SEO Marketing Hub

+ SEO Terms: 0 – 9

301 Redirect:

A 301 redirect is a way of pointing an old URL to a new one on a permenant basis, the redirect isn't visible to users but it signals to search engines that the move is permenant and to update their index

302 Redirect:

302s are often used to create temporary redirects and is not immediately visible to web visitors as users are often redirected to the intended page at a different URL. 302 redirects are a little vague and 307 redirects are preferred as it states precisely that the requested URL has been moved to a temporary location and will be back in a while. Use this redirect if you’re sure the move is temporary and you’ll still need the original URL later on.

307 Redirect:

307 redirects are an updated 302 redirect. They are more specific in saying the redirect is temporary and the original URL will be used again.

404 Error:

This error indicates hat the wrong URL has been entered, the page has been mover or removed. This error is client side and is visible so It's now common practice to make custom 404 Pages to offer web visitors an alternative URL to go.

+ SEO Terms: A

ALT Text/Tag or Attribute:

A description of images that is only added to the HTML code of a webpage, this text is read by search engines not humans. Alt text ads to the relevance of your page, as much as search engines look for keywords in the copy on a page, they look for relevant keywords in the description of images on the page.

Anchor Text:

Linked text. The actual text shown on a link to a web page. By default, this text is usually dark blue and underlined and purple once clicked, however many sites choose to design theres differently; in most cases the underline is still used to indicate a link. Anchor text indicated to search engines what the destination page is about so should contain a relevant keyword to the content that will be viewed once clicked through.

Affiliate Link:

A link to another website that markets there product or service, the site referring the traffic usually receives a fee or commision based on actions taken by users who click through.

Algorithm:

Sometimes shortened to just 'algo'. This is a program used by search engines to determine mathematically based on a range of factors (e.g. location of search or device used) what pages to rank in a SERP for any given search query.

+ SEO Terms: B

Baidu:

The most popular search engine in China.

"Black Box:"

A complex computer program that is difficult to understand due to it's confidential nature and vagueness of inner working. While the inputs and outputs can be measured and analysed, there is no access to the internal processes. Google’s algorithm is a black box.

Blog:

Section of your website that is regularly updated with new posts and content which take the form of new pages. These usually follow the same template but will typically include new updates, industry insights and content relevant to this. For most websites this is the section of the domain that provides the most ranking/SEO potential. You should avoid hosting your blog on a seperate domain.

Bookmark:

A link to a website saved for later reference in your web browser or computer. Social bookmarking sites, E.g. Delicious.com let users share websites they like with each other. These social bookmarks signal to search engines that your site is of interest to people which helps with overall search ranking.

Backlink:

A link from another website or page into a page.

Backlink Analysis:

An examination of all links to website or page to evaluate the quality and authority of these links and the way in which they effect the performance of the website or page.

Backlink Profile:

Also known as a backlink profile. This is a technical way of describing all the links to a particular website or page.

Black Hat SEO:

This comprises of SEO techniques that do not conform to best practices. These techniques place an emphasis on going to extrememe lengths to game the system and manipulate SERPs.

Bounce Rate:

Percentage of users who land on a particular page of a website and leave the website without viewing any other pages.

Breadcrumbs:

A websites internal navigation, usually visible on the horizontal menu bar abova main content. It helps users know where they are on a website in relationtion to where they have been and the websites hierachy.

Broken Link:

Any link that leads to a 404 Error page.

+ SEO Terms: C

Citation Flow:

The number used by Majestic to predict how influential a webpage might be based on how many sites are linking to it. This degree to which the website is influential directly relates to it's performance in ranking in search engines.

Canonical URL:

A canonical URL is a means by which you show search engines which URL can be considered the best URL or orginator of a piece of content. This is used in cases of duplicate content or content that can be reached via multilple URL's.

Conversion Form:

A form through which you collect information about your site visitor. Conversion forms convert traffic into leads. These are usually attached to the bottom of content or require filling in before gaining access to content.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets):

A coding language used to define how elements on a web page should looks taking basic HTML buidling blocks and improving the aesthetics for the user.

Cloaking:

This black hat technique comprises of providing different content to search engine spiders, than is delivered to human users.

CMS (Content Management System):

Platforms that help with the creation and modification of digital content and entire websites. A popular example would be Wordpress. CMS's allow webmasters to manage there websites with little to no coding skills as they manage the technical aspects in the background.

Crawl Budget:

This is based on Crawl Demand and Crawl Rate. Based on this search engines can determine how often they can crawl your site and how many pages in any given period of time. (See Crawl Demand & Crawl Rate)

Crawl Demand:

Crawl demand is how much Google wants to crawl your pages based on how popular your pages are and how fresh the content on the site in relation to it's index.

Crawl Rate:

How often google crawls the pages of your site. This is capped at a limit that won't negatively effect your web servers.

+ SEO Terms: D

Dead-End Page:

A webpage that links to no other webpages making it a dead-end for crawlers as there is no place for them to move on to.

Deep Link:

Any link pointing to any page on your site that is not the homepage.

Directory:

A web directory or link directory is an online list or catalog of websites. It's a popular SEO tactic to increase the number of inbound links by submitting your site to many web directories. The most popular web directories are Yahoo! Directory and Dmoz which is used by Google.

Domain:

The main web address of your site that is used to identify one or more IP addresses in a URL. E.g. www.weareleanmarketing.com the domain name is weareleanmarketing.com. It's a good idea to purchase your domain and register as soon as possible when setting up your business, as the age of a domain does factor in ranking.

Domain Authority:

A metric used by Moz to estimate a websites potential to rank well.

Duplicate Content:

Copies of the same content in two seperate URL's. This could be an entire web page or a significant amount of it.

+ SEO Terms: F

Featured Snippet:

Also known as position zero, Google programmatically determines that a page contains a likely answer to a user's question and this is displayed as a snippet, a box at the top of google search results that contains a summary in response to a question. It also displays the date of publication, the page title and a link to the web page where the answer originated.

The Fold:

(Also above the Scroll) Web design term that refers to the area of any webpafe that is visible without scrolling. This varies with screen sized so there is no specific cut-off. Search engines do prioritise content that is above the fold when determining relevance to search terrms and in contrast having too many ads before the fold can negatively impact a webpage in ranking for any particular search term.

+ SEO Terms: G

Google Search Console:

Google’s Search Console Is a free service offered to web masters which gives the ability to monitor sites for indexing errors, site speed and allows you to optimise the visibility of your pages.

Gray Hat:

Techniques used by SEO specialists that follow the Google webmaster guidelines to some degree but to bend the rules slightly in order to perform well.

GYM:

This simply stands for the big three search engines. Google, Yahoo and Microsoft (Meaning Bing)

Guest Blogging:

Also known called guest posting is a link building tactic that involves creating content for other websites with good authority and relevance in exchange for a backlink pointing back to your website.

+ SEO Terms: H

Headings:

Text on your website that is placed inside of a heading tag, such as an H1 or H2. As a General rune the number of the heading tag denotes it's importance with H1 being most important.

Head Term:

A common and frequently searched query that typically contains less than two words. These search queries have high volume and are often difficult to rank for. They can be seen as short-tail and are more generic.

HTML:

Hypertext Markup Language is the standard markup language for creating web pages and web applications, it's the building blocks and spine of all web pages. Search engines read this HTML so it's important that it's as clean as possible so search engine crawlers return ofren, index your pages and rank them well.

Hub:

A hub is an expert trusted page, it contains quality for users and links to relevant and related pages.

Hummingbird:

A complete overhaul of Googles core algorithm that took place in August 2013.

+ SEO Terms: I

Inbound Link:

A link from an external site to your website.

Internal Link:

Links on your site that lead to other pages on your site and not external URL's.

Indexed Pages:

Pages on your website that have been crawled and stored by search engines; this is essential in order for a page to rank.

Indexability:

This relates to how easy readable a particular page is for search engines when adding pages to their index. Indexibility determines on the degree to which a search engine can understand a pages content and relevance.

+ SEO Terms: J

Javascript:

Alongside HTML and CSS, JavaScript is one of the three core coding languages used on practicallt all websites. Javascript allows web developers and designers to apply various effects or changes to the content of a website. Search engines have often had difficulty reading content that is inside of Javascript, but this is improving,

+ SEO Terms: K

Keyword:

A search query entered into a search engine.

Keyword Density:

The amount to which a particular keyword is present in the copy of a page. As a general rule of thumb you wouldn't want this to be more than one or two times in each standard length paragraph as this verges on keyword stuffing. (See keyword stuffing.)

Keyword Canibalisation:

When a single website unintentionally targets the same keyword across multiple posts or pages; this excessive reuse of the same keyword on muliple pages of a website makes it difficult for search engines, and at times users, to determine which page is most relevant to a keyword.

Keyword Research:

Keyword research is the process by which you research popular search queries people type into search engines, this can include finding similar queries to those you have already discovered, and identifying the volume of each query or group of queries. This can be done with both SEO and search engine marketing in mind, wth the latter, the predicted cost of each query comes into play.

Keyword Stuffing:

The practice of attempting to manipulate search engine rankings by overloading copy on your page with a particular keyword to the extent that it is not natural and often the text doesn't read well. These keywords can appear in a list also.

+ SEO Terms: L

Link Building:

The process of intentionally gaining more inbound links to your website in order to impreove your search rankings.

Link Sculpting:

The deliberate use of internal links to direct domain authority and any ranking benefits to the pages you want it to go.

Long Tail Keyword:

An uncommon or infrequently searched query, typically more than two words in the search query. These keywords tend to have lower difficulty and lower search volume but in contrast tend to be more qualified searches.

Landing Page:

The page shown to visitors when they click through on any SERP or first land on your website through a URL.

Latent Semantic Indexing:

An indexing and retrieval method that uses a mathematical technique to identify patterns and relationships on web pages of commonly associated groups of words. This allows search engines to base a web pages relevance to a search based on not only an exact keywords presence, but the relevance of associated words and groups of words.

+ SEO Terms: M

Manual Action:

These are carried out by people and not the google algorithm, pages or websites are effecively demoted or removed as a whole from Google indexes as a penalty for not complying with the Google webmaster guidelines.

Metadata:

An umbrella term that refers to a range of meta tags that provides search engines with information about your website, including what it's about. e.g. Meta Description

Meta Description:

HTML tags that provide a brief summary of what a particular page is about. Search engines often display the meta description in SERPs under the clickable header. These tags are fewer than 160 characters and if ot specified, search endines will often use the first 160 characters of the page.

Meta Keywords:

These tags were used by search engines in the 90s and early 00s to help determine what a web page was about. Meta Keyword Tags were a way to list what a particular page was about and therefore should rank for. The meta keywords tag is no longer used by any major search engines.

+ SEO Terms: N

Nofollow:

Nofollow is a value that can be assigned to a hyperlink. It's a way to signal to search engines that though you're linking to another URL, you do not wish to pass any SEO authority to it. This is a way to link to necessary sites, without endorsing them.

NoIndex:

A value that can be asigned within the 'Head' section of a webpage or within the code of a hyperlink. It signals to search engines that the page or link should not be indexed.

+ SEO Terms: O

Off-Page SEO:

Is a technique that takes place outside of your website, it involves using other websites and platforms to optimise and improve the ranking of your website. Techniques that could be seen as off-page SEO would be those such as link building, social media marketing, influencer marketing and off-page content marketing.

On-Page SEO:

On page SEO consists of optimising and improving aspects of your website in order to make it perform and rank better on search engines. These apects of your site can be anything from the HTML source code to the visible content on screen.

Organic Traffic:

Refers to the visitors that land on your website as a result of organic traffic. Organic in this case meaning not paid for directly e.g. Google Ads

Organic Link:

Links that are published by webmasters based on there merit alone and not by link building activity. This is usually done based on relevance to a topic or added value to content on page. This is a cornerstone of White Hat SEO.

Orphan Page:

A page on your website that is no linked to by any other pages on your website.

+ SEO Terms: P

Page Speed:

Page speed is simply the amount of time it takes for a page on your website to load up completely.

Paid Traffic:

Refers to the visitors that land on your website as a result of paid traffic. Paid meaning visitors who have been acquired by paying. This could be through anything from social media marketing, serach engine ads or even youtube Ads.

Page Title:

The name you give your web page, which is seen at the top your browser window. Page titles should contain keywords related to your business. Words at the beginning of your page title are more highly weighted than words at the end.

PageRank:

A number from 0-10, assigned by Search engines. This rank indicates how well your sites overall SEO performance is in comparison to others ranking for that particular search.

Panda:

A series of updates released by Google in February 2011 to its search engine ranking algorithm. These updates were intended to discourage people who create large amounts of poor content in an attempt to rank for lots of keywords without adding much value for actual users. Panda is updated from time-to-time in order to prevent poor quality content from gaming the system and gaining top rankings.

PBN (Private Blog Network):

Also known as a link farm. This is a group of websites that all link to each other, usually owned by the same company. Ther purpose of this is usually to create enough authority to be able to point links at a chosen website in order to directly increase it's ranking and authority.

PPC:

Pay Per Click, this is a means of marketing where advertisers pay for each click they receive.

+ SEO Terms: R

Ranking Factor:

Criteria applied by search engines when evaluating web pages and determening where to rank a a page. An example ranking factor would be the number of inbound links to a page or the Heading 1 Tags on a page.

Regional Long Tail Keyword:

Essentially the same as long tail with the key difference being that a region, city or geographic location is included. This is particularly useful for small businesses with limited reach. (See Long Tail)

RSS Feed:

RSS stands for 'really simple syndication.' It is a subscription based way to get updates on new content from a web site. You can set up an RSS feed for your website or blog to help your followers stay updated when you release new content.

Robots.txt :

A document used by websites that indicates to search engines which areas and pages of the website should be crawled and indexed.

+ SEO Terms: S

Sandbox:

The Google Sandbox is an alleged filter placed on new websites that prevents sites from ranking well for a set period of time. Details on the sandbox mechanism are vague but there are tools that allow you to check if your website is sandboxed.

Scraping:

Copying content from a site. This is usually done via automated bots and tools that make use of them.

SEM:

Search engine marketing, usually shortened to Search Marketing. Describes all forms of web marketing with the goal of increasing visibility and ranking in search engines. While SEO is a part of SEM, paid methods such as PPC also fall under the umbrella of search engine marketing.

SERP:

Search Engine Results Page. The page displayed after you enter a query in a search engine. Typically this has 10 organic results on it and a number of paid results, but this may vary depending on the query, search engine and device being used to search.

Search Volume:

Simply the quantity of searches made per month for any particular keyword.

Sitemap:

A map of your website showing all the pages on a website. This makes it easier for a search engines to index the pages on your website.

The Scroll:

Web design term. See 'above 'The Fold'

SSL Certificate:

Secure Socket Layer. This is a web-wide cryptographic protocol that provides identity authentication and ensures information is encrypted and sent via a secure channel from the web browser to the web server. SSL has been depricated and TSL has taken it's place, however this is often still referred to as SSL. (See TSL)

Spider Trap:

Also called a Crawler trap. This is an infinite loop of links intentionally created to waste the resources of unfriendly spider bots, in some cases this can even crash the program. These unfriendly bots ignore the robots.txt file that let friendly spiders such as Google's know to avoid it.

+ SEO Terms: T

Taxonomy:

Classification of a website into categories to maximise the findability of the content available, helping users to find there way around.

Time on Page:

The amount of time that a user spends on one page before clicking off. This is used by search engines to determine the relevance and quality of page to a search as it indicates the visitors interest.

Title Tag:

The title of a page on your website, which is enclosed in a HTML 'Title' tag. It appears in search engine results as the clickable headline for that particular page and on the tab in web browsers when they are on that page. Title tags should be an accurate and concise description of the page's content.

Top-Level Domain (TLD):

Top level domain, e.g. .com or .org. TLD's are the highest level of the hierachy of domain name systems on the internet.

Traffic Rank:

The ranking of how much organic traffic your site gets in comparison to all other sites on the internet. You can use this to compare your organic performance against your competitors for benchmarking purposes.

Trust Flow:

This is a metric used by Majestic to determine the reliability and confidence that can be placed on a URL based on the degrees of seperation via links from the most trusted websites on the internet. The idea being that trusted websites only link to other trusted sites, and so on. A number between 0 - 100 is placed on this with 100 being the most trusted. As an example, google.com has a trust flow of 99.

TSL:

Transport Layer Security. Taken the place of SSL since it's deprication, the minor difference is that TLS uses a stronger encryption algorithm and can work on multiple ports. (See SSL)

+ SEO Terms: U

URL:

Uniform Resource Locator. The web address of a page on your site e.g. www.yoursite.com/blog

Usability:

The ease and learnability a webpage has for people who are using it and the context in which they will be using it. This is based on things from the websites design to any disability enhancements added.

User Generated Content (UGC):

Any type of content, such as images, videos, text and audio, that has been created/posted by users on online platforms. Social media platforms and websites such as Wikipedia rely on this content.

User Experience (UX):

User Experience, refers to the senses and reactions users are left with after interacting with your website or brand.

+ SEO Terms: V

Vertical Search:

Similar to a regular search engine however vertical search engines are focused on one specific segment of online content. The segment, or vertical, could be based on a topic, media type or genre. Example's of this would be Youtube for videos, or Kayak for travel.

Visibility:

What percentage of all possible organic clicks and impressions based can your website get in search engines based on search position for any specific keyword.

Virtual Assistant:

Artificial intelligence platforms that uses natural language processing to perform tasks like web searches. Cortana and Siri are examples of this.

Voice Search:

Also called voice-enabled search lets users speak to a device to deliver commands to search or search queries.

+ SEO Terms: W

Web Crawler:

Is a bot that systematically searches the web. These are used by search engines in order to index the pages of your site, but also by a number of SEO tools e.g. Screaming Frog or Deep Crawl

Web Spider:

Better known as a web crawler. Is a bot that systematically searches the web. (See Web Crawler)

Web Copy:

Or just Copy. This is the visible text on a web page that can be read by visitors.

Web 2.0:

Websites that activly enourage user interaction and user-generated content.

White Hat SEO:

This comprises of SEO techniques that are conform to best practices without placing an emphasis on going to extrememe lengths to game the system and manipulate SERPs.

Widget:

An element of interaction used on web pages to provide enhanced functionality, these elements are given to other websites and usually have a link within them, meaning they're an easy way to garner lots of links, this is however this is against Google's webmaster guidelines.

+ SEO Terms: Y

Yandex:

The most popular search engine in Russia.