Digital Marketing Glossary
It’s always a good idea to start with the fundamentals. Learn all of the common terms, acronyms, and vernacular that digital marketing, SEO, and web design professionals use on a regular basis.
301 Redirect
A way to send users and search engine crawlers to a different URL than the one requested. This process is done by redirecting away from the original requested URL by forwarding to a different URL. A 301 specifically, is a permanent redirect to the URL that is being redirected to receive full link equity from the original URL.
302 Redirect
A temporary redirect, although a 302 can pass full link equity along, typically it does not, and that is why 302 is recommended for temporary use.
404 Error
A client error the page was not found. In other words the site could not be reached. There is an error on the website’s side. There is a possibility that the link you clicked was to a site that was deleted from the main site.
A
A/B Testing
A/B testing simply is comparing “A” to “B”, or in other words two different versions of a website, submission form, or application against each other to see which one performs better.
Above The Fold
The top portion of the webpage that is displayed when the user enters the site. This is the first portion of the page that the user sees and is the beginning.
Ad Blocking
Software designed to prevent advertisements from being displayed and appearing on any web page a user who has installed it opens.
Ad Click
A metric measuring the number of times users have clicked on a particular digital advertising to reach an online property.
Ad Extensions
Additional pieces of information that expand the reach of your advertisement by making it more useful to its users.
Ad Manager Account
A tool that allows you to create and manage your ads. You can view, edit, and view analytics. Google Ad Manager supports multiple ad networks such as Adsense, Ad Exchange, and third party networks.
Ad Network
A community where businesses seek websites to host their advertisements and websites that seek to host businesses advertisements. Google’s Ad network would include YouTube for example.
Ad Space
A portion of the web page devoted solely to displaying ads.
Adwords
Google’s advertising system reaches markets through its search engine platform and partner sites.
AdSense
AdSense serves ads via plain text, as opposed to graphical content. These plain text ads are smaller and less intrusive to the web page and user. Loading speeds are also negatively affected along with the viewability of the web page with graphical ads.
Affiliate Marketing
An external channel of traffic is generated by referrals.
Affiliate Merchant
An affiliate merchant is a business that increases sales, traffic and brand awareness through online advertising via a network of affiliate websites. Merchants will typically pay affiliates a commission for every visit to the website or every sales conversion this means they only pay for results.
Affiliate Software
Software that provides tracking and reporting of actions set to trigger commission such as sales, registrations, clicks, form displays, form submissions from affiliate links.
Aging Content
Content on the web that is not as relevant anymore because it has been posted for many years, and has not been reposted in years.
Algorithm
A process or set of rules to be followed by a computer. This is completed by the computer by following calculations or other problem-solving operations.
Algorithm Update
Periodic improvements made to certain procedures, or the algorithm entirely.
Alt Text
Also called alternative text is a word or phrase that can be inserted as an attribute in HTML code. The alt text tells web site users the nature or contents of an image. Typically alt text is in a blank box that only is visible to the user when the image is not available. Alt text is a substitute for the picture that would normally be there.
Anchor Text
This is the clickable text in the hyperlink typically underlined and in blue color.
Article Spinning
A form of black hat SEO in which content is rewritten to try to trick search engines into thinking it is new content.
Attribution Models
An analysis of user touchpoints prior to a conversion, to understand how that person converted in the first place.
Audience
People who are observing something whether it is a live performance in person or online, or a Google ad campaign this is the segment of traffic going to your campaign.
Audit
An examination into a company’s website and/or marketing through official reports.
Authority Linking
Backlinks from websites that have a high level of domain authority.
Automation
Technologies used to reduce human intervention in a task or set of tasks.
Autoresponder
A computer program that automatically responds to emails or chats that are sent by a user.
Average Position
This is a ranking by Google of how your ad compares to other ads.
B
B2B
A business to business transaction, both buyer and seller are dealing with commercial goods or raw materials typically.
B2C
A business to consumer transaction, the business sells to the consumer buyer.
Backlink
Also known as inbound link. A link to your website from another website.
Backlink Audit
Analyzing what websites are linking to your site.
Bandwith
The maximum amount of data that can be transferred on the current wifi connection.
Banner Ad
An ad that appears on websites, called a banner ad because it resembles the shape of a banner.
Banner Blindness
The user of a website intentionally or in some cases unintentionally ignoring the banner ad because they assume it is not relevant to them.
Banner Exchange
A network of banner ad traders who offer spots on their website for others ads or ads that they want to be displayed. They trade slots for ads or ads for slots.
Bid
The maximum amount of money an advertiser will pay for a click on an paid search ad.
Black Hat SEO
Various tactics that can or used to manipulate the search engine indexing system, that are inconsistent with the purpose of the indexing system.
Blog
A site that is typically purely informational or discussion based. Sort of like a website journal.
Bots
Also called internet bots or robots are automated programs that run on the internet either automatically or when given a specific command by the user.
Bounce Rate
The percentage of a particular website’s users that bounce off the page. This means they only viewed one page, the home page which is always the first page accessed.
Brand Awareness
The amount of people out of a random sample who recognize a particular brand.
Brand Equity
The value that the brand name carries through its legacy. It is independent of the current products. The value comes from having a long standing good reputation.
Brand Loyalty
Positive feelings towards a particular brand that drives repeat business.
Brand Mentions
When a brand is mentioned online, whether positive or negative. This could be in a news article, consumer review, blog, social media, or educational site post.
Broken Links
Links that do not work anymore.
Browser
A program used to access the internet.
Buyer Persona
A persona is a comprehensive list of traits such as demographics, needs or wants, and behaviors of a buyer. This is used to categorize buyers into more specific groups.
Buzzword
A word or phrase that gains popularity quickly similar to content on the web going viral.
