Webbed Marketing's Search Marketing Glossary

Webbed Marketing presents your online glossary of Search Marketing Terms. If you read any online publications about Search Engine Marketing or Paid Advertising, the industry experts use the lingo, but rarely stop to explain the basics. The follow list provides a simple definition for many of the industry buzz words.

You may also be interested in our Social Media Glossary

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z #

A

Abandonment Rates
Abandonment rates are the percentage of webpage visitors who, upon landing on a particular page on a website, exit without linking to other pages on the site.

Acquisition
An acquisition refers to the point in time when a visitor to a webpage becomes a qualified lead or customer.

Acquisition Cost
An acquisition cost represents the ratio of the total cost of a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaign to the total number of leads or customers.

AdWords
AdWords is the Pay-Per-Click (PPC) search engine marketing (SEM) program provided by Google.

Algorithm
An algorithm refers to the set of mathematical rules and equations which leads a search engine to rank web pages in a particular order for every search. Algorithms are updated frequently.

Alt tags
Alt tags are actually attributes coded into HTML which associate keyword targeted words with web images. In other words, Alt tags are a way to describe an image file other than by the name associated with it. For example: if the file name for an image of a dog is image1.gif, creating an alt tag into the code (Picture of Dog) will inform search engines what the picture represents.

Anchor Text
Anchor text refers to the text which replaces the URL in a hyperlink. It is common to find anchor text which directs web page visitors to click here. However, it is better practice to use keywords in anchor text.

B

Back Links
Back links are links which take a visitor from anywhere on the internet to a particular website. They are also referred to as inbound links and determine link popularity.

Broken Links
Broken links are the links to pages which no longer exist or have been moved to a different URL. Most search engines provide ways for visitors to report on broken or “dead” links.

C

Cache
A cache is content which is saved by search engines in their indexes.

Call-to-Action
A way to engage the website visitor in a manner which encourages them to interact with the company.

Click Through Rate (CTR)
CTR is a measurement to describe the number of visitors who click on a link or advertisement, determining its effectiveness. The CTR is often used in conjunction with a conversion rate to measure the effectiveness of a PPC campaign.

Cloaking
Cloaking is a deceptive practice by which a single URL displays different information depending on the IP address of the individual requesting to view the page. Cloaking is typically used to provide different information to search engine spiders than what is shown to actual people. Search engines enforce stiff penalties to websites engaging in cloaking.

Conversion
A conversion happens when a visitor takes a desired action, such as making a purchase or downloading a file.

Conversion Cost
The conversion cost is how PPC campaign managers figure out the total cost for a single sale. This is calculated by dividing the total cost of a PPC campaign by the number of resulting sales.

D

Directory
A directory is a collection of links to various websites, organized in a manner which makes it possible find specific websites by category: Yahoo! Directory, for one.

DMOZ
A continually expanding directory run by volunteers: www.dmoz.org.

DNS
Stands for Domain Name Service, Domain Name Server, Domain Name System: the DNS is a name service which allows letters, or domain names, to be used to identify computers instead of IP addresses.

F

Flash
Flash refers to a form of video software developed by Macromedia which creates vector-based graphic animations that occupy small file sizes.

Frames
Frames are HTML tag devices which allow more than one web pages to be displayed simultaneously. Framed websites are typically not search engine friendly.

H

H1, H2…H6 Tags
In HTML, these are the different levels of headers and sub-headers which define the titles and sub-titles of the copy on a webpage. Headers should contain keywords wherever possible

HTML
Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) refers to the text based language which is used to create websites. HTML can be understood by search engines, while graphic displays cannot.

Hyperlink
A hyperlink is a word or phrase which is clickable and takes the visitor to a different page on the site or a completely different website. A word or phrase is displayed as anchor text in place of the URL of the linked page.

I

Impression
An impression is any time that an image, usually an advertisement, is displayed.

Inbound Link
Also referred to as back links, inbound links are links outside of a particular webpage which direct visitors back to that page.

Index
An index is a search engine’s database, or where it stores information about the internet.

IP Address
The IP Address is the unique numeric address for each internet user.

J

Java
Java is a powerful programming language which is independent of platforms that can run on multiple different computers and operating systems.

JavaScript
JavaScript is a relatively simple scripting language which can be seamlessly integrated with HTML and is used on many websites. JavaScript is less complex and, consequently, less powerful than Java.

K

Keyword
Keywords are competitive terms which define the content and purpose of a webpage and are selected based on the search habits of internet users.

Keyword Stemming
Keyword Stemming is the practice adopted by search engines to search, not only for keywords, but variations of keywords, such as plurals.

L

Link
Any copy on a webpage that, when clicked, takes the visitor to a different page on the site or another website entirely.

Link Popularity
A measure by both number and quality of inbound links to a particular webpage.

M

Meta Description
A meta description consists of copy which is seen by search engines but not by visitors to a site. This “hidden information” contains descriptive information about a webpage, including keywords. Each individual part of the meta description is referred to as a meta tag.

Meta Tag
Meta Tags are HTML tags placed in the header of the page script, consisting of title, description and keyword tags.

N

Natural Listings
Natural listings are the results of a search on a search engine that are not paid advertisements. Typically, most search engines will sponsor several advertisements related to search terms before displaying the natural listings.

Nofollow
Nofollow is a tag which is coded into the HTML markup of a website. The tag is used to prevent a search engine from crawling and indexing a webpage.

O

Off-The-Page
Off the page refers to all of the factors which are not located on a specific webpage which is considered by a search engine when it calculates the value of the page. These include inbound links.

Optimization
Optimization refers to the process of structuring a webpage to rank as highly as possible on search engines for a set of desired keywords.

Organic Listings
See natural listings.

P

Page Impression
See page view.

PageRank
PageRank is Google’s method for measuring the link popularity of a site by determining the number of inbound links to a particular webpage and the quality of the sites which provide them.

Page Views
A calculation of page views refers to the number of pages viewed by all visitors to a website in a given amount of time.

Paid Inclusion
Paid inclusion is when the operator of a webpage makes a payment to be included in a search engine index or online directory.

Paid Placement
Paid placement is when a company pays to place an advertisement on a search engine results page. These typically appear before the natural listings.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
Pay-Per-Click, or PPC, is a form of online advertising where the promoter pays only when an advertisement is clicked. Impressions of the advertisement will coincide with a search of predetermined keywords. The cost per click depends on the competitiveness of the desired keywords.

PDF
PDF, or Portable Document Format, is a type of file for viewing documents.

Pop-Up Ads
Pop-up ads are a form of advertisement which automatically opens a new window in a browser to display ad copy. This form of advertisement is generally disliked by internet users and many programs exist which block these ads.

R

Redirect
See 301 or 302 redirect.

Robot
A robot is a program, much like a browser, which can request webpages in order to index them in a database. Spiders are examples of robots which index page content.

Robot.txt
This is text file instructing search engine robots which pages they may or may not index.

ROI (Return on Investment)
ROI is the ratio of total revenue which is generated to the amount of money spent on the advertising campaign.

S

Search Engine
A tool designed to find information on the internet. Search engines are typically made up of a spider, indexer, database, web interface and search program.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
SEM is the practice of advertising through programs provided by search engines. PPC is a type of SEM.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
See optimization.

Search Engine Referrals
Search engine referrals are visitors who arrive at a particular webpage after clicking the results of a search on a search engine.

Search Term
A search term is a word or phrase which is entered into a search engine.

Sitemap
A sitemap is a webpage containing links to every page associated with a particular website. Sitemaps are particularly useful for spiders as they can allow the spider to move through a website quickly and accurately.

Similar Pages
Similar pages are sites identified by search engines as having the same theme.

Spam
Spam refers to a wide range of different things: in particular, an intrusive, usually automated, form of marketing which is targeted by numerous forms of anti-spam software.

Spider
An invaluable part of a search engine, a spider is much like a user and a browser. The spider crawls the internet by following links and indexes its findings in its search engine’s database.

T

Title Tag
See meta description.

T-Rex
The name of the Lycos spider.

U

Unique Visitor
A unique visitor refers to the first time that one single person visited a website over a given period of time.

URL
URL stands for either Universal or Uniform Resource Locator and is unique for every internet resource must have in order to be found on the internet.

W

Web Spider
See spider.

Webinar
An online seminar containing audio and video.

#

301 Redirect
A 301 redirect is a file on a server indicating that a requested page has been permanently moved to a different location.

302 Redirect
A 302 error page is the webpage that displays when a user attempts to access a webpage has been moved, renamed or no longer exists.

401 Error Page
A 401 error page is the webpage that displays when a user attempts to access a webpage has been moved, renamed or no longer exists.

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