You Need This Awesome Marketing Glossary In Your Life
Okay, so you might not need this glossary to live but you certainly need this glossary for your staff and your clients. Why? Because it quickly but aptly describes the various words used within our wonderful marketing world. We’ve compiled as many terms as we could physically think of and gave each a short description to help our clients and new members of staff understand our world a little better. This is a more in depth and more up to date version of our previous blog post “The A – Z Of Digital Marketing” and unlike your usual glossary isn’t in alphabetical order (sorry).
I have split these terms off into 4 sections: SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), PPC (Pay Per Click), SMM (Social Media Marketing) and Web Design/Development. Please be warned that these are descriptions only and they in no way tell you how to implement them. For more guidance on how to implement work you can refer to other posts within our blog, if you can’t find anything then don’t hesitate to get in touch!
SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
This is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s unpaid results – often referred to as “natural,” “organic,” or “earned” results, or traffic.
On Page Optimisation
In search engine optimization, on-page optimization refers to factors that have an effect on your website or web page listing in natural search results. These factors are controlled by you, or by coding on your page. Examples of on-page optimization include actual HTML code, meta tags, keyword placement, images and keyword density.
Title Tag
Title tags are often used on search engine results pages (SERPs) to display preview snippets for a given page, and are important both for SEO and social sharing. The title element of a web page is meant to be an accurate and concise description of a page’s content. This is the first line in a Google search result (which is blue in colour) and should be 60-65 characters long.
Meta Description
Meta descriptions are HTML attributes that provide concise explanations of the contents of web pages. Meta descriptions are commonly used to display preview snippets for a given page. This is the 3rd section in a Google search result (which is grey in colour) and should be up to 160 characters long.
Page Text/Content
Page text is all text that can be found on any a page of a website. Content, is another word for text. You can find page text on physical pages of a website, and content in the blog of a website. All pages of your website (including your blog) should ideally have around 400-500 words of text, explaining you and your business etc.
Keywords
Keywords are terms (or key phrases) used in search engine results. Your keywords need to reflect your business, so if you are a florist based in Colchester you will want to rank for the keyword (or search term) “Colchester Florist”.
Keyword Density
This is the frequency in which keywords are used within a block of text on your website. Your keyword density should ideally be no more than 1.5% for any keyword (as repeating keywords too often can harm your website).
Keyword Research
This is when we use Google’s Keyword Planner to research the kinds of keywords that you should be using on your website for your business. This research is important as it tells us exactly how many people are searching for specific terms every month.
Duplicate Content
This is when your page text or content has been duplicated somewhere else on the web (including social media). Your content needs to be 100% unique to you, as duplicate content issues can cause a website to be penalized.
Header Tags
This is when you create tags within your CMS (content management system) for headings, instead of making it bold. Header tags come in numbers, from H1 to H6. The lower the number, the larger the heading becomes. A header tag looks like this – <h1>Hello</h1>.
Photo Created Using Canva
Cross Linking
This is when you link to other pages on your own website within your page text. So, for example, on your homepage you may decide to link to your service pages. This is encouraged as it builds page strength.
Outbound Links
This is when you link to websites other than your own. We would encourage you to add in various outbound links to trusted websites. One way this can be done is to link to brands you stock or awards you have won, resources etc.
Image Optimisation/ALT Text
All images on your website, no matter where they are placed need to be optimized for the web. All pages of your website should have 1 relevant image with appropriate ALT text. ALT text is the description given to your image within your CMS. The text needs to perfectly describe the image, using keywords whenever appropriate.
Content Management System
This is the system used to showcase the content on your website. From this you will be able to edit and create text and also various pages. The most commonly used content management systems are WordPress, Joomla and Wix.
Page Load Speed
This is the speed in which your website loads for any visitor. The speed is determined by various factors as listed by Google PageSpeed Insights. The faster your website, the better your score and the more customer friendly it is. Loss of page speed can result in loss of sales and engagement.
Homepage Visibility
This is a test of how many URLs your website is visible. Google see’s different URLs as different websites, so this can cause duplicate content issues. Your website should only be visible from 1 URL, most commonly laid out as such – http://www.example.com/. You can test your homepage visibility by searching with the following URL structures:
If your homepage is seen in more than one of these, you will need to ask your web developer to redirect them all to one single URL.
Sitemaps
A sitemap is a list of all of the pages you have on your website. All websites need a sitemap, to submit to Google Webmaster tools. This allows Google to crawl your website and notify you of any errors or changes to those pages.
Google PageRank
This is the rank given to you by Google. This is determined by numerous factors, such as your on page optimisation, social media etc. The rank is between 0 and 10, the higher your pagerank the more trusted your website is.
Traffic
This is a general term used for customers, or potential customers. Human traffic, as it were. When we say “the potential traffic is huge”, what we mean is “there is a potential for a lot of people to visit your website”.
Outreach
This is a term we use to describe the art of contacting people for marketing purposes. We are reaching out either to gain a link back to your website or we are reaching out to share creative content (such as an infographic).
Infographics
These are visual based informational images that help to gain links back to your website through outreach. We create infographics to help drive traffic to your website. If the infographic is topical and informational, people will want to read it.
Guest Posting
This is the act of posting content to someone else’s website as a “guest”. Google sees this as spam, as many of these articles are paid for (which is against Google Guidelines). Websites that use the term “guest posting” should be avoided.
Local Listings/Local Search
This is when we specifically target an audience within your area by creating a local listing with Google. To do this we create a My Business account for your company, so you are included in search results within your area.
Link Building
This is another term which is slightly frowned upon by Google. Link building is when you post/gain many many links to try and improve brand awareness. It’s seen as a quick way to get results, but is not good for a long term marketing solution.