C
Cache Copy
Temporary saves of a particular website visited previously. Used to speed up load times as well as decrease the amount of bandwidth needed to load the page back up.
Caching
Web page data that is saved by a browser to improve usability.
Call To Action
A written text that invites the web page user to engage in a desired action. Marketers typically want a lead form response or a sale.
Campaign
A digital marketing effort launched on any of the various platforms. Typically the main focus of any ad campaign is cost per lead.
Canonical Tag
An HTML element used to help prevent duplicate content issues.
Channel
A platform used to reach your specific target audience.
Chat Bot
A robot, also called a bot, used to respond to messages from a website user automatically and almost instantly.
Citation Flow
Measuring how many clicks a link receives or how popular it is.
Click-Through Rate
The number of clicks the ad received divided by the number of times the ad was opened.
Clicks
The number of times users selected your website.
Cloaking
The deliberate action taken by web designers to have the URL show a different page to human users than what is shown to the search engine. This action can result in the webpage being deindexed from Google.
Code
Text that is written to give program instructions.
Comment Spam
This refers to unsolicited advertisements posted as comments on a forum, comment section, blogs, wiki, or social media website. This intentional practice is abusive to the community and goes against the rules and guidelines.
Competitive Analysis
The process of researching and categorizing your competitors to better understand how your company compares to them.
Consumer Experience
The overall experience a consumer received from a business. Researchers look into the totality of cognitive, affective, sensory, and behavioral consumer responses during all stages of the consumption process that includes pre-purchase, consumption, and post-purchase stages. All of these experiences combine for the consumer into an overall perception of the brand.
Content
Content is what makes up any website. This can be a news article, video, or even a product page on an ecommerce website. This can also refer to user generated content such as a post on a social media website, or even a combination of ecommerce and user generated content such as a for sale listing on an online marketplace. The purpose of any content is to target a specific audience.
Content Delivery System
Larger websites have multiple systems of servers spread out around their area of service. This is done so that a user can be matched with the closest server to them to increase the loading speed of a website or files within.
Content Gap
This refers to the gap between what is currently offered by the content and what is desired from the users.
Content Management System
Also called CMS, is a software application that allows users to collaborate in creating or editing digital content.
Content Marketing
Content creation with marketing as the main focus. This strategic marketing approach utilizes consistent, relevant, and in some cases valuable content to a growing but clearly defined audience. This is done to drive consumer action that is profitable for the creator.
Content Syndication
This is a method of republishing previously published content on a different website in hopes of reaching a broader audience. If done properly the original article should have an increase in traffic.
Content Upgrade
A lead generation strategy that trades readers a free piece of content in exchange for their email address.
Contextual Advertising
Targeted advertising that is generated based on the linguistic elements of the particular website it is being shown on.
Conversion Rate
A marketing metric this is calculated by dividing the total number of conversions by the total number of ad interactions.
Conversion Rate Optimization
Also called CRO, is the process of optimizing the website or landing page experience based on analytical and behavioral data. This is done to hopefully reduce cost per conversion.
Conversions
This is counted when a user completes a desired goal such as buying something or filling out a contact form.
Cookie
A small piece of data in plain text. HTTP cookies are used by websites to identify you individually and offer an improved experience based on your previously stored browsing data.
Cost Per Acquisition
Also called CPA, is a marketing metric that is calculated by dividing the total cost by the number of new customers.
Cost Per Action
This specific type of advertising the client pays the host a specific amount per lead or percentage of a sale. Regardless of the specific action the amount paid per action depends on the previously negotiated amounts.
Cost Per Click
Also called pay-per-click, is a type of online bidding done by digital marketers. The digital marketer sets a maximum amount they are willing to bid for a click on the ad.
Cost Per Lead
This metric measures how cost effective the marketing campaign is. This is essentially the bottom line to firms. A low cost per lead is typically more important than having a higher amount of lead generation.
Cost Per Thousand Impressions
Also called cost per mile, is the cost a marketer pays for a thousand views or clicks on the advertisement.
Crawl Frequency
This refers to how often a website is crawled by search engine spiders.
Crawler
Also called web crawlers or search engine spiders. These are programs that systematically browse the web to create an index for the data to be sorted accordingly.
Crawling
This is the process of tracking and gathering URLs to prepare them for indexing. The process is similar to crawling from link to link gathering data about each subsequent link to report back.
Creative
Visual, audio, or other types of assets generated by a company that are used for creative purposes, such as campaigns, promotions, or other digital media needs.
CSS
This stands for cascading style sheets, this is a language used to style and improve the design or presentation of a web page. It works with HTML code to enable management of the aesthetic of a site.
Customer Acquisition Cost
The cost of acquiring a particular customer’s business. Many points of data are included in the calculation but typically it starts with marketing and salary costs.
Customer Lifecycle
The various stages a customer will go through in the sales funnel, including the actions they may take after they complete a transaction or conversion.
Customer Lifetime Value
An estimation of the net profit a single customer will provide a business over the course of their relationship with that customer.
D
Data Transfer
The process of transferring data from one location to another (e.g., transferring data from a hard drive to the cloud).
Dead Link
An invalid link that either goes to a 404 page or generates some other response error code.
Dedicated Hosting
A web server that is unique to your company and isn’t shared with any other companies.
Dedicated IP
An IP address that is unique to your company and isn’t shared with any other domains.
Deep Link Ratio
The number of internal links on a site divided by the total number of links on a site.
Deep Linking
Hyperlinking with the intent of pointing users at a specific piece of information on a website or webpage (e.g., hyperlinking to an article with an anchor link to a specific section of that article).
Deep Web
Areas of the world wide web that are not indexed by search engines.
Demand Generation
By targeting and marketing to a buyer at every step of the sales funnel, a business owner is employing demand generation for a brand, product, or service.
