In several domains of applied geophysics, surface and guided waves are considered a source of information that can be exploited by a variety of well-established geophysical solutions for characterizing the near surface, which in a marine environment includes the seabed. In contrast, in exploration seismic surveys, these waves have traditionally been regarded as coherent noise that should be quickly filtered out. With proper analysis and inversion they can be used to characterize the near surface with a surprisingly high resolution, and can provide valuable information for tasks such as velocity and geological modelling. Here, we discuss a workflow for the analysis and joint inversion of surface and guided waves in oceanbottom cable and shallow streamer seismic data and we list cases where the retrieved shallow velocity models can enhance conventional processing in shallow marine environments.