Link Audit/Detox
This is where we sit down and exavulate all of the links that link back to your website, removing those that could be harming your website. This is something that could take anything from minutes to days, depending on how many people link back to your website.
Link Disavow
This is when we use the Google Disavow tool to tell Google to ignore specific backlinks or pages when crawling your website.
Affiliate Marketing
This is when your business is affiliated with another company or service. This is done for advertising purposes, so that you can reach a wider audience.
Google Search Algorithm
This is simply a set of criteria, or rules, used to rank websites is search results.
Backlinks
These are links back to your website from other websites.
Citations
When a website mentions you and your brand without linking to your website.
Spiders/Bots
These are what crawl your website, indexing your website and making sure it is compliant with Google Guidelines.
PPC
Pay Per Click (PPC)
This is when we use Google Adwords to create adverts that appear in Google search results for specific keywords. It’s an effective way of marketing your business without needing an overly large budget.
Conversion Optimisation
In internet marketing, conversion optimization, or conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the method of creating an experience for a website or landing page visitor with the goal of increasing the percentage of visitors that convert into customers. So conversions are those that visit your website and then convert into a sale.
Remarketing Adverts
These are image adverts created to be remarketed at those who have already visited your website. The images appear on various other websites within advertising space and the aim is to get people to come back to your website.
Ad Groups
These are the groups made for the keywords you wish to target for your adverts. Your groups should ideally group similar keywords together, such as ones that share a key phrase.
Impressions/Clicks
Impressions are the amount of people who have seen your advert and clicks are those that have clicked your advert to reach your website.
Click Through Rate (CTR)
This is the percentage of people who clicked your advert after seeing it. This is based on your impressions versus your clicks.
Average Cost Per Click (CPC)
This is your average spend per click through to your website. This does not necessarily mean that they have become a sale, simply that they have clicked your advert.
Average Position
This is the position in which your adverts all appear. You need your advert to ideally be ranking between positions 2 and 3, as 1st place adverts tend to be ignored.
Conversion Rate
This is the percentage of people that clicked and turned into a sale. This is based on the clicks versus the conversions.
Bid Prices
These are bids for certain keywords. You are battling with the everyone for the right to rank for that specific keyword, so you need to adjust your bid prices to make sure that you’re paying enough to rank, but not too much.
SMM
Social Media Marketing (SMM)
Using social media networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+ to market yourself to your target audiences.
Social Networks
These are websites in which there is a wide audience made up of the general public. They are networks of people all over the world, some with publicly viewable profiles.
Social Sharing/Social Shares
Social Sharing is sharing relevant content or news/updates to various social media channels. Social shares are counted when somebody shares something of yours via their social media networks.
Social Signals
These are an offsite SEO measurement that can determine the popularity of a brand/company based on how much they have been shared and discussed on social networks.
Social Media Advertising
This is paid advertising using tools within the social networks themselves. With these you are able to target specific audiences with good results.
Hashtags
These are tags within text that help to aim content or links at a specific audience. You can hashtag a word or phrase by adding a # and removing all spaces.
Social Scheduling
This is where we use a social scheduling tool to schedule your social media posts in advance. This allows us to create up to 1 month’s worth of content that automatically posts to your social networks.
Viral Content
This is media that has become so popular it is considered “viral”. This kind of content is great to share, especially at the time of posting.
Web Design/Development
Web Design
Web design encompasses many different skills and disciplines in the production and maintenance of websites. The different areas of web design include web graphic design; interface design; authoring, including standardised code and proprietary software; user experience design; and search engine optimization.
Web Development
Web development is the coding or programming that enables website functionality, per the owner’s requirements. It mainly deals with the non-design aspect of building websites, which includes coding and writing markup.
404 Error
This is a website error that appears when a web page has been moved or deleted.
301 Redirect
This is when you permanently redirect one URL to another.
302 Redirect
This is when you want to temporarily redirect one URL to another.
Above/Below The Fold
Above = The area of the website that can be seen by the user before scrolling down. Below = The area of the website not visible until scrolling down.
Analytics
Using Google Analytics we can collect data of a website to help us have a better understanding of your website and how it performs.
Captcha
A challenge/response test to prove to a website that you are a human and are not spam. You usually have to type in a word or set of numbers.
CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)
A website language used to apply certain styles to web elements such as the font size, colour, background and alignment.
Cookies
These are text files that are used in web browsers and websites to store data such as login sessions and details or tracking activity.
Hosting
This is a space on the web that you effectively rent for your website. Much like how you would rent a flat. This is where your website lives and is run from. Hosting can either be shared or dedicated.
Domain Name
This is effectively the homepage URL of your website. This is the name you register when buying your website.
Ecommerce
The buying or selling of physical goods online.
HTML/PHP
These are super intelligent programming languages, or code, used to create and build websites.
Landing Page
This is the page you wish for your user to land on when they first arrive at your website. This is usually the homepage and has clear calls to action.
Plugins
These are files or bit of code that can be installed to add different functionality to your website or CMS (content management system).
Responsive/Adaptive Web Design
There are 2 kinds of responsive web design, adaptive and responsive. Adaptive designs are when a website has set layouts for certain devices (such as mobiles and tablets), whereas responsive designs respond to the size of the screen (even when moving) and changes accordingly.
Usability
This is a measure of how usable your website is to visitors, something which is tested regularly to make visits to the website easier and more enjoyable.
Webmaster
This is the owner of the website (so whoever bought the domain name and is in charge).
So that’s it! I hope you found this not so alphabetically ordered glossary helpful, in the meantime stay tuned for more marketing related blog posts from us here at Surge.
Feature image credit: Horia Varian via Flickr
If you enjoyed this blog post then perhaps you’d like to read “How To Make Content For A Mobile Orientated Audience“?