SEO Slang: Online Marketing Glossary
Here are a few examples of SEO slang, the common terminology you may hear experts use when discussing online marketing strategies. Do you know the lingo?
Above the fold — Elements that appear visible on a website after it loads without scrolling. This often includes headers, navigation menus, and page headings.
Active Users — A term used in GA4 (Google Analytics) to describe website visitors that have engaged with your website.
Algorithm – The equation in a computer program that search engines use to determine where to place a website on results pages. There are literally thousands of factors that go into this equation, many of which are not shared with anyone.
ALT text — A description of an image added to website code that allows screen readers and search engines to understand the content of the image.
Backlinks – Backlinks, or Inbound Links, are links from a different website pointing to one’s own website. To clarify an often confused notion about backlinks, these are not links on one’s website going to another site. The links must be coming in to the website to be valuable.
Black Hat – “Black Hat” is a term used in the SEO industry to describe frowned-upon practices for improving placement on search engines. Examples of Black Hat SEO include paying for links to one’s website that are created specifically for placement purposes, or using tiny or white text to conceal the use of keywords on a page. Black Hat SEO techniques may work for a short time initially, but will eventually result in penalty from the Search Engines, and in rare instances, search engines will blacklist a website from search results permanently.
Bounce Rate — The percent of users that are on a site less than 10 seconds, do not convert, only view one page, and/or have no user engagement.
Channel — A term used in GA4 to describe the top-level manner in which a user found their way to the website. Channels include Direct, Organic, Paid, Email, Social, and many others.
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) — Measures visual stability of the webpage by indicating how much the elements on the page shift after loaded. This is one of the metrics in Core Web Vitals.
CMS (Content Management System) — Software that allows users to create websites, manage assets, and modify content. Examples include WordPress and Webflow.
Code – A broad term for behind-the-scenes computer programming text or instructions used to create, design, or enhance a website. Code can also be used to provide additional information to search engines, such as schema markup.
Conversion – When a visitor to a website performs an action that has been defined as valuable to the business, such as making an online purchase, downloading a white paper, or watching a video. Many conversions can be measured through analytics software, and used to determine ROI for their online marketing efforts.
Conversion Rate — The percent of visitors that complete conversions.
Cookies — Pieces of information stored in the web browser when a user visits a website. This allows websites to gather information about user activity and patterns. Some cookies are essential, like ones that keep users logged into websites if they browse away from the page. When non-essential cookies are used, like those left by analytics tools, the website needs to inform the user of their existence.
CPC (Cost Per Click) – Used in paid search, the amount charged for a click on a paid search ad.
CPM (Cost Per Thousand Impressions) – Used in paid search, a cost structure where one pays the search engine based on the number of impressions or times its ads are shown, instead of paying for each click on the ad.
CTA (Call to Action) — An element added to websites or social media pages that encourages visitors to perform a certain action. Types of CTAs include links to a contact page or buttons to purchase products or services.
CTR (Click-Through Rate) – The percentage of how many times an ad or search result was clicked out of all impressions (how often a search result or ad is displayed on a SERP) For example, if an ad displayed 20 times on Google, but was only clicked on once, the CTR would be 5%. CTR can be used to gauge how well one’s keywords and ads are performing.
CWV (Core Web Vitals) — A collection of metrics that Google uses in their algorithm to rank webpages on the SERP. These metrics are based on website quality from a technical standpoint and pertain to how quickly a webpage loads. Core Web Vitals includes LCP, INP, and CLS.
Direct Traffic — Website visits where the user goes directly to the site without going through another channel. This includes the user typing the URL into the browser or clicking on a saved bookmark, as well as other use cases. In GA4, it also includes any traffic that can’t be attributed to any other channel.
Domain Authority — A metric provided by MOZ between 0 and 100 that indicates the strength of a website based on the quality and quantity of its backlinks.
Domain Name – A character string that identifies a website. This is typically the business name but can be any string. It includes a dot in the middle that is followed by the top-level domain (TLD). Ex: .com, .net
Duplicate Content – Having the same text repeated on a page, or on more than one page of a website. Duplicate content can also appear on more than one website, for example, a press release that’s syndicated by multiple news sources. If discovered, search engines will choose one duplicate content page to index (include in search results), and will ignore the other page(s) with the same content.
E-E-A-T (Experience – Expertise – Authority – Trustworthiness) — A set of guidelines set by Google Quality Rater Guidelines that instruct what information to include on a website in order to signal that it is reliable, high-quality content.
Evergreen Content — Website content that is appropriate to stay on a website for a long time. It is not time-dependent.
External Link — A link that connects outward from one’s own site to another.
FID (First Input Delay) — A metric that measures the time from when a user first interacts with the webpage to the time when the browser begins to respond. This metric was removed from Core Web Vitals in March 2024 and replaced with INP.
GA4 (Google Analytics 4) — Google’s program for measuring metrics about users that visit websites and their activity.
Google Ads — Google’s platform for creating and promoting paid ads on their SERP.
Google Business Profile (GBP) — A service from Google that allows businesses to add and manage information about their company. This information appears in other Google products like Local Search and Maps.
Google Tag Manager — A program that manages the deployment of tags on a website. Tags it can deploy include GA4 and Microsoft Ads.
Impression – The number of times a webpage or paid search ad is shown on a SERP or page within a search engine display network. An impression doesn’t always indicate a result is seen by a user — only that it was shown on the page.
INP — Interaction to Next Paint. One of Google’s Core Web Vitals that influences the search algorithm. This metric measures the responsiveness of the page when a user interacts with it, such as clicking with a mouse or tapping an element on a touchscreen, on a wider scale than FID.
Internal Links – Links within a website directing users from one page on the website to another page on the website.
Keywords – Words or phrases that are used to match a website or ads with the terms that people query.
Keyword Placement — Where selected keywords are ranking on SERPs when queried.
Keyword Stuffing – Putting too many keywords or instances of keywords within the text on a page for the purpose of trying to place higher on search engines. Search engine algorithms in general will lower placement of a site’s page on the SERP when it detects keyword stuffing.
Landing Page – The web page to which a visitor is directed when clicking on a paid search ad or an organic listing. The term is also used in email marketing, where a user opens an email and clicks on a link, arriving at a specific landing page.
LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) — A Core Web Vitals metric that measures the time it takes for the largest element above the fold to load. This is often the first image or section of the page.
Link Building — An SEO strategy where the number of inbound links to a site are increased in order to improve search engine rankings.
Link Juice – The power of a link. The more respected or credible the source website or domain is, the more powerful the outbound links it sends to other websites. Link juice can be hypothesized by looking at the Domain Authority of the linking website. Link juice improves search engine ranking.
LSO (Local Search Optimization) – Also known as Local Search, LSO refers to optimizing a website for placement in the local (or maps) portion of search results. LSO is typically used by businesses targeting a local audience, like restaurants or doctors.
Medium — A term used in GA4 to describe the middle-level manner in which a user found their way to the website, following the Channel.. Examples include cpc, direct, organic, and referral. For example, if a user came from a Facebook post, the Channel would be Social, and the medium would be Organic; if they came from a Facebook ad, the Channel would be Social and the medium would be CPC.
Meta Description — Meta data added to a page’s code that describes what the page is about. This description is often displayed in search results.
Meta Title — Meta data added to a page’s code that indicates the Title of a webpage, and appears in the browser tab and in the search result. This is shorter than the meta description.
Microsoft Ads — Microsoft’s platform for creating and promoting paid ads on Bing and Yahoo SERPs.
Organic Search Results – Organic search results are displayed below the Paid Search Results and Rich Results at the top of a search engine results page. Additionally, if local search results appear on a query, organic search results will appear below the map results that appear on the page. Organic search results are presented as a result of the search engine’s algorithm.
Page Rank – A score or rank given to a website by search engines based on the number and quality of links to the page. Similar to Domain Authority, but only applies to a single page rather than an entire website. The higher the page rank, the more credible or respected the webpage is.
Page Redirect — A code set up to direct a user from one URL to another. Typically put in place if a page URL or domain changes. Some link juice is retained from the original URL when redirected to another.
Paid Search Results – Paid Search Results display at the top, side, and very bottom of Search Engine Results pages on highly competitive keywords. Paid search results have the word “Sponsored” listed above them. They are obtained by using PPC Marketing.
PageSpeed Insights — Google’s testing tool that measures Core Web Vitals and assigns a score to web pages based on performance metrics.
PPC (Pay Per Click) – Commonly known as Paid Search (for example Google AdWords and Microsoft Advertising), PPC is an internet advertising model that directs traffic to websites. Search engines charge a fee to the sponsoring company for every click on an ad. The fee charged depends on a variety of factors including the competitiveness of the keyword, the quality of the ad, and the keyword bid, among other things.
QS (Quality Score) – Used in paid search, a 1 through 10 score given to each keyword in one’s paid search account. The score is based on the expected click-through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. A high quality score reduces the cost per click, and impacts where the ad is displayed on the SERP.
Query – Also known as search query or search term. It is the term or phrase entered in the search engine by a person in order to find relevant results, products, or answers to what is being searched on.
Reciprocal Link – When one site links to a website, and that same website links back. Reciprocal links can aid a website visitor in finding additional relevant information, and should be used for that purpose. However, search engines do not apply as much link juice to reciprocal links as they do to one-way links.
Referral Traffic — Website visits that come from links clicked from another website.
Schema – Also known as schema markup, it is code that provides additional