This Russian SEO expert moved to Thailand to grow his career. Here’s what he learned

This interview was conducted by Dmitrii Udimov and edited and compiled by the author. This has been heavily revised from the original transcript.

Dmitri Kolpakov

Dmitry Kolpakov is an SEO expert and developer from Moscow who’s held many roles from system administrator to marketing director. A few years ago, he moved to Thailand in search of new growth opportunities. Since then, he’s lived and worked in Bangkok.

In our conversation, Kolpakov told me how his relocating to Thailand boosted his career, which challenges he faced when he moved to Asia, the distinctive features of Thai SEO, and some pieces of advice for those who want to apply their skills in a new market.

How did you get into SEO?

It all started with my interest in computers. When I was a high school student, I took some orders from my classmates assembling PCs, installing Windows, removing malware, etc. After school, I worked as a system administrator in IT support. It was around 2005, and the internet was growing rapidly.

The first question that those interested in the internet would ask is “How do you code?” So, I took a course, and within six months, I figured it out. In my company, I turned to web development.

One day, my boss came to me and said, “We have a nice website. Why are we outside the top 10? We need to be at the top. Handle it.” That was the first time I’d ever thought of SEO.

When and why did you come to Thailand?

Well, that’s an interesting story. Every three to four years, I take my career to a whole new level. So, I first worked in IT, then I tried to master the internet. After that, I turned to marketing.

I was working as a marketing director for Proskater.ru and was running four marketing channels—social media, search engines, PPC, and email—when I told myself, “Maybe I should try this in another market.”

A week before the new year, I realized that I’d never left Moscow. It was the perfect time to get some rest and consider everything. That night, I saw a TV show about Thailand. I didn’t really know much about traveling, but that night I saw this country, opened a fare aggregator website, bought tickets, and flew away.

In Thailand, I realized that the websites and the overall marketing level were the same as in Russia about 10 years ago. They focus mainly on offline channels and push online in the background. I knew that this was my growth opportunity, so I decided to stay.

Did you get to use the skills you learned in Russia? Or did you have to learn from scratch?