Demand Side Platform
A system that allows advertisers to manage multiple accounts across a single dashboard.
Demographics
Data points about a person or a set of people that helps categorize them into groups.
Digital Assistant
A type of AI software that uses learning algorithms, paired with search engine functionality, to create a personalized, conversational approach to completing everyday tasks.
Digital Marketing
A type of marketing that utilizes the internet and devices that connect to the internet in order to promote brands, products, and services to web users.
Direct Traffic
Any traffic that visits your website by typing the domain name directly into a web browser address bar.
Disintermediation
Also known as “cutting out the middleman,” is the process of removing intermediaries from a supply chain.
Display Advertising
The process of promoting an advertisement to users using audio, video, and/or images.
Display Network
A group of websites, applications, and other services where your digital advertisements can appear.
DNS
Also known as Domain Name System, is essentially the phonebook of the internet, connecting registered domain names to people via unique identifying factors.
Domain Authority
In a specific market segment, domain authority can refer to a website’s relevance to user search queries in that segment.
Domain Name
A unique registered portion of the internet in which a user has autonomy over content, applications, other administrative web settings.
Doorway Domain
A website that is used to manipulate search engines to index for keywords of a specific topic and then redirect users to an entirely different page that may be about another topic.
Doorway Page
A page that is used to manipulate search engines to index for keywords of a specific topic and then redirect users to an entirely different page that may be about another topic.
Duplicate Content
Content that appears on the internet in more than one place, generally through copy and pasting text.
Dynamic Content
Any content that is displayed on a website that is generated dynamically, meaning the content changes when the page refreshes.
Dynamic Keyword Insertion
A feature of Google Ads that allows a business owner to customize their ad to cater to a user’s specific search query.
Dynamic Website
A website that displays dynamic content, or different content every time a user visits it.
E
eCommerce
Buying or selling products or services online.
eCommerce Website
A website that is specifically designed to handle transactions of products or services.
Ego Bait
Creating position mention of a person in the hopes they will share that message with their circle of influence and therefore promote your product, brand, or service further.
Email Automation
The process of creating automatically generated emails to consumers based on set parameters within an email marketing platform.
Email List
A segment of people who are signed up to receive an email communication from a specific campaign, usually as part of an email marketing campaign.
Email Marketing
A form of marketing that uses email lists to promote products, brands, or services to potential customers.
Email Spam
Sending messages, usually unsolicited, to a user repeatedly via email.
Embed Code
A small snippet of code that is provided by a third party application or site to run a specific piece of that site in your site. For example, a YouTube video player can be considered an embed code.
Embedded Link
Any link that takes a user to another webpage or website, that is hyperlinked or linked via an image or other object.
Event Marketing
The practice of marketing for a specific event, whether physical or online.
Evergreen Content
Content that can be used all year.
Exit Rate
The number of exits a page receives divided by the number of pageviews.
External Links
Links that exist on your website that take users to a different website or domain.
F
Facebook Ads Manager
A way for those who are displaying ads on Facebook to create new campaigns and manage the performance and parameters of their ads.
Facebook Advertising
A marketing strategy where a business owner pays Facebook to feature a post regarding their brand, product, or service on the news feeds of targeted individuals.
Facebook Audience Insights
Analytics tool provided by Facebook to help page owners create targeted content to the right demographics.
Facebook Business Page
A type of Facebook profile that is specifically made for a business and has an entirely different suite of management tools than a personal profile.
Facebook Live
A feature that allows a user to live stream a video from their device to their Facebook feed. Friends can join the stream, which acts as a mini chatroom, to talk with the streamer and each other, and post reactions.
Facebook Messenger Bots
A type of chatbot AI that can be implemented by businesses to create automated responses to users.
Featured Snippet
When an answer to a user’s search query is answered in a zero position block at the top of their search results, it is displayed in a featured snippet.
First Crawled
When a site was first indexed by search engine bots.
First-Mover Advantage
A type of advantage a company may have if they tap into a market segment early and build a strong customer base before their competition.
Flash
A multimedia computer software developed by Adobe to create rich, sharable content.
Footer
The bottom section of a website, typically containing navigation links to other parts of the site, a company’s contact information, copyright information, etc.
Forum
An online social platform in which users can create an account and post within various forums, or discussion threads about a specific topic.
Frames
A single image on a screen in a moving graphic or video. Multiple images in rapid succession make up what is known as frame rate.
Freemium
When a basic service, such as a theme or plugin, is provided for free, but additional time-saving features are offered at a cost.
Frequency
In advertising, the number of times a person sees your ad over a period of time.
Frequency Cap
The maximum amount of times that a person can see your ad per day.
G
Geo-Targeting
A method of targeted advertising in which ads are shown to people in a certain geographical area.
The most popular search engine today, Google offers a whole suite of products and services that go far beyond search engine technology, including cloud computing, social media, software, email, etc.
Google Ads
An online advertising platform where business owners can place ads on search engine results pages or on non-search sites.
Google Analytics
An intelligent reporting solution that connects to your website via a tracking code to monitor web traffic, conversions, and other data on your site.
Google Chrome Security Warning
Web browser warning that displays when a user encounters an unsafe website.
Google Click Identifier
Tracking parameter appended to website URLs in order to connect Google Ad campaigns to Google Analytics.
Google Home
A service provided by Google to bring Google search and voice recognition together to create smart devices.
Google Hummingbird
Google update in 2013 that improved the overall search algorithm to interpret the meaning behind a search and efficiently provide more relevant results.
Google Maps
An intelligent web-mapping service provided by Google that offers real-time navigation, satellite imagery, and a globally collaborative way to map Earth.
