Hi! 👋 We’re so glad to feature you on SEOjobs.com. Please introduce yourself to our site’s readers.
Hey, I’m Jason Faber! I’m a dad, husband and dog owner who spends his days as a fractional SEO consultant and whatever free time he has outside of that training for triathlons and marathons. I’ve been working in SEO and marketing for almost 20 years, starting on the agency side for a few years before moving in house for the bulk of my career. I went solo and launched my consulting business 3 years ago and never looked back.
Please share your current role and what you’re focused on right now with your consulting practice (and any fractional or project-based work).
I currently work as a fractional SEO and growth consultant where I work with clients across B2B SaaS to help them scale their organic growth and revenue.
I work closely with founders, executives, and marketing leaders to turn SEO into a durable growth engine, one that compounds over time and holds up as search behavior shifts toward AI-driven discovery. My work spans SEO strategy, content and topical authority, technical SEO, international and multi-domain strategy, and executive-level roadmap development, with an increasing focus on AEO and LLM visibility
I am currently working with a small handful of clients on a fractional basis, including GrowthBook, Owner.com, Memberful and VEG ER for Pets.
Can you walk us through how you first entered the SEO and digital marketing industry? What sparked your interest?
I was introduced to the web at a very young age. My parents were both tech-savvy entrepreneurs. We always had the latest computers in the house and the fastest internet my dad could get his hands on. By age 10 I was already building websites, which was quite novel in the late 90s. For a while I thought I was going to be a web designer or software developer, and then in high school I developed a passion for marketing and writing.
In 2004, my mom founded WebFuel, an SEO agency that she ran for 20 years before she retired, eventually sunsetting it. I started working at WebFuel in 2007 when I was 19 years old, learning the SEO ropes and bringing my social media and writing skills into the mix. From there, I was hooked.
How did you start to learn SEO? What are you currently doing to keep up with the ever-changing SEO industry?
I learned SEO by getting my hands dirty working on client accounts at WebFuel. I recall reading “Search Engine Optimization for Dummies” and “The Art of SEO” in physical book form, and consuming everything I could find from Danny Sullivan, Bruce Clay and Barry Schwartz. Rand Fishkin and Moz’s ‘WhiteBoard Fridays’ quickly became a favourite of mine as well.
So much has changed in the last 20 years, it’s wild to think back on. Today, search is changing so fast it’s almost impossible to keep up. I still learn a ton by doing – working day in and day out on client accounts. I try not to let the noise on LinkedIn get to me, but I have a few folks who I read, listen to, and trust: Kevin Indig, Lily Ray, Eli Schwartz, Nick LeRoy (not just saying that!), Gaetano DiNardi, Chris Long…there are a lot of great voices in our industry today.
You left the corporate tech world (including time on the Growth team at Shopify and as Director of Growth at Wethos) to launch your consulting business in 2023 as a fractional SEO and growth consultant. What prompted that transition, and what has surprised you most about building a solo fractional practice?
Starting my consulting business was not planned. After 4 years at Shopify, I fell victim to their first big round of layoffs. It was time for a change anyways, and I was excited to take a step up in my career. The job market was still hot and I landed an awesome gig leading growth at Wethos. After about a year at Wethos, the market was shifting and VC dollars were drying up, which led to about half of the company being laid off.
To complicate things, this second layoff in 12 months landed on the due date of our first child. I was pretty fed up with corporate tech and this point and admittedly pretty scared. I decided at that moment, on the way to the hospital to deliver our son, that I was going to go out on my own. Control my own destiny.
Building a consulting business from scratch with a newborn at home was certainly not easy. It took me a while to find my footing and figure things out. But once things clicked, they really clicked. By the end of my first year, I was able to replace my in-house income, which I doubled in year two. Now three years in, I am proud of the thriving consulting business I have built.
You emphasize embedding yourself as a true extension of the client’s team rather than operating as a traditional external vendor. What does that partnership model look like day-to-day, and why do you believe it produces stronger results?
As opposed to a typical freelancer or agency relationship, I get embedded directly within my clients teams. This often means that I have a corporate email address, I am in their Slack, and participate in weekly meetings. I collaborate with the team; not just my main point of contact. A lot of our work is a sync and happens across Slack. Communication is constant and we work together to prioritize initiatives, secure resources, and ship work. What doesn’t happen is this: a client Slacks me on a Thursday and doesn’t hear back from me until Monday.
Demand for SEO + AEO/GEO work has surged in your practice. What common mistakes do you see startups and growth-stage companies making with organic search?
The biggest mistake I see these days is the desire for instant gratification and leveraging AI to scale (create and ship more, faster) before putting in the real work to build a strong product, understand what their customers want, and craft content or pages with care. More is not better. Too many founders and marketing leaders are trying to AI everything and they are way too distracted by the shiny new object. They are losing focus of their strategy and chasing tactics, changing their mind every two weeks.
What advice do you give founders or marketing leaders when they’re choosing between agency, in-house, freelancer, or fractional support?
I actually wrote about this topic last year: https://www.jasonfaber.ca/blog/how-to-hire-for-seo
The first step is to diagnose the gap before you shop for the solution. Every option has a fit in the right situation.
Agencies are often a good fit if you need execution at scale when direction is already set. The best agencies can handle strategy, but few are able to put all the pieces together. Agencies come at a cost: usually high priced, long term contracts
Hiring in-house offers focus, proximity, and long-term investment, but it’s also the most demanding option. Again, this can come with a high cost (salary + benefits) but can also set you back if you make the wrong hire. It can be a good option for companies with a mature SEO function and a clear mandate. But many teams hire too early—or hire for execution when they actually need strategy—which leads to slow progress and expensive learning curves.
Freelancers are great if you have a predefined strategy and need an executor that is cost-efficient. This usually comes with limited strategy, so if you don’t offer strong guidance their work can end up being inefficient or even detrimental.
Fractional SEO consultants are most valuable when SEO is becoming important, complex, or risky, but the company isn’t ready (or willing) to commit to a full-time executive hire.The role exists to turn SEO from a collection of disconnected tactics into a coherent growth function, where strategy, execution, and business goals actually align. Consultants are typically a good fit for growth-stage companies that need leadership, strategy and execution, without adding headcount.
You’ve scaled your fractional consulting business significantly, with most growth coming from network and referrals, rather than cold outreach. What systems, positioning, or habits have been most important in building a sustainable, high-impact practice?
99% of my leads and clients come from my network and referrals, so relationships and reputation are everything. This isn’t something that happens overnight, but something I have been growing and cultivating over the last 20 years of my career.
This is something I think about every day. Doing great work goes a long way. So does being easy to work with. Results talk, but so does reputation.
Being really specific about what value you offer and to who is key. If your network doesn’t know how or when to recommend you, you have a positioning problem.
I spent a lot of my effort on Linkedin posting and commenting on all things fractional and SEO.
This not only grows my network, but helps keep my top of mind with my existing network that “Jason is consulting, Jason does SEO”.
When they get to a point where they have a need – or someone in their network asks them if they know someone – I am (ideally) always top of mind.
I also invested in a new website last year that clearly describes who I am, what I do, and how I do it. Ensuring that my presence across my website and LinkedIn are consistent is key.