of types of applications that can
benefit from using XML.

There are literally thousands of applications that can benefit
from XML technologies. The point of this question is not to have
the candidate rattle off a laundry list of projects that they have
worked on, but, rather, to allow the candidate to explain the rationale
for choosing XML by citing a few real world examples. For instance,
one appropriate answer is that XML allows content management systems
to store documents independently of their format, which thereby
reduces data redundancy. Another answer relates to B2B exchanges
or supply chain management systems. In these instances, XML provides
a mechanism for multiple companies to exchange data according to
an agreed upon set of rules. A third common response involves wireless
applications that require WML to render data on hand held devices.

12. What is DOM and how does it relate to XML?

The Document Object Model (DOM) is an interface specification maintained
by the W3C DOM Workgroup that defines an application independent
mechanism to access, parse, or update XML data. In simple terms
it is a hierarchical model that allows developers to manipulate
XML documents easily Any developer that has worked extensively with
XML should be able to discuss the concept and use of DOM objects
freely. Additionally, it is not unreasonable to expect advanced
candidates to thoroughly understand its internal workings and be
able to explain how DOM differs from an event-based interface like
SAX.

13. What is SOAP and how does it relate to XML?

The Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) uses XML to define a protocol
for the exchange of information in distributed computing environments.
SOAP consists of three components: an envelope, a set of encoding
rules, and a convention for representing remote procedure calls.
Unless experience with SOAP is a direct requirement for the open
position, knowing the specifics of the protocol, or how it can be
used in conjunction with HTTP, is not as important as identifying
it as a natural application of XML.

14. Why not just carry on extending HTML?

HTML was already overburdened with dozens of interesting but incompatible
inventions from different manufacturers, because it provides only
one way of describing your information.
XML allows groups of people or organizations to question C.13, create
their own customized markup applications for exchanging information
in their domain (music, chemistry, electronics, hill-walking, finance,
surfing, petroleum geology, linguistics, cooking, knitting, stellar
cartography, history, engineering, rabbit-keeping, question C.19,
mathematics, genealogy, etc).
HTML is now well beyond the limit of its usefulness as a way of
describing information, and while it will continue to play an important
role for the content it currently represents, many new applications
require a more robust and flexible infrastructure.

15. Why should I use XML?

Here are a few reasons for using XML (in no particular order).
Not all of these will apply to your own requirements, and you may
have additional reasons not mentioned here (if so, please let the
editor of the FAQ know!).
* XML can be used to describe and identify information accurately
and unambiguously, in a way that computers can be programmed to
‘understand’ (well, at least manipulate as if they could
understand).

* XML allows documents which are all the same type to be created
consistently and without structural errors, because it provides
a standardized way of describing, controlling, or allowing/disallowing
particular types of document structure. [Note that this has absolutely
nothing whatever to do with formatting, appearance, or the actual
text content of your documents, only the structure of them.]
* XML provides a robust and durable format for information storage
and transmission. Robust because it is based on a proven standard,
and can thus be tested and verified; durable because it uses plain-text
file formats which will outlast proprietary binary ones.
* XML provides a common syntax for messaging systems for the exchange
of information between applications. Previously, each messaging
system had its own format and all were different, which made inter-system
messaging unnecessarily messy, complex, and expensive. If everyone
uses the same syntax it makes writing these systems much faster
and more reliable.
* XML is free. Not just free of charge (free as in beer) but free
of legal encumbrances (free as in speech). It doesn’t belong to
anyone, so it can’t be hijacked or pirated. And you don’t have to
pay a fee to use it (you can of course choose to use commercial
software to deal with it, for lots of good reasons, but you don’t
pay for XML itself).
* XML information can be manipulated programmatically (under machine
control), so XML documents can be pieced together from disparate
sources, or taken apart and re-used in different ways. They can
be converted into almost any other format with no loss of information.
* XML lets you separate form from content. Your XML file contains
your document information (text, data) and identifies its structure:
your formatting and other processing needs are identified separately
in a style sheet or processing system. The two are combined at output
time to apply the required formatting to the text or data identified
by its structure (location, position, rank, order, or whatever).

16. Can you walk us through the steps necessary to parse
XML documents?

Superficially, this is a fairly basic question. However, the point
is not to determine whether candidates understand the concept of
a parser but rather have them walk through the process of parsing
XML documents step-by-step. Determining whether a non-validating
or validating parser is needed, choosing the appropriate parser,
and handling errors are all important aspects to this process that
should be included in the candidate’s response.

17. Give some examples of XML DTDs or schemas that you
have worked with.

Although XML does not require data to be validated against a DTD,
many of the benefits of using the technology are derived from being
able to validate XML documents against business or technical architecture
rules. Polling for the list of DTDs that developers have worked
with provides insight to their general exposure to the technology.
The ideal candidate will have knowledge of several of the commonly
used DTDs such as FpML, DocBook, HRML, and RDF, as well as experience
designing a custom DTD for a particular project where no standard
existed.

18. Using XSLT, how would you extract a specific attribute
from an element in an XML document?

Successful candidates should recognize this as one of the most
basic applications of XSLT. If they are not able to construct a
reply similar to the example below, they should at least be able
to identify the components necessary for this operation: xsl:template
to match the appropriate XML element, xsl:value-of to select the
attribute value, and the optional xsl:apply-templates to continue
processing the document.

Extract Attributes from XML Data
Example 1.
<xsl:template match=”element-name”>
Attribute Value:
<xsl:value-of select=”@attribute”/>
<xsl:apply-templates/>

</xsl:template>

19. When constructing an XML DTD, how do you create an
external entity reference in an attribute value?

Every interview session should have at least one trick question.
Although possible when using SGML, XML DTDs don’t support defining
external entity references in attribute values. It’s more important
for the candidate to respond to this question in a logical way than
than the candidate know the somewhat obscure answer.

20. How would you build a search engine for large volumes
of XML data?

The way candidates answer this question may provide insight into
their view of XML data. For those who view XML primarily as a way
to denote structure for text files, a common answer is to build
a full-text search and handle the data similarly to the way Internet
portals handle HTML pages. Others consider XML as a standard way
of transferring structured data between disparate systems. These
candidates often describe some scheme of importing XML into a relational
or object database and relying on the database’s engine for searching.
Lastly, candidates that have worked with vendors specializing in
this area often say that the best way the handle this situation
is to use a third party software package optimized for XML data.