Summit Search Group has been retained by First Rank on the recruitment of an Head of SEO. First Rank is a growing Winnipeg-based SEO and digital marketing agency helping businesses across Canada grow their online visibility, leads, and revenue through search, paid advertising, and AI-driven discovery. First Rank has built its reputation on a results-first philosophy: every campaign is structured around the client’s specific goals, competitive landscape, and growth objectives rather than a generic checklist of deliverables. The agency has a proven track record of measurable outcomes across a diverse client base from coast to coast.

First Rank’s integrated service platform spans SEO, Google Ads management, website design and development, reputation management, and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): a discipline focused on ensuring clients are cited, surfaced, and recognized as trusted sources by AI-powered platforms including Google’s AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and Perplexity. As AI fundamentally changes how people search and discover businesses, First Rank is actively investing in staying ahead of that shift and building the team and capabilities to lead clients through it.

The Opportunity

Reporting to senior leadership, the Head of SEO is a hands-on leadership role responsible for the performance and professional development of First Rank’s seven-person SEO team, and for the strategic quality of SEO and GEO work delivered across the agency’s client portfolio. This is both a management and a practitioner role: the Team Lead reviews strategies and key deliverables, coaches team members, steps into complex or high-priority client work when needed, and leads the ongoing evolution of how First Rank approaches SEO and GEO as search continues to shift.

First Rank is not looking for someone to maintain the status quo. Search is changing quickly, and this role is for someone who is genuinely energized by that change: testing new approaches, evaluating emerging tools and methodologies, pushing the team’s capabilities forward, and ensuring that what First Rank delivers for clients stays ahead of where the industry is heading. The Team Lead will have real influence over the direction of the SEO department and a genuine opportunity to shape a team that consistently delivers meaningful results.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead, mentor, and develop a team of seven SEO professionals through regular coaching, 1-on-1 meetings, clear expectation-setting, and ongoing identification of individual strengths, skill gaps, and professional development opportunities.
• Oversee the quality and strategic direction of all key client deliverables, including audits, strategies, recommendations, and reports, ensuring genuine alignment with client business goals and a consistent focus on measurable outcomes.
• Monitor campaign performance across the client portfolio, proactively identifying accounts that are falling behind expectations, diagnosing root causes alongside team members, and developing and executing effective improvement plans.
• Serve as the primary escalation point for complex SEO and GEO challenges, providing expert guidance on technical issues including indexation problems, schema errors, crawl anomalies, and traffic drops.
• Build, maintain, and continuously improve the department’s standard operating procedures, processes, and quality standards, fostering a team culture of accountability, continuous learning, and measurable performance improvement.
• Stay current with changes in Google’s algorithms, AI-driven search behaviour, GEO, and emerging search platforms; evaluate new tools and methodologies; and lead the testing and introduction of innovations that meaningfully improve client results.

Qualifications

• A minimum of 5 years of hands-on SEO experience, with strong technical and strategic depth and a demonstrated track record of managing and improving complex, multi-account client campaigns.
• At least 2 years of direct experience managing or leading an SEO team, with a proven ability to coach team members, raise performance standards, and build a collaborative, results-driven culture.
• Strong technical SEO skills, with the ability to identify and troubleshoot a full range of issues including indexation problems, schema errors, crawl anomalies, and traffic drops.
• Proficiency with industry-standard SEO tools and analytics platforms including Google Search Console, GA4, Google Business Profile, Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, and Semrush; experience with Surfer SEO or similar platforms is an asset.
• AI-native or highly competent with AI tools, with genuine curiosity about how generative AI is reshaping search and the ability to translate that understanding into practical SEO and GEO strategies for clients.
• Excellent communication and client-facing skills, with the confidence to manage complex escalations, present strategic recommendations clearly, and build trust with both clients and the team members being led.

For more information or to submit your resume, please reach out to Matt Erhard at Summit Search Group, matt.erhard@summitsearchgroup.com.

Summit Search Group has a strong commitment to Diversity, Equality and Inclusion. We strive for continuous development, modeling inclusive behaviors and proactively managing bias throughout our process.