The SEO industry – just like any other industry in the online or offline world – has it’s own jargon. If you want to be efficient, you need to know and to understand these terms and concepts. Here is a small collection with the most important terms you should know.

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301 redirect; HTTP status code used to tell search engines that a web page has permanently moved to another URL; will force the visitor to automatically jump to a new specified URL which might be on the same site or on a different one

302 redirect; unlike 301 redirect, the 302 redirect is used for pages that have been moved temporarily

404 (or “page not found” error); HTTP status code used when the server couldn’t find the web page requested by the browser

A

A/B testing (or split testing); useful method to test, analyze and compare the conversion rates obtained with two different graphical, structural, etc versions of the same offer (e. g. testing two different marketing copies or two different email templates)

above the fold; the upper section of a web page which is completely visible without scrolling

affiliate link; a special URL provided by the advertiser and associated with a given affiliate; contains a unique tracking code that can register and measure the performance of the given affiliate

affiliate network; an external third party who basically works as an intermediary between advertisers and publishers, providing the necessary technical platform and complete packages of management services for both sides

affiliate program; a performance-oriented partnership between a merchant (advertiser) and an independent individual promoter (affiliate); the advertiser agrees to share the profit with the affiliates in exchange for generating certain qualified actions, usually sales

affiliate software; a software used by merchants to run and manage their own affiliate program as as “independent” in-house platform without using external affiliate networks as intermediaries

alt tag (or alt attribute); a modifier used to tell search engines what an image is about; without this meaningful description search engines won’t index any information about the image, except its name

anchor text; the visible and clickable text in a hyperlink

anonymizer; desktop software or online service used to hide the visitor’s IP address

B

backlink; an incoming hyperlink that links from a given web page back to your own site

bad neighborhood; an umbrella term covering websites that utilize unethical methods, black hat techniques, etc to improve their SEO results; any links to such sites will have serious negative consequences for the original (linking) website; the most common characteristics are: negative PPC links (porn, gambling, etc), link collections or too many links without enough content, anything that is spammy (links, adverts, etc), lack of content or substandard content

bandwith; is a data transfer rate representing the amount of data that can be transmitted in a defined amount of time (or range) between your site and others on the internet

black hat SEO; unethical techniques used against Google’s webmaster guidelines – e. g. hidden content, keyword stuffing, duplicate content – in order to achieve better search engine rankings

blog; a regularly updated website aiming a specific target group and containing chronological publications, articles on personal or individual thoughts

bounce rate; a metric expressed as a percentage and used to measure the proportion of visits that end on the first page of a given website; a low bounce rate is equal with an effective, well-performing entry page that can generate a certain level of interest encouraging visitors to visit more pages before leaving

breadcrumb; a collection of navigational links used to show where the user is in a given moment in relation to the whole site structure

broad match; a Google AdWords match type (keyword setting) which allows you to show your ad whenever the searcher used any related or relevant variations of your phrase, including similar phrases, synonyms, singular or plural forms, stemmings, etc; is the opposite of exact match