SEO Terms

Search Engine

Web programs that spider and index websites and online documents. Popular web search engines include Google, Bing and Yahoo!

Keyword

A term or phrase searched by web users.

Citations

An online reference to a business’ name, address and phone number.

NAP

An acronym for a company’s Name, Address and Phone Number.

Local Algorithm

Google’s algorithm that displays results for local businesses.

Local Ecosystem

The collection of online directories, reviews websites and local websites that affect Local SEO.

SERP

Search Engine Results Page. The search engine page that lists all the sites relevant to your search query.

Search Verticals

Refers to the different types of Google search results. Commonly includes video, ads, images and maps.

Spider

A program that searches the internet for websites and other pieces of content to index. It is called a spider because it “crawls” through websites as it looks for information.

Local SEO

The process of optimizing a website to display for location-based quieries.

Universal Search

A search that pulls information from multiple databases to display on the same page. This means that not only are websites displayed on an SERP, but videos, news results, images, etc. are displayed as well.

Indexing

The process of collecting and storing information in a search engines’ database.

Video SEO

The process of optimizing video content for search engines. It typically includes optimizing the video content, load times, selecting a hosting provider or server, optimizing the associated titles and meta data and finally optimizing the page the video is located on.

Pay-Per-Click Google Advertising Terms

Ad group

A group of ads with common themes and keywords, all within the same Adword campaign.

Cost Per View (CPV)

Where advertisers pay for each unique view of an ad. A unique view can be in the form of pop-ups, pop-unders or video ads.

Campaign

Within Google Adwords, a campaign is what determines the daily budget, language, geographic coverage, and specific networks where ads under the campaign will be displayed on.

Click Through Rate (CTR)

The number of times people click on an ad in relation to the number of times people see an ad on Google. The higher this percentage is, the more efficient a campaign is. This is most often effected by the specific keywords within the ad headline & body.

Cost Per Click (CPC)

The amount of money charged to an account for each individual ad click. The advertiser is able to set a maximum CPC to remain within budget.

AdRank

A ranking determined by keywords, cost per click bid, and an ad’s Quality Score.

Display Network

A collection of websites and blogs, such as YouTube, that partner with Google to display Adword advertising.

Remarketing

An online targeting technique that allows advertisers to specifically retarget people who have already visited a specific page.

Quality Score

Google’s algorithm that rates the landing page of each ad for its relevancy in relation to the specified keyword on a scale of 1 – 10 (1 being the lowest and 10 being the highest). This is determined by a company’s bid on a keyword, as well as the relevance of the keyword to the ad and subsequent landing page. The higher the QC score, the higher the ad will most likely be placed.

Negative Keywords

A way to refine a keyword strategy where Google allows advertisers to avoid having their ad displayed when certain terms are entered in a search query in conjunction with their keywords. (i.e. “free”, “cheap”, “inexpensive”)

Placements

The websites that your ad will appear on. Placements are only available on Google’s display network and typically represent specific blogs or websites that have opted in to the service.

Search Network

A network of search engines, in addition to Google, that an advertiser can opt-in to have an ad displayed.