Google Mobile Speed Update
An update made by Google in 2018 that correlates mobile page speed with mobile search rankings.
Google My Business
A platform business owners can use to verify and manage their Google Knowledge Panel information on search engine results pages.
Google Partner Agency
Advertising agencies and other types of organizations that meet the qualifications to receive a Premier Google Partner Badge.
Google Reviews
Reviews that users write on Google Knowledge Panel or Google My Business profiles, including Google Maps and other services, to share their experiences about a business.
Google Search Console
A service provided by Google that allows a website owner to verify traffic and search engine indexing reporting for their domain.
Google Tag Manager
A conversion and tracking software that easily allows you to monitor campaign web performance using a series of small code snippets or tags.
Grey Hat SEO
Using a mixture of approved and unapproved SEO techniques that may or may not end up in manual action taken against your site.
Guerilla Marketing
A marketing technique in which a company uses unconventional or visually surprising tactics to creatively promote their brand in a memorable way.
Guest Blogging
A marketing technique where a person creates a blog post on an external website to promote their own website, brand, product, or service.
H
Hashtag
Using the hash symbol (#), hashtags are metadata tags that are used to increase awareness and shareability of social media content.
Header Code
Any code that is placed in-between the <head> tags on a webpage, which loads before any other content is loaded.
Heading
Typically refers to different types of text headings on a web page, but can also to refer to the top section of a webpage.
Header Tags
Typically refers to HTML tags which display different types of text headings on a web page <h1> through <h6>.
Heatmap
A tool used in behavioral and web usability studies to understand where the eye travels as a person scrolls down a page.
Hit
A web server request for a file on a particular page. A single page load can contain multiple hits.
Home Page
The top-level page of a website, typically the domain name.
House Ad
An ad a company can run on their own website to promote new products or features to site visitors.
Hreflang
If you have multiple versions of your webpage in different languages, you can use the hreflang HTML attribute that tells Google what language your web page is in (e.g., English, Spanish, French, etc.) so users can easily see that on search engine results pages.
HTML
Hypertext markup language is the standard code language for web documents on the internet, and comprises the majority of code markup for websites.
HTML Banner
A web banner that is generated using HTML and is therefore more complex than just an image file.
HTML Email
An email generated in HTML format.
HTTP Status Code
A specific set of numerical codes that indicate whether or not an HTTP request has been successful or not.
HTTPS
Also known as hypertext transfer protocol secure, is a type of internet protocol that indicates a web document is served over an encrypted connection.
Hybrid Model
Involves two or more payment strategies for garnering impressions and clicks. For instance, you can invest in cost-per-click (CPC) and cost-per-mile (CPM) simultaneously in a hybrid marketing model.
I
Iframe
An HTML element that places external content inside of a box, which can be embedded on a webpage.
Impressions
Content that was displayed to a person, whether the person interacted with it or not.
Inbound Link
Also known as a backlink. A link to your website from another website.
Inbound Marketing
A type of marketing that involves attracting customers by creating meaningful, relevant content for them.
Incentivized Traffic
When users receive some type of reward, usually monetary, for their interaction on your site.
Index
The process of search engine bots interpreting and organizing web pages.
Infographic
A visual way of displaying complex information, using flowcharts, graphs, icons, or other objects and images, typically on a single page.
Information Architecture
Structuring data elements in an organized way to promote disambiguation.
An American social media platform that is mainly based around sharing photos and videos.
Instagram Advertising
Utilizing the Instagram feed to promote your brand, product, or services to users.
Instagram Stories
Ephemeral content users can share to their followers that disappears after 24 hours.
Instagram TV
A standalone app that allows users to share longer videos than the traditional app.
Interactive Agency
Also known as a digital agency, is a type of agency that mainly focuses on digital promotion.
Interactive Content
Any content on a webpage that a user can interact with, such as an image carousel, a video, a form, or some other media.
Internal Link
A hyperlink on your website that takes you to another page on the same website.
Internet Protocol
The set of communication rules that is shared across networks in order to transmit data throughout the world wide web.
Intuitive Design
When a design is intuitive, it means that a user doesn’t have to guess what they need to do in order to interact with it.
IP Address
Also known as an internet protocol address, is a unique identifying number that is assigned to individuals devices that connect to the internet.
J
JavaScript
A type of coding language that is standard to most websites today.
jQuery
A library of JavaScript code.
JSON-LD
A method developers can use to encode linked data using JSON.
K
Keyword Density
Refers to the number of times a keyword appears on a particular page in relation to the total number of words on that page.
Keyword Popularity
Refers to keywords that are used in a higher volume of searches.
Keyword Research
Utilizing online software or tools to determine how people are finding your site and your competities via search queries. When implementing keyword research for your site’s SEO, it is important to identify keywords that are relevant to your company or brand and help users find meaningful content on your website more easily.
Keyword Stuffing
The process of trying to manipulate search rankings by adding a large number of keywords to your webpages.
Knowledge Gap
The concept that knowledge is distributed differently amongst social systems.
Knowledge Graph
Consists of the different interlinked descriptions of businesses or topics that serve to improve search engine results pages and the integration of data on the web.
Knowledge Panel
Information in Google that appears alongside your search results to provide a quick snapshot of information about a particular business or topic.
L
Landing Page
A page on a website that web traffic is funneled to for lead generation purposes, usually as part of a campaign.
Landing Page Optimization
The process of ensuring a landing page for a particular campaign or business is optimized for SEO, web responsiveness, accessibility, page speed, etc.
Last Crawled
The last time a search engine crawled or indexed a web page.
Latent Semantic Indexing
A concept used by search engines to conceptualize the meaning and topics behind pairings of words in various documents, in order to produce more human-centered and in-context results for search queries.
Lead
New business for a product or service.
Lead Generation
The process of generating new business for a product or service.
Lead Magnet
A product or service that is given away for free in the hopes of attracting future business.
Lead Nurturing
The process of nurturing prospective clients or buyers at every stage in the buyer process, usually through relationship building and personalized communication.
Link
Also known as a hyperlink, is a clickable object or text that takes a user from the current page or document to a different page or website.
Link Building
The process of acquiring backlinks to your website to build web authority.
Link Checker
Tools used to monitor the source of links. For example, a link checker can be used to see if a link is still valid or if it returns a 404 page.
Link Disavowal
To remove association with non-compliant backlinks to your site in order to remedy manual action from Google.
Link Juice
The amount of influence a particular backlink has on the authoritativeness of a website.
Link Neighborhood
The hierarchical structure of backlinks to a particular website, which includes the domain, primary backlinks to the site, secondary backlinks that point to backlinking sites, and so on.
Link Popularity
The number of backlinks that point to a particular website. Volume of backlinks alone does not guarantee improved search ranking.
Link Profile
The composition of backlinks to your site, which in order to rank in search engines, need to be high quality and from a variety of authoritative domains.
Link Spam
Low-quality, out-of-context links that are usually generated in user comments on a shareable social platform with the purpose of creating backlinks to their site.
Link Text
When text is hyperlinked, the URL is masked by what is known as link text. For example, someone can click on link text that reads “click here.”
Link Velocity
The speed at which your website received backlinks from other websites.
Linkable Asset
Any digital content that is able to produce product backlinks to your website.
Linkbait
The process of creating backlinks that direct a viewer back to your website or content you’ve hosted on an online platform.
A social media platform that connects millions of working professionals.
LinkedIn Advertising
Advertising your product, brand or service on the LinkedIn social platform.
Linking Domains
Websites containing backlinks to your website.
Live Streaming
Sharing live video and audio coverage (usually in the form of screen recording or video recording) on a social platform.
Local Citations
Any mention of a company’s phone, website, ro business address in a directory or other online platform.
Local SEO
Search engine optimization as it relates to a specific geographic area.
Log File
There are many types of log files, but generally speaking, a log file is used to document various changes, errors, or other data that can be used for troubleshooting and moderation.
Long Tail Keywords
Longer, more detailed search queries that target user intent more specifically, and generally have a smaller, more focused search volume.
Lookalike Audience
People who may have never interacted with or heard of your brand or business before, but share a lot of the personas or demographics of the people who have.
M
Managed WordPress Hosting
A type of hosting service in which many of the technical aspects of managing a WordPress website or series of WordPress websites in managed by the host, which can save a business owner time and money.
Manual Submission
Manually entering website URLs to search engines by hand, as opposed to automated submission tools.
Map Pack
Company listings that appear on search engine results pages and are accompanied by a map of a geographic area, typically influenced by SEO ranking.
Marketing Automation
Creating automated processes to drive digital marketing strategies (e.g., email marketing automation).
Marketing Funnel
A visualization of the marketing process. Consumers generally go through different stages when discovering a brand, product, or service, starting with the Awareness stage, followed by Interest, Consideration, Intent, Evaluation, and finally Purchase/Conversion.
Marketing Plan
A part of an overall business plan that describes how a budget is spent to market goods and services.
Media Kit
A package of visual and textual information about your company, brand, product, or service.
Medium
A channel or system of information or communication (e.g., print media, video media, image media, etc.).
Meta Description
An element in the heading of an HTML document that describes the web page. This description appears below the meta title on search engine results pages.
Meta Keywords
An element in the heading of an HTML document that defines the topic(s) of a web page as it is read by search engines.
Metasearch Engine
An advanced search engine tool that takes data from other search engines and aggregates that data to create its own search engine results pages.
Meta Tags
Elements in the heading of an HTML document that describes the content on that page as it is read by search engines.
Meta Title
An element in the heading of an HTML document that defines the title of a web page as it is read by search engines. This title appears as a hyperlink on search engine results pages.
Metadata
Data that provides summary information about other data.
Mobile Advertising
The planning, strategy, and executing of serving advertisements to users in a way that is optimized for mobile devices.
Mobile App
An application designed specifically for a mobile device.
Mobile Search
Using a search engine on a mobile device.
Mobile-first Design
Optimizing a website’s design for mobile consumers, through UX/UI and responsive design techniques.
Mobile-first Optimization
Optimizing a website’s content for mobile consumers, through UX/UI and content strategy.
Moderator
Someone who moderates a website discussion or other community-based forum.
Mousetrapping
Techniques used to keep visitors from leaving their website.
Multivariate Testing
Changes are made to three or more sections of a webpage, and then tests are run on all the different variations.
N
Naked Link
A hyperlink that uses the full URL as the text rather than some other text.
NAP
Short for name, address, and phone number. Making sure these are consistent across all platforms will ensure your website is optimized for SEO.
Navigation
An element on a website, typically in the header or footer, that contains links to other pages on the website.
Networking Effect
When a product or service increases in value as more and more people purchase it and use it.
New Users
Users that have never visited your site before.
Niche Marketing
A strategy that is designed to target a specific subset of people via advertising or campaign efforts.
Nofollow Links
An HTML link attribute that is used to inform search engine crawlers to ignore a specific link on a page.
Noindex
An HTML attribute that is used to inform search engine crawlers to not index a page.
O
Off-page Optimization
Strategies used outside of a website to improve its SEO and thus its search rankings. An example of this is creating high-quality backlinks to the website.
On-page Optimization
Strategies used on a website to improve its SEO and thus its search rankings. This can include optimizations to content, meta tags, meta descriptions, page speed, etc.
Open Graph Tag
Introduced in 2010 by Facebook, open graph tags allow Facebook to present external website content in a controlled way via object integration.
