I was asked, this question:

If I want to learn SEO with no prior knowledge, where should I start?

Here was my reply:

• Set up a blog on WordPress.com & post some content & monitor the results. Go to http://your-name-here.Wordpress.com
• Watch some Google seo help videos or here
• Setup Google Webmaster Tools by adding verification code to homepage (very important), watch these 2 videos to undertand why you need it:
  * How to use Google Webmaster Tools and
  * Using Google Webmaster Tools for SEO
• Watch Matt Cutt (Google SEO chief) talk through a website audit
• Watch a Google webinar & powerpoint slides on “your site & Google“
• Watch a live SEO audit from marketingexperiments.
• Join an seo community site & order a training video:
  SEOmoz dvd £129
  SEO book videos & tools for £195 per month, min 1 month
  Webmaster World
  Search Engine Watch
  Google Webmasters forum (free)
• Get an Analytics SEO mentor (free).
• Go to an GoogleUniversity event at an SEO conferences:
  * Ad-Tech london on 21-22 Sept(free)
  * Internet World on April 2011 (free)
  * Search Engine expo advanced (£387) in London on May 2011
• Attend an in person SEO training class or 1 day course:
  * Google Adwords & Analytics Seminars for Success training – £357 for 2days -
  * Econsultancy: Search Marketing : Organic SEO Training – £495 for 1 day in Mancherster or London -
  * Internet Advertising Bureau: £950 for 1 day Tutor lead course for £950 in London -
  * Charter Institure Marketing: £1447 for 35 hours training course in Digital Marketing certificate, taught at set locations in UK -
• Attend an online SEO training course:
  * WebCEO seo software – slides & test: basic version is free or £193 for advance seo-training-course.com – software is about £200 per year
  * Search Engine Marketing institute: slides & test: £1042
  * Market Motive: Tutor lead £2280 over 3 months.
• Sign-up to an SEO podcast
• Buy an SEO book on Amazon
• Setup an iGoogle SEO dashboard of for SEO news, RSS feeds & keyword trends (or ask me to email you my dash to import)
• Follow SEO people on Twitter & read their tweets wefollow.com/twitter/seo

SEO articles to read:

• Google SEO starter guide
• Google SEO audit of their internal sites
• Google SEO basics
• Google webmaster guidelines
• What is a Google friendly site
• Questions to Ask SEO company
• What is Website management
• SEO cheat sheet – shows the anatomy of a URL
• SEO guide for Developers and pdf version
• Beginners guide to search engine optimisation (printable)
• 15-minute seo audit (e.g. try disabling javascript & browsing site)

If you think I missed anything, please add in comments box below:

Here are links to posts I have been working on…

BlackHat Analytics: as WA industry develops will a Dark Side appear?
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=76b3bd95476477e9&hl=en

Automatically tagging PPC urls in using dynamic parameters in Google, Yahoo & MSN
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=3b79c0131cf3148d&fid=3b79c0131cf3148d000482083ca6ef07&hl=en

Asynchronous version of WSO tracking code
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/websiteoptimizer/thread?tid=37ea2516e63addd6&hl=en

Race Condition – More accurately tracking Outbound Clicks using 100ms delay
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=149353cfd4211daf&fid=149353cfd4211daf000481fef2d2ad8e&hl=en

Wildcards in WSO goal urls
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/websiteoptimizer/thread?tid=7c4b4834dbcc8abf&hl=en

Preventing GA Log Spam
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=1a9b2f4d4b3688a8&hl=en

Referal analyser excel tool
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=2d74ead257215a78&hl=en

Cookie law
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=727d37d7ceb6b488&hl=en

Cached Clicks from googleads.g.doubleclick.net
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=200cb2d4021f93ce&hl=en

gclid URI spam & use of setAllowAnchor(true);
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=653ee3228853e56b&fid=653ee3228853e56b000479d1593b06a8&hl=en

New AutoTrackOutbound in function in ga.js
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=3dfa688533e09141&hl=en

NoScript GA tracking (capture 3% more visitors)
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=60c76276a088c32a&hl=en
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=5f11a529100f1d47&hl=en

SuperCookie / SmartCookie
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=0e672a6afb56558c&hl=en

EventTracking – guide
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=6a111847b0416165&hl=en

Pdf and download tracking
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=707882f2fda88535&hl=en

Public facing ticketing system & known issues
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=37cd96fbf0b886ca&hl=en

Number of GA users
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=27cdc3dd7e66e18c&hl=en

Google images tracking
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=4f166221a4857871&hl=en

GoogleBot executing JS
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=0bb335df2a8e57ed&hl=en

RegEx – How do constructs work when using ((enclosed parenthesis)) e.g $A1 or $A2
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=30647554c192c0a0&hl=en

RegEx – Is it better to close functions? eg (.*) …to… ^(.*)$
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=3fd62513a4356a40&hl=en

RegEx – replacing %20 with a white space
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=52fe4628373e5003&hl=en

RegEx – extracting TLD
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=1766ab971fc4ba1c&hl=en

Cookie prefetching from Google SERP (FireFox feature)
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=6a177a1f88c8ecb0&hl=en&fid=6a177a1f88c8ecb00004814fc5020db2
about:config
network.prefetch-next=true
network.dns.disablePrefetch=false
network.prefetch-next;true
Example: http://www.google.co.uk/webhp#q=moneysupermarket.com

Tracking Social Engine in GA
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Analytics/thread?tid=3f47581499ff210d&hl=en&fid=3f47581499ff210d0004821a239f57ff