SEO Strategist / GEO Lead — Relocation to Cozumel, Mexico
Sanctuary Clinics & Communities
Location: Cozumel, Quintana Roo, Mexico (on-site, full-time)
Reports to: Marketing Project Manager and Dr. David Hoskins (Founder)
ABOUT THE ROLE
This is the most strategic role we are hiring for right now — a full-time, on-site position in Cozumel for someone who can independently own and drive search performance across our entire web portfolio, not execute someone else's checklist. Sanctuary Clinics is building a brand-new web portfolio, which means the architecture is still being decided — and that is the opportunity here.
We need someone who helps build the strategy, not just run it, and who can run two campaign tracks at once. National campaigns compete for high-volume, high-intent head terms against established treatment brands. Local and geo campaigns win city by city and province by province, where the competition is thinner but volume is fragmented across hundreds of pages. The two need different tactics, content, measurement, and patience levels — and we need one person holding both. This is a build-it role: we need someone who can architect the search program, not just maintain it.
You will own organic and AI-answer search across a portfolio of seven-plus web properties supporting a global vision of Christ-centered clinics and communities, beginning with Monticello (FL), Cozumel (MX), and Montreux (Switzerland). Your first job is to give the network an architecture: a keyword map that covers every market and every stage of the decision, and an entity model that tells search engines and AI systems who we are, who our clinicians are, and what we are authoritative about. You will build both in partnership with leadership — you bring the search expertise, research, and recommendations; leadership brings market knowledge, clinical and brand constraints, and business direction. That partnership only works if you can defend a position with data, rather than nod and build the list you were handed.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Own the keyword map — build it from scratch and maintain it: full topical coverage across substance use, mental health, family and aftercare, mapped to intent stages and segmented by market (US national, Florida local, Canada by province, Mexico destination search). You recommend what we target, what we ignore, and in what order.
- Design the entity model — define how our organization, facilities, clinicians, programs, and treatment modalities are represented as connected entities across the network: knowledge-graph work, schema architecture, sameAs and citation strategy, and internal linking that reinforces topical authority. Our physicians should be recognizable entities, not names in a byline.
- Run national campaigns (the competitive tier) — high-volume head and mid-tail terms across substance use, mental health, and faith-integrated treatment, aimed at families searching without a location in mind. Set the target list, the content depth required to compete, and the honest timeline to get there.
- Run local and geo campaigns (the volume tier) — programmatic local SEO across three countries, including a 24-city page map organized by province in Canada, plus destination search for Cozumel and Florida-local for Monticello. Own the template logic, the differentiation that keeps pages from reading as duplicates, and the expansion plan as we open new facilities.
- Own topical authority architecture — pillar and cluster structure across the network, including which topics live on which domain and how they link. Flag and fix cannibalization.
- Own AI search visibility (GEO/AEO) — whether we get retrieved, cited, and accurately represented inside ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and AI Overviews. Treat this as its own discipline: understand query fan-out, passage-level retrieval, and chunking/embeddings, and build the entity and citation footprint that corrects what these models currently believe about us and our category.
- Produce content that serves both — pages that earn a traditional ranking and survive being chunked and retrieved out of context: answer-first openings, question-shaped headings, self-contained sections, claims tied to a named clinician, and clean structured data — without sacrificing readability for a family in crisis.
- Own link building and digital PR — new domains with no authority will not rank on content alone. Find what is genuinely link-worthy and go get the links; we value topical relevance over domain rating. Run digital PR that puts a named clinician forward: pitching, briefing, and turning their expertise into placements.
- Own technical SEO — set it up right at launch: index management, Core Web Vitals, canonicals, sitemaps, redirect logic, and structured data validated at launch. Direct the Web Developer on implementation and verify before it ships.
- Own on-page execution — every article passes through you before publish, working from our Article Anatomy Standard, running entity validation, and briefing our content producer.
- Own measurement — monthly reporting that connects organic work to qualified admissions inquiries. We care about the pipeline, not vanity rankings.
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS
- 5+ years in SEO, including at least one role where you built the keyword strategy rather than inherited it, with a track record of independently owning search strategy and delivering ranking/organic-traffic growth.
- A keyword map and an entity or topical model you personally built, that you can walk us through.
- Proven work on both sides: a national or highly competitive campaign you moved, and local or multi-location SEO at scale with programmatic page sets. We are skeptical of candidates who have only ever done one.
- Experience working strategy through with an executive stakeholder — presenting a recommendation, taking the pushback, and landing on a plan you both own.
- Fluency with Ahrefs, Google Search Console, GA4, and Screaming Frog (or an equivalent crawler).
- Real command of schema markup — designing an interconnected entity graph, not pasting generator output into a plugin.
- A working understanding of how large language models retrieve and cite content: you can explain chunking, embeddings, retrieval-augmented generation, and query fan-out to a non-technical colleague, and say what each changes about how you write a page.
- Demonstrated AI-search work — monitoring brand mentions and citations across AI assistants, diagnosing why a competitor gets cited and you do not, and shipping the fix.
- The judgment to tell a durable structural principle from a passing tactic. We would rather you say "we don't know yet" than repeat something you read on LinkedIn.
- Google Business Profile, local citation management, and review strategy across multiple locations.
- A real link-building track record with placements you can name, ideally in a regulated or competitive vertical. We will ask how you got them.
- Hands-on WordPress experience — fully comfortable in the admin, building and editing in Elementor, and configuring Yoast or RankMath.
- Working knowledge of HTML and CSS — read a page source, spot a heading-structure problem, and make a small fix yourself instead of queueing it.
- Familiarity with Git and staging-vs-live workflow — you do not need to ship production code, but you should understand branches, pull requests, and be able to review a change before it goes out.
- Strong editorial instincts — you can tell when copy is optimized into unreadability, and you push back on it.
- Clear written communication — much of this role is documenting what you decided and why.
- Willing and able to relocate to Cozumel and work full-time on-site.
- Professional written and spoken English (bilingual English/Spanish strongly preferred).
PREFERRED / BONUS
- Healthcare, medical-tourism, or YMYL SEO experience and EEAT familiarity.
- Multi-language / multi-country SEO (US, Canada, Mexico) experience.
- Familiarity with EEAT and how to build clinical authority into a site architecture.
- French language ability, given our Canadian market.
- Familiarity with call-tracking analytics and conversion attribution.
- Experience building an SEO program or function from scratch.
FIRST 90 DAYS
- Deliver a full portfolio-wide audit, ranking benchmark, and a written SEO/GEO strategy you own.
- Build the first full keyword map — every market and intent stage — with a clear recommendation on what we are ignoring and why.
- Design and ship the entity model and schema architecture for the priority properties.
- Stand up an AI-search visibility baseline (where we are retrieved and cited today) and a reporting rhythm tied to admissions pipeline.
- Establish your reporting rhythm to leadership and ship the highest-impact quick wins independently.
RELOCATION & RESIDENCY
This is a full-time, on-site role structured as a founding residency on our Cozumel campus in Quintana Roo, Mexico — we are looking for someone ready to plant roots and build something from the ground up, not a short-term contractor.
You will start with a brief remote trial period so both sides can confirm the fit. Once the trial is successfully completed, you will be invited to relocate to Cozumel within 6–8 weeks for an initial 6-month founding residency, with a pathway to a 2-year commitment. Throughout the residency, we provide full room and board on campus, so you arrive to housing and meals already covered and can focus on building the work.
COMPENSATION & BENEFITS
- $2,500–$3,000 USD/month, paid to your home account
- Up to $500 USD/month performance bonus
- Full room and board on our Cozumel campus (housing + meals included)
TO APPLY
Send the following to [email protected]:
- Your resume/CV
- A link to your LinkedIn profile
- A link to your portfolio or case studies (keyword maps, entity/schema work, link placements, or AI-search results you can walk us through)
We read every application and respond to all of them.
Job Types: Full-time, Temporary
Pay: $43,600.00 - $52,300.00 per month
Application Question(s):
- Have you personally owned BOTH a competitive/national SEO campaign AND a multi-location or programmatic geo/local SEO project?
- How many years of hands-on SEO experience do you have, including at least one role where you built the keyword strategy rather than inherited it?
- Are you hands-on in WordPress — comfortable building in Elementor and configuring Yoast or RankMath yourself (not just directing a developer)?
- Can you name specific backlinks you personally earned, ideally in a regulated or competitive vertical?
Language:
- English at the Professional spoken and written level? (Required)
Work Location: In person