Opt-in Email
Choosing to participate in a product, service, survey, etc via email.
Opt-out
Choosing not to participate in a product, service, survey, etc.
Organic Link
Outbound links that are placed on websites naturally.
Organic Search
Web pages on search engine results pages that are not generated via paid advertising.
Organic Traffic
Visitors who arrive at your site from search engines.
Outbound Link
A link on your website that takes users away from your site and to a different domain.
P
Page Authority
Developed by Moz, an SEO analytics company, to predict how well a page will rank on search engine results pages, based on the search engine optimization of that specific page.
Page Speed
The time in which page content takes to load.
Page Views
The number of times a web user has visited a specific page on a website.
Pagejacking
Copying source code of one website and replicating it on another site.
PageRank
Part of the Google search engine algorithm that determines the ranking of web pages in search engine results.
Paid Advertising
Advertising, whether digital, print, or other media, that you pay for.
Paid Links
Paying other websites to generate backlinks to your website in order to manipulate search engine rankings.
Paid Search Traffic
Generating traffic to your website via advertising on search engine results pages.
Pay Per Click
In pay-per-click advertising, you only pay for an ad when people click on it.
Penalty
Getting penalized by search engines means your website or your SEO practices were not following the rules and guidelines of that particular search engine, and it results in your site getting blacklisted or losing a significant portion of traffic.
Permission Marketing
Advertising to prospects with consent, or an opt-in.
Pixel
The smallest possible element in an image on a screen.
Podcast
A digital series of audio files that a user can easily listen to or download. Podcasts generally revolve around a particular topic or series of topics and are recorded audio of one or multiple people speaking.
Pop-under Ad
An ad that displays in a new browser window behind the currently active browser window.
Pop-up Ad
Ads that display above content, either taking up an entire screen, or showing as a small banner at the top or bottom of a screen, typically with an “x” or “close” button.
Portal
Also known as a web portal, it is a specially-designed website that functions as a centralizing point for various types of information, tasks, and procedures to improve online user interaction with a business.
Position
On search engine results pages, position refers to how far a user has to scroll to get to your website for any given search query.
Premium WordPress Theme
Themes are the foundation of any WordPress site, and while there are a lot of great free themes out there, a premium theme is a paid theme which usually offers more flexibility and features.
Private Blog Networks
A repository of authoritative and unrelated web domains that link to a particular website in order to manipulate search rankings, usually resulting in penalization from search engines.
Programmatic Advertising
Using software to purchase digital advertising instead of the traditional sales method of interacting with humans.
Proposal
A document outlining a proposed exchange of money for goods and services.
Q
Qualified Traffic
Visitors to your site that are pre-qualified clients based on their previous interest in your products or services.
Quality Score
A metric used by search engines to determine the position and the cost per click of search engine ads.
Query
Also known as a web search query, is when a user enters a specific search term into a web search engine to find information on a specific topic.
R
Rank Tracking
A form of SEO research in which one can check the ranking of their website on various search engine results pages for various keywords.
RankBrain
A part of Google’s overall search algorithm that helps the search engine contextualize search queries into the most useful results.
Rate Card
A document that outlines various price points for different ad display options.
Reach
The total number of different people exposed to a specific ad at least once.
Reciprocal Links
Used in an agreement between two entities to provide backlinks to each other. Essentially, it’s saying to the other person, “If you link to me, I’ll link to you.”
Reconsideration Request
A request for Google to review your site after your site has been flagged some sort of manual action or security issue.
Redirect
An automatic forwarding from one URL to another URL.
Referral Traffic
When visitors arrive at your website from other websites outside of search engines.
Referring Domains
A domain with backlinks to your website.
Relevance Score
Used primarily by Facebook to determine the quality and engagement metrics for Facebook ads. The higher the score, the more likely your ad will be served.
Remarketing
Serving ads to users that have already completed an action on a website but haven’t converted (e.g., abandoning a shopping cart) in order to guide them down the sales funnel.
Report
In digital marketing, a report is a visual overview of a company’s performance across their digital channels.
Resource Pages
A page on a website that organizes helpful links on a particular topic.
Responsive Web Design
Making websites easily usable and attractive, and fast on all devices.
Retargeting
A form of digital marketing in which user behavior is tracked when they visit a web page but did not complete a conversion (e.g., purchase a product or service). The user is then served ads on other web pages and platforms they visit with a call-to-action to complete the conversion for the original product or service.
Return Days
The number of days an affiliate can earn commission on user conversions after the initial user click-through.
Return On Ad Spend
The amount of revenue earned for each dollar spent on advertising.
Return On Investment
In digital marketing, ROI usually refers to the net profit or loss generated from digital marketing campaigns.
Rich Media
Any web media that a user can interact with beyond a traditional click.
Robots.txt
A file used to communicate with web crawlers about which parts of a website to crawl or not crawl.
Root Domain
In web structure, the domain root is the highest level of a website in a hierarchical domain structure.
RSS Feeds
Also known as Really Simple Syndication, an RSS feed can be used to generate dynamic feeds of content from different websites into a singular feed using XML code.
S
Schema Markup
Code that is placed on a site to help search engines produce more useful search results for end users.
Scraped Content
A form of plagiarism in which you take the content from another website and post it on your site.
Search Algorithm
Used by search engines to analyze search databases and find information related to user search queries.
Search Engine
A software system that uses algorithms to interpret user search queries and present an organized list of search results from a database.
Search Engine Marketing
Increasing visibility of a website through paid advertising on search engine results pages and unpaid search engine optimization strategies.
Search Engine Spam
Inserting a high number of keywords (e.g., keyword stuffing) into a webpage to try to manipulate search engine rankings.
Search Impression Share
The number of impressions received divided by the number of impressions you are eligible to receive in a search network.
Search Network
Text-based, pay-per-click ads that appear on search engine results pages.
Search Operator
Commands and keyboard symbols that can be used to refine search results. For example, if you wish to search “housing assistance” for only U.S. government sites, you can enter “housing assistance:.gov” to display only .gov sites.
Search Queries
Keywords, phrases, questions, or other terms a user inputs in a search engine to retrieve a list of desired results.
Search Ranking
A website’s position on a search results page. The higher your website appears in search engine results, the higher the chances are that users will visit your website.
Search Retargeting
A type of retargeting in which a marketer can utilize search query data users performed on other websites, typically competitors, in order to leverage keywords to favor their own website, which the user has never visited.
Searcher Intent
The objective a user is trying to accomplish behind a search, whether it be to purchase a product or service, to find more information on a topic, to volunteer for a charity, etc.
Segmentation
Dividing your customers into groups based on defining characteristics.
Semantic Search
A type of artificial intelligence of search engines that is used to interpret the contextual meaning behind a search query rather than a literal match.
SEO
Also known as search engine optimization, is the means by which you maximize the visibility of your website to users via search engines.
SEO Competition
Any website that uses the same or similar keyword search terms as you and influence your page ranking on search engine results.
SEO Keywords
Words, phrases, and topics that define the content of a website. When implementing keyword research for your site’s SEO, it is important to identify keywords that are relevant to your company or brand and help users find meaningful content on your website more easily.
SERP
Also known as search engine result pages, a list of web results a search engine produces when a user types in a search query.
Session Recording
A behavioral research message that can be used to understand user flow through a website, as well as how users interact with, read, and interpret website content.
Sessions
A set of interactions that a single users has within your website over a period of time. A session can include multiple interactions, such as viewing multiple pages, filling out a form, or commenting on a post.
Shopping Cart
During the checkout process, a buyer collects items they want to purchase from your company by placing them in their online shopping cart. When a buyer is finished selecting their items, they can navigate to their shopping cart to finish the checkout process.
Site Search
A search query that is performed on a website to find content on that web domain.
Sitemap
A list of all the parent pages and subpages of a website, organized in a tree. This can be a design document presented by web designers, an XML sitemap presented to search engines, or a separate page on a website that includes all of the pages.
Sitewide Link
A link that appears on every page of your website, typically in a global section like a header or footer.
Skyscraper Ad
A type of display ad that is typically 160 pixels wide by 600 pixels tall, typically placed in the sidebar of a web page.
Slug
Part of a website URL that defines a webpage, typically a subpage, so the web address is easily identified by users and search engines.
Social Media
Websites and applications that encourage users to participate in content creation, sharing, and networking.
Spam
Sending messages, usually unsolicited, to a user repeatedly.
Spider
Bots used by search engines to crawl and index the world wide web.
Splash Page
A simple page that acts as a gateway into a website, typically to promote a particular message. The page generally contains a link to “Continue to Full Site.”
Sponsorship
In addition to placing ads on a site, a sponsorship will create additional content to promote a brand, product, or service in a positive manner. For example, a company can have its logo placed on all promotion materials for a charity event to receive more brand recognition surrounding the event.
SSL Certificate
A digital certificate that is offered in the form of a small data file inserted on the server-level to create a secure, encrypted connection to a website.
Stickiness
The average amount of time users will spend on a website over a period of time. The longer they stay, the “stickier” the website is.
Subpage
Also known as a sub-navigation page, these pages typically exist under a parent category or page on a website in a drop-down menu at the top of the site.
Super Affiliate
Contributes a much greater percentage to an affiliate merchant’s program activity than a regular affiliate.
Surround Session
Users are shown advertisements on every page of their site visit.
T
Tag
There are different types of tags, but they are generally a small snippet of JavaScript code that is placed on a website to track performance of a digital campaign, similar to tracking codes.
Target Audience
In digital marketing, your target audience is who you should aim your messaging to. It is the demographic and subset of people that are most likely to purchase your product or service, or support your business in other ways.
Technical SEO
Refers to tactics that are used on a website and server configuration level to increase search engine indexing and page rank metrics.
Testimonial
A positive review of a company, person, product, or service that is displayed on a website to show customer satisfaction. Sometimes testimonials are presented by famous people to increase brand authority.
Text Ad
An advertisement that uses text and hyperlinks instead of pictures.
Thank You Page
After a form or call-to-action has been successfully completed on a website, a thank you page can be generated to improve user experience, keep the user on the site, direct them to other information, and track and analyze campaign metrics.
Tiered Link Building
Created a tiered set of backlinks to your website to increase domain authority and thus page rank.
Time On Page
The amount of time a user spends on a particular page.
Title Tag
An HTML code that is inserted into a webpage and defines the title for that page. Title tags are important for optimizing a website for SEO, as they directly reflect what will be seen when a user receives that page as a search engine result.
TLD (Top Level Domain)
This is the short segment (e.g., .com, .org, .gov) that is entered after the last dot in a domain name. Different TLD’s may be used to distinguish different geographic regions, country codes, or other categories that are tied to the purpose of the website.
Top of Funnel Marketing
Also known as the awareness stage, the top of the marketing funnel refers to the first step in a buyer’s journey to discovering a product, service, or brand.
Tracking Code
A small snippet of code that is typically written in JavaScript and is inserted into a website or a particular page of a website to measure advertising campaign metrics or other web traffic analytics data as users visit that page or site.
Trick Banner
An intentionally deceptive banner advertisement that tries to click people into clicking it by disguising itself as an operating system message, an award, or something else.
Trust Flow
Metric that is used to measure how trustworthy a website is, based on the quality of the site and the authoritativeness of the site as users flow into the site from trusted sources.
U
UI
Also known as user interface, is every visual or physical component an end user may interact with on a technological device, an application, or a website.
Underdelivery
The underperformance of a digital campaign that usually results in having to change the parameters of the campaign to meet desired goals.
Unique Selling Proposition
The “why” behind your brand, product, or service that makes you stand out above your competitors.
Unique Visitors
The total number of actual people that visit your website over a period of time.
Unlinked Mentions
A mention of a particular brand or company on a web article or page without a link to that brand or company’s website.
Unnatural Link
Any link that is created to intentionally manipulate page rank within search engines can be flagged as unnatural.
URL
Also known as Uniform Resource Locator or web address, a URL is a specific location of a website or webpage that users can enter into a web browser.
URL Structure
What a particular URL looks like. A URL starts with the protocol (usually http, which is not secure, and https, which is secure), followed by your website’s domain (also known as the second-level domain), followed by the top-level domain (e.g., .com), followed by subdirectories where your content lives.
User-generated Content
Any form of content that originates and is uploaded by users within online platforms, such as social media, forums, wikis, etc.
UTM Tracking
UTM, or Urchin Tracking Module, is a simple code that can be appended to website URLs to measure the effectiveness of digital campaigns within analytics software like Google Analytics.
UX
Also known as user experience, is the set of emotions a user feels, as well as their perceptions, when interacting with a product, brand, or service.
V
Value Proposition
The value a business delivers to consumers; it tells your prospects why they should choose your product, brand, or service over your competitors.
Variable
In digital marketing, there are typically two different types of variables: independent variables and dependent variables. Independent variables are controlled by the marketer, whereas dependent variables are outcomes measured by the efficacy of independent variables.
Vertical Banner
A form of banner advertising that typically utilizes the vertical space of a left-hand or right-hand sidebar on a website to promote a product, brand, or service through image, video, or animation.
Video Marketing
Using videos to promote a product, brand, or service to web visitors.
View-through Conversion
A metric used in display or video ad campaigns, which tracks when a user views (but does not interact with) your ad, but later completes a conversion on your website.
Viewable Impression
Ads that are actually seen on a screen by a visitor. Since ads are positioned differently on different devices, the number of viewable impressions for the same web page on a desktop device may be different than on a mobile device, since some of the ads may be displayed below the fold on a tablet or smartphone.
Viral Marketing
A marketing strategy that primarily utilizes social media platforms to increase the visibility and demand of a particular product or service through increased likes and shares.
Visitors
Individual users that visit a website.
Visit
Also referred to as a session, a visit is a set of individual user interactions that take place on a website within a certain period of time. For example, a user can view multiple pages, fill out forms, or comment on a blog within a single visit.
Vlog
Shortened form of video blog, which is a type of blog where the primary medium is video.
W
Web 2.0
Refers to a state in web evolution in which websites are built with user interaction, collaboration, and user-generated content in mind. This contrasts with Web 1.0, where content was served in a more static fashion on websites were typically read-only.
Web Browser
A computer application used to connect to the internet and browse websites.
Web Crawler
A bot that is operated by search engines to automatically crawl the world wide web and index website data, organize it, and make it accessible to others.
Web Design
The act of creating the look-and-feel as well as the functionality of a website on various devices through a variety of tools and methods.
Web Directory
A list of websites on the world wide web, typically organized by human reviewers instead of computer algorithms.
Web Hosting
An internet service that provides web server space and tools to individuals in order to connect their website to the world wide web and make it accessible to others.
Web Page
A collection of content displayed to a user on a single page within a web browser, usually under a unique web address or URL. Multiple web pages typically exist under a specific domain name to create a website, but a website can also consist of a single web page.
Web Usability
The effectiveness of the presentation of content on a website or webpage, ultimately driving the ability of a user to accomplish their goal.
Webinar
A seminar hosted by a person or an organization that is attended virtually.
Website Traffic
The number of people that visit your website through various methods. There are many different types of website traffic or channels, but they can usually be broken down into five categories: Organic, Direct, Social, Paid, and Referral.
White Hat SEO
Google-approved SEO optimizations that follow search engine rules and guidelines, which ultimately creates meaningful content for humans and helps drive organic traffic to your website.
Whois
An internet protocol and public database containing information on registered domain names and website ownership.
Widgets
Small web components that can expand how a website functions. There are many different types of widgets, but typically they run third-party code that functions similarly to an iFrame, without changing the code structure of a website.
Wiki
Informational websites with content that is primarily written and driven by user contributions.
Wireframe
Used to visually understand how a particular webpage looks or will look in its simplest, structural form. This can be helpful for understanding how content is organized on all devices.
Word-of-Mouth Marketing
Both organic and promotional spread of traditional word-of-mouth in which a product or service is amplified based on customer satisfaction.
WordPress
The world’s most popular content management system (CMS) used today to build a variety of websites.
X
X-Robots-Tag
An HTTP response method that controls how different parts of a web page (e.g., certain file types) are indexed by search engines.
XML Sitemap
An XML file located on a website’s server (typically in the root directory) to provide data on all of the subpages of a website. This file helps search engines like Google more easily index a website and understand how it is structured.
Y
Yahoo!
A web services company that was most popular in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. The company still offers users an alternative search engine, email, news, and other content feeds.
Yahoo! SearchYoast
A technology company that is most notably known for their popular WordPress SEO plugin, Yoast SEO, that helps businesses optimize their website for organic traffic.
Z
Zero Position
Refers to information that is displayed in a featured snippet block at the top of a user’s search results page when searching for a question or definition in a search engine.
Zero-Click Searches
When an answer to a user’s search query is answered in a zero position block at the top of their search results, so they don’t have to click into any other search results unless they need more information (hence “zero-click”).
