Content & SEO Lead
Remote, South Africa. Full-time.
We are looking for someone who can open a client's Search Console, work out what the site is really missing, and then come up with the article nobody else in that niche would have thought to write.
This is not a copywriting job with a bit of SEO attached. Around half of it is working out what to write and why, from real data, and the other half is writing it well enough that it performs.
Who we are
Lakewood media is a small UK agency. I started it in 2013, and I still run it day-to-day. We work with a handful of long-term clients in specialist consumer sectors, mostly across the UK, Europe and Australia, and we handle everything in-house.
We are deliberately small: no layers, no committee, nobody sitting between you and the decision.
We also care about more than rankings. We are working towards planting 1,000 trees by 2027, and we pay attention to the places our team live: the UK, the Philippines and South Africa.
One thing to flag before you read on
Our main client sector is one that some people would rather not work in. It is entirely legal, the work itself is ordinary marketing, and we have been doing it for ten years. It is also not something I am going to put in a public advert.
There is a question in the application that tells you exactly what it is, and you can decide there and then. Nobody gets to a call without knowing, and if it turns out not to be for you, that is completely fine.
What you would actually do
Run the projects. Each client is a live project on a monthly cadence, and you would own the ones assigned to you. Keeping them moving, hitting the dates, and knowing what state each one is in without having to go and look.
Set the strategy. Decide the direction for each campaign and what gets built in what order. Live in Search Console, Ahrefs and GA4. Find the gaps in what we are already running and bring them to me rather than waiting to be asked.
Bring ideas. Angles nobody in the sector is using. If the plan we have is boring, say so and put something better on the table.
Content. Decide what gets written each month and why that piece rather than another. Write the pieces that carry a cluster. Brief and edit freelance writers, and hold the line when a draft is not good enough.
The SEO work in between. On-page fixes and internal linking audits: the orphaned pages, the hubs nobody points at, the anchors doing nothing. Checking what Google has crawled and quietly not indexed. Tracking keywords, running competitor and link-gap analysis, and turning a Screaming Frog or Ahrefs audit into a prioritised list you then get through.
Plan the links and the PR. I run the link programme myself at the moment, but the planning should come from you: which pages need links next quarter, which publications are worth going after, and what we would pitch them. Over time I would expect you to take the whole programme on.
Clients and reporting. Day-to-day client email is yours. Content plans going out for approval, chasing what has gone live, answering the questions that come back. I stay on the relationship and run the monthly review calls.
What we need you to be good at
Two halves, and I weight them about equally.
Content. Native-standard English, written in British English. Short sentences, no filler. Persuasive, because most of what we produce is moving someone from interested to buying. And ideas with a commercial job attached, not just nice ones.
SEO. Read Search Console, Ahrefs and GA4 and reach a conclusion rather than produce a screenshot. Understand internal linking properly, and how value moves around a site. Know what a content hub is for, and why the structure is often what wins the head term. Judge which pages should receive links and defend the choice.
You do not need to be a senior SEO specialist, so please do not count yourself out. No migrations, no log files. Comfortably past junior is the bar.
Organisation. You would be juggling content stages, link logs, publisher conversations and reporting dates across several clients. None of it is hard on its own, all of it goes wrong at once when the trackers slip.
The tools we use
Ahrefs, Google Search Console, GA4 and Screaming Frog for the SEO work. Asana for projects, Missive for email and internal chat, Notion for documentation, Google Workspace for everything else. WordPress on most client sites.
We also use Claude heavily, including Cowork and Claude Code. Real experience there counts for a lot, so do say if you have it.
On AI
A lot of pure writing work has dried up because the brief now goes to a model and the writer gets handed the edit. What has held its value is people who write well and also know what the writing is for. That is the job.
So I expect you to use AI, and I will pay more for someone who uses it well. What I will not do is hire someone whose only real skill is operating it.
The test is simple. If we took the AI away tomorrow, could you still do this job to the same standard, just slower? If yes, you are the person I am looking for.
What we are not looking for
The one thing that does not work here is someone who logs in, works quietly alone all day, and sends a report at six o'clock. By then it is too late to discuss anything, and the decision has already been made without me.
What I want is someone who talks to me while the work is happening. Who says "I have been through this site and the internal linking is a mess" before I have asked. Who reads a report properly and spots the number that does not add up. Who would rather get on a call and argue about a campaign than send three paragraphs about it. Start your application with the word Ampersand so I know you have read this far.
Beyond that, this will not work for:
- Copywriters who would rather not touch the data
- Writers who need a detailed brief before they can start
- SEO specialists who do not really want to write, or whose background is local SEO, Google Business Profiles or paid ads
- Anyone running their own agency or client book. This seat needs your full attention during working hours
- Anyone whose link background is PBNs, Web 2.0s, comment spam, bought packages or AI spinners
- Part-time, or full-time for now while you keep looking
How we work
Distributed team, flexible on hours. The shape of your day is yours, as long as you are contactable through the working morning and around for the calls we book.
Core overlap: 08:00 to 13:00 SAST, Monday to Friday.
Terms
- Remote, based in South Africa. This is a South African rate for a South African role, so please read the range in that context
- Full-time, contractor basis, invoiced monthly
- USD 1,500 to 2,000 per month, depending on what you can show me. The range is real. Someone clearly strong across writing, ideas and SEO starts at the top of it
- Paid via Wise, and we cover the fees. What we agree is what lands in your account
- The rate gets reviewed as you take on more
- You would work directly with me
- A long-term seat rather than project work
How to apply
Please do not send a cover letter. A few paragraphs in your own words on why you are right for this particular role will tell me far more, and I read every one of them.
There are a handful of screening questions. Most are one tap, a few want a sentence, and one of them tells you what sector we actually work in.
Shortlisted candidates get a recorded assessment: around thirty minutes, screen and voice, done live.
Reference: LM-CSL-0826
Thanks for reading this far, and good luck with it.
Adam
Posted 18 August 2026 · Lakewood media Limited, United Kingdom
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