Digital Marketing Lingo: 25 SEO Terms and Definitions You Should Know
What Is Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing refers to the various methods that an individual, group, or agency uses to promote their brand and reach a higher volume of potential customers. These techniques typically involve a digital medium, such as the Internet, search engine optimization, social media marketing, email marketing, mobile optimization, and content writing.
If you’re new to the digital marketing universe, you may find yourself overwhelmed with the sheer volume of digital marketing terms that are out there. Digital marketing strategies are constantly evolving and, as a result, so are digital marketing terms. That’s why we’ve created this comprehensive SEO glossary to help you dive into the marketing universe! Keep reading to learn about our top twenty-five SEO terms that every aspiring business owner or marketing agent should know.
Application Programming Interface (API)
An API, or application programming interface, is a network that allows SEO companies to create applications through the data of another system or application.
Algorithm
An algorithm is a formula that stores information, usually a set of rules, to be used and followed by a computer when needed.
Alternative Text
Alternative text, or alt text, is a short phrase in HTML code that digital marketing agencies use to describe an image. Alternative text is the text that will appear when an image is downloaded or when it isn’t loading on a designated website.
Anchor Text
Anchor text is the text that links to pages. On most search engines, this text is blue and underlined, or purple if it’s been visited before.
Backlink
A backlink, or an inbound link, is a link from a website that points to the client’s website.
Black Hat SEO
Black hat SEO is an illegal method used to rank websites on search engines. This practice increases a website’s backlinks while decreasing its domain authority because of the unreliable, low-quality websites from which the links are obtained. Google considers this SEO tactic to be deceptive, and a website caught using this method will suffer greatly in regard to rankings.
Blog
A blog is a section of a website where business-relevant content is posted regularly, often by SEO companies. Each blog post is a new page, and more pages mean more opportunities for internet visibility.
Bookmark
A bookmark is a link to a website that has been saved for reference in a browser or on a computer.
Bounce Rate
Bounce rate, as the name suggests, is the percentage of visits to a specific website that did not result in a subsequent action on that site.
Brand Awareness
Brand awareness refers to the level of awareness the average potential buyer has of a brand, product, or service. Brand awareness can be developed using various marketing techniques, the most popular of which is social media marketing. This process is crucial when it comes to digital marketing and product development. Without brand awareness, consumers won’t feel compelled to purchase a product or remain loyal to a certain company over another.
Browser
A browser, such as Chrome, Edge, or Firefox, is software that allows an individual to access information on the internet.
Cascading Style Sheet (CSS)
A cascading style sheet, or CSS, is a website’s code that contributes to the way it looks, including aspects such as fonts, sizes, and colors.
Click-Through Rate (CTR)
A click-through rate is the ratio of impressions to clicks on a URL.
Conversion Rate
Conversion rate is the ratio of website visits to conversions. (A conversion is when a user buys a product or service.)
Cost Per Thousand (CPM)
CPM, also known as cost per mille or cost per thousand, refers to the price of a thousand impressions on a given advertisement. But what’s an impression? An impression occurs when a user sees an advertisement – either on social media, a search engine, or another platform. CPM is used to keep track of website advertisement effectiveness and manage digital marketing campaigns and budgets.
Crawling
Crawling is the process by which Google, Bing, or another search engine reads and discovers a page.
Direct Traffic
Google Analytics defines direct traffic as any website visitors that reach your website directly, without using a source such as Google, Bing, or a redirect link from another site. Typically, direct traffic visits include users who type a URL directly into the search bar, users who click on a link using a digital bookmark, and users who click on a link sent to them through email or text.
Domain
A domain is the main address of a site, such as www.website.com.
Engagement
Engagement is data that allows SEO companies to see how internet searches may be interacting with a certain site based on search results.
Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)
Hypertext markup language, more commonly referred to as HTML, is one of the languages SEO companies use to create websites.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Digital marketing KPIs are specific values used to monitor marketing campaign success. KPIs are a crucial element when it comes to tracking digital marketing campaigns and strategies. KPIs often vary across categories, such as social media, Google advertisements, content writing, email marketing, and more. KPIs can help digital marketing agents collect data and forecast the performance of a certain client or website.
Keyword Stuffing
Keyword stuffing is when a content writer purposely stuffs an article or webpage with keywords, relevant or not, in order to improve that page’s or article’s rankings on a search engine. Keyword stuffing is regarded as a form of manipulation by most search engines, and SEO rankings will be punished if a website appears to be keyword stuffing.
Long-Tail Keywords
Long-tail keywords are keyword phrases with more specific intentions and a lower monthly search volume. Long-tail keyword search queries are often used by website visitors who know exactly what kind of product or service they want rather than website visitors who are simply browsing. Long-tail keywords are advantageous to digital marketing agents because they are less competitive and have a lower keyword difficulty. When doing keyword research, marketing agents should strive for a balance between long-tail and short-tail keywords.
Page Speed
Page speed refers to approximately how fast a website is loaded. Page speed differs depending on the device used and is very important for rankings on both mobile and desktop devices.
Return on Investment (ROI)
Return on investment, or ROI, is a tool for measuring SEO results. ROI is equivalent to the amount of profit that can be generated from organic search divided by the cost invested in it and multiplied by one hundred.
Search Engine Results Page (SERP)
A search engine results page is the page that a search engine displays when a user makes a query. Search engine results pages generally consist of ten organic search results, which are ranked based on keyword relevance. In some cases, other search functions are displayed on SERPs, including images, ratings, carousels, lists, videos, and paragraphs.
Title Tags
Title tags are HTML code tags or metatags which provide the title for web pages. Title tags are the blue hyperlinked lines of text that appear on a search engine results page. Typically, a website’s title tag includes a potential search term used in a search query and should contain keywords that match the webpage’s keywords. Title tags should be engaging and succinct, ranging from 50 to 60 characters long.
