This video interview of Stephan was originally published on Brighton SEO podcast.

Hi, my name is Kelvin Newman. Welcome to the Brighton SEO podcast, where we share talks from one of the world's most popular search marketing conferences. The event started out as a few people meeting in an upstairs room of a pub and is now attended by over 3000 people from all over the world. This episode is a recording of one of the speakers at a recent event.

We're going to start off with Stephan, who's going to talk about how to hire an insanely great SEO. We're then going to move on and talk about GDPR, the General Data Protection Regulations, which I know is worrying lots of you. And then we're going to talk about doubling close rates, and we're going to chat about that a bit more.

It's my pleasure, first of all, to bring Stephan Spencer up to the stage and join me and give me a round of applause. Thank you.

I'm Stephan Spencer and these are some of my accolades, blah, blah, blah, but you don't care about that. These are my books. Who wants a book? Does anyone want a book? I brought it. I brought a couple. This is the one I'm most known for: The Art of SEO. Like, who really wants a book? Like enough to come to get it, like literally to come to get it.

Fortune favors the bold. Should we try this again? Who wants a book? That's socially commerce. So, it's all about how to leverage Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. And then Google Power Search. I'm going to hold on to this one. Gotcha. Okay, I'll give out more later. In fact, if you post a really cool tweet, you might get a book.

I brought some more with me, and these are my podcasts. You should subscribe because they are awesome. This is Marketing Speak, and then the Get Yourself Optimized because I am the optimized geek. This is actually not an SEO podcast. This is life hacking, biohacking. If you're into Tim Ferriss, who likes Tim Ferriss? He was one of my guests.

Dave Asprey, The Bulletproof Diet. Bulletproof Coffee: Is anyone into Bulletproof? Yep, he was one of my guests. Okay, question for you. Who's in the market to hire an SEO employee? Alright. How many to hire a contractor? How many to hire an agency? Okay. All right. So, this is going to apply regardless of which category you fit in.

Okay. That's pretty cool. And I've got a seven-step process. So this is what we're going to do. We're going to go through these seven steps. We're going to start with how to get the garden to weed itself and how to get people to exclude themselves by making stupid mistakes. Okay. Who's familiar with the band Van Halen?

Okay. David Lee Roth. He famously had this clause in his contracts, which required a jar of M&Ms in his dressing room. And it had to not have a certain color of M&M in there. Why would he be so anal about that? It's so weird, right? It wasn't weird at all. It was really smart because if he saw that color of M&M’s in there, he knew that his contract was not red and all the special lighting effects that they needed.

We're probably not done correctly. And they had a lot of writing on concluding actual lives. We're writing on the correct wiring and everything about the lighting. So he would go and check out the lighting if the M and M's weren't right. So I think of it this way: if you have special clauses in your contract, it's in the job posting.

Isn't that clever? Kind of like the M&Ms. So the job posting is their first contact with you, their first impression of you. So you need to also present a really positive front for yourself. Think of it as your opportunity to sell them as well as them wanting to put their best foot forward. When you write your job posting, tell a story and make it about more of me than about so what.

In fact, all copywriting should be this way. Think of it this way: If people are reading it and thinking, "So what, so what, so what?" There's not a lot of connection there. If it's a lot of me too, like, for example, if I, in my job posting, talk about how I started doing computer stuff when I was a kid, there's not a lot of connection there.

Started programming when I was, like, 12 or 13 years old, taught myself machine language, programming assembly language and stuff. They might not connect with the assembly language piece, but they might connect with being a real geek and being on the computer all the time when they were a kid. So I tell that little story and say, look, I turned that little hobby.

I got into a business, and now I'm employing a wonderful team of people, and I would love for you to be on that team. See how that's me too instead of a so what if I said, you know we have ex-clients and blah blah blah, and it's all about me and my accolades and successes. There's no connection there, So it's all about the me too, not the so what.

After you've sold them on how amazing it is to work for you, you're going to incorporate some really cool stuff into the job advert, kind of like the M&Ms. Okay. Now, where do I post this job advert? I post to Craigslist. I've tried a lot of different places, and Craigslist works like gangbusters.

Do you guys have Craigslist here in the UK? Even if you do, I'm curious: How many of you are looking for people, maybe potentially overseas? Anyone? Okay, so how many only want to hire people in the UK? Okay, so it's a mix. If you're open to hiring people outside of the UK, Craigslist in the US, I would target college towns, bigger college towns, Boston, New York City, and Chicago, rather than the smaller cities.

Small college towns like Madison, Wisconsin, are not a great fit because even though it sounds good, there's not enough volume there, and you're going to weed out a lot of the candidates very quickly using my M&M's process. So we'll find out. So that's a really effective place. Now, if you're looking to hire people from the Philippines, you can get really great people from the Philippines.

Is anyone interested in hiring out of the Philippines? Okay. For those of you who are, Onlinejobs.ph, that is essentially  Craigslist for jobs in the Philippines. And if you're looking to use a service like a recruiting firm, there's a really great service called Virtual Staff Finder, also in the Philippines.

Now we have the job posting, but we're going to insert the M&M clauses in there, so stay tuned for that. I want to delegate the screening process because it's a headache, and it's really simple to check for the M&M's. You don't need a rocket scientist to do that part of the process. I have a virtual assistant working for me who goes through the initial screening process.

I don't even look at the CVs or the resumes when they come in. All I do is jump on the interviews once they've made it past the initial screening process. So delegate that. I also have a riddle or test assignment that I can incorporate into it. Here's where the M&Ms come in. Okay, if you have some sort of process that they have to pay attention to details, now you got something going for you where you weed out a lot of the people who are not that attentive to detail.

I'll incorporate a problem-solving riddle, and the riddle kind of goes like this: So we have, and this is just an example, a child, a convict, and a policeman. On one side of the river, the boat only fits two people. All three need to get across. You can't leave the convict alone or with the child by himself, and blah, blah, right?

So, get the parameters there all across and show your work. If somebody sees that in the job advert, many people will be lazy and will not bother filling out the job advert. They, they won't apply. And that's great. I don't want them because if they're lazy, I don't want them working for me. If they're not attentive to detail and they're just blasting out all this stuff without paying real attention to each job advert, I don't want them either.

See how powerful this is. Another way you could do this without using a riddle is to incorporate something into the instructions. For example, put a certain keyword in the subject line of the email that you send me. Like, let's see, squirrel, put the word squirrel or the word cheetah or whatever in the subject line, okay?

Another way you can do it is to only allow them to apply via voicemail. You have to give these certain details in the voicemail. Do not email me; I will not consider any emailed CVs. You must leave a voicemail first or a combination. So, a question for you: What are some test assignments that you might give as a way to weed out the, you know, not-so-qualified candidates? Something, some sort of test, some sort of riddle or challenge of some sort.

Do you have any ideas? Yeah, okay. So send this file and the CV in a certain file format, like a PDF. Okay. We'll only accept PDFs as attachments. Cool, okay. Do you have any other ideas?

So, a paid test brief of one piece of equipment or one piece of content, and they have to get paid for that, but they have to do that before they can get hired. Awesome. Any others? Cool. Okay. So, did they defend their wrong answer? Oh, by the way, for giving me a good for participation.

Here you go. Yep. And who was the other person? Yup. Okay. All right. And here's the deal breaker for sure. Did they defend their wrong answer? But, you know, no, I think it works if you do this with the boat and blah, blah, blah. Nope. Because if that's how they operate before they get hired, I don't want that kind of headache once they're on board.

So, step two is to review their social media profiles. There's gold in those social media profiles. Part of the process I require is, in the job advert in the posting, I say, send me at least one social media profile. It could be their own personal, their company, or one that they work on for their employer. I don't care. I just want to see a social media profile.

Ideally, if they send me a personal one, then I can get a lot of dirt on them. So here's what I do: I ask myself the following questions. Are they connected to and active in the SEO community? Do they seek out opportunities to answer SEO questions or at least participate in the conversation by asking questions?

What kind of content are they sharing? Is it remarkable content? By the way, I have already uploaded this to SlideShare. So you don't have to take notes unless you want to. And if you're wondering what my SlideShare is, I'm going to quickly go back here to this slide. Okay. SlideShare.net/StephanSpencer.

Oh, I'll just keep it there for a second more. SlideShare.net/StephanSpencer. SlideShare.net/StephanSpencer. Yeah, you can take a picture of the slide. Okay. More questions. More weeding out questions. Have they publicly criticized or bashed their employers, co-workers, or clients? That's a bad one. Is there evidence they participate in SEO conferences, trainings, events, meetups, discussion groups. That's a good one. I really want to see some of that.

How are their spelling and grammar? Are they attentive to detail? Are they swearing in their social media posts? Do they participate? In volunteer opportunities, are they giving back? Do they have personality flags? Things that just don't seem cool, like antisocial behavior? Mood swings? Are they racists?

Are they prejudiced? Is there evidence of illegal activities? Illegal drugs, etc. Other red flags are not a good fit culturally. And be careful, because I don't know what the laws are here in the UK, but in the States, there are discrimination laws if you use this in a way that discriminates your plan and dangerous territory.

Step three is AB testing, your AB testing, and all sorts of other stuff. Why aren't you AB testing your job adverts? Whoever AB tested a job advert really just. Okay, two of you. Okay, you can get books.

You're probably wondering how many books I have behind there. Alright, who raised their hand? They're really heavy because I am not taking them back. Not going back to LA. All right. So AB testing. How would you AB test a job advert? What would you put into an AB test job titles? Yep. Maybe some of the stories that I talked about with the, either the me too or the so what's yes. The description of the job itself, the job duties and responsibilities. Yep. The image, right? So, are you going to put a picture of, you know, happy staff or stock photos or whatever? Heaven forbid that. Yep.

Right. So, the minimum requirements are their past experience and the kind of senior leadership level versus junior levels. Perfect. Cultural elements. Okay. So, behaviors are things that I'm looking for. All right. Nice. Yeah. So he says he'll make little one-minute videos showing what it's like to work at that company and test the different videos to see which ones perform the best. 

Okay. Bullet versus continuous pros. Yeah, these are great tests. I love them. Are there any others? Yeah, the tone of voice and how you describe stuff, right? So if you're using passive voice versus active voice or third person instead of first person, great. Okay. I love AB testing, and it really helps you hone in on the best-performing job ads.

The next step is to use trick questions in the first interview. Often, I'm not even conducting the first interview. I have one of my team do it, and they're armed with certain trick questions that will help them weed out the fakers and the charlatans. So, what are some trick questions that you might consider asking in an interview? Yeah.

Okay. If you give a scenario, if you're a link-building specialist, what do you do if somebody offers you a link by paying for it? So you have to buy the link. What do you do? It's kind of an ethical scenario. I like it. Okay. So, say the first part again, because get them to rank themselves out of 10. In terms of SEO knowledge and, see if they're overly arrogant or full of hubris. Nice. I like it. Okay. Yeah. What's the last thing you've read about SEO? Perfect. Okay. These are great trick questions. Let me give you a few more.

What's your process for optimizing meta keywords? These are trick questions because there's really only one right answer. I want trick questions that anybody could ask. They don't have to have any knowledge of SEO. And they can weed out the candidates. What's the right answer to what's your process for optimizing meta keywords?

Like a chuckle, right? Like, haha, right? You're joking? Meta keyword, if they say anything along the lines of, well, meta keywords don't count so much anymore, or, you know, they've been discounted over time, Google doesn't really count them so much. All those are wrong answers because the only right answer is meta keywords that are never counted in Google.

Never, ever, ever counted. They were never a positive ranking signal. And if they say anything to the contrary, then they're out. Here's another one. What's a good keyword density to aim for? Keyword density? Like, seriously? Who's measured keyword density in the last decade? I mean, it's just ridiculous. What's the difference between a Panda and a Penguin?

Oh, that's a good one, right? If you don't know that, you're out. And this is something that you can easily explain to the first interviewer: I don't think Panda is about content, you know, low-quality content. And Penguin is about links. They can't fake that. If the person is talking about, well, you know, Panda and Penguin are pretty similar, but they're kind of different, and then they're just going on some tangent about it.

And it's not, well, content and links, or they get it wrong, and they put it the other way around. I've had that happen. Like, seriously? The opposite? Okay, here's another one. What's more important, attention to detail, honesty, dedication, technical acumen, or creativity?

Let's actually try this exercise. What's more important? I'm asking you. You're my candidates: attention to detail, honesty, dedication, technical acumen, or creativity. Nope. That's not, that's not, yeah, they're all important. Pick one. Let's do a little poll attention to detail.

Who says attention to detail? Okay. Who says honesty? Okay, so there are a bunch of you. Okay, dedication. Okay, also, there are a bunch of you. Technical acumen. Okay. And creativity. Alright, so there are not that many; we don't need anybody creative. So what's the right answer? Any guess? Okay. It's actually honesty. This is called the honesty test.

If somebody's not honest, they're out. That's not their highest value. I've had staff before where I don't know what they were thinking, but I could see their computer screen's reflection behind them on the window. And they'd like, as soon as I started walking up, what the hell do you think I'm stupid

And then, you know, hiding windows, and as I'm walking up, I don't want that. Honesty is number one. So here is a really cool free bonus for you guys. I actually have two things, but the SEO BS detector has more trick questions if you want these kinds of powerful trick questions with the answers.

There you go, StephanSpencer. StephanSpencer.com/Brighton. I also have an SEO hiring blueprint with the seven-step process in it, so that's pretty cool. If you're taking a picture, go ahead. What is the most important of the five qualities? Remember? Honesty. Step five is to ask specific questions that can prove expertise. I ask them, what's your wellspring? In other words, what is your gift? What are you so amazing at? And then what's your quicksand? Where do you get stuck? Where is it really hard for you?

Where is it a big challenge? Powerful questions. And I'm looking for specifics. This is super important when you are interviewing people; always ask for specific examples. Don't just say, you know, tell me, you know, what's more important, creativity or attention to detail. Tell me about a time when your creativity saved a project or, you know, changed an outcome.

Give me a specific example. And if I'm starting to develop this picture of them, I ask for contrary evidence because I want to flip that and see if I can actually find evidence to the contrary. Let's say, "Oh wow, they don't seem really attentive to detail." I'm thinking that in my head. Tell me about a time when you were super attentive to detail, and that saved a project.

See, I'm looking for contrary evidence, so keep your mouth shut. They should be talking 80% of the time, you 20%. I'm looking for opportunities for them to show their desire to learn, like what training you have gone on and tell me some of the things you've learned at some conferences. Oh, you were at Brighton SEO.

Tell me about that. What were some takeaways? Where are you teaching other people? Because if you teach others, your retention rates go sky-high. It's about 90% when you have the intention of teaching something to others as you're learning it versus just regularly listening to it. And then what's their link-building philosophy that goes into your question about that ethics question?

Alright, what's legit in terms of link building and what's not. And then step six is the second interview, bring in an expert, such as myself. I would come in, and for my clients, I would participate in the second interview process and weed out a lot of fakers that way. And then step seven is confirming the fit during the trial period.

So, what are their strengths? I used Strengths Finder 2.0. It's $15 or $18 for that test. Awesome. Awesome test. I find out what their primary and secondary advantages are using the Fascinate Test. Test from Sally Hogshead, and I have them do a disc assessment. That one's free. You can go to Tony Robbins.com/disc for that one.

DISC finds out how introverted or extroverted they are, how dominant they are, how steady they are, how attentive they are to detail, and then their values and their highest values. Then, I define collaboratively with them, their roles, responsibilities, handoffs, and success metrics. I have them that take this test, which is also free.

It's a Demartini values determination. So, I know their highest values and their hierarchy of values. I'm just asking a question. What's your highest value? Is it like family? Is it your church, your children, travel, or your job? What is it? Does anyone want to throw out what their highest value is? Anyone? Kids?

Anyone else? Anything different? Job? Family? Yeah, everybody has different values, and their hierarchy is different. If I match their job duties and description with those highest values, for example, if their highest value is travel and one of their jobs is a virtual assistant, working for me is booking my travels, like you can become a travel ninja.

I'm going to show you stuff about how to get the best deals on price lines and through orbits and so forth that will blow your mind. You can travel for half of the price that you would normally have traveled for. You could potentially travel the world with this kind of knowledge, and like, wow, that sounds really cool.

So that's what I do. And then another quick question. What's the best indicator of future behavior? Any ideas? Past behavior. You get a book. So come up afterward. The best indicator of future behavior is past behavior. So you're looking for that evidence that they've achieved these things and have these qualities, these traits, these attributes in past jobs throughout their life.

Because you cannot instill new values and attributes in them, you can only teach them the job and the skills. So, there we go. Again, here's the URL: StephanSpencer.com/brighton. And you get some other stuff too, besides the hiring blueprint and the BS detector. You get like chapter seven of the book, which is all about content marketing and some other cool stuff.

Thank you very much.

This was originally recorded at a Brighton SEO conference. If you want to listen to more episodes or find out about the conference itself, you can do so at BrightonSEO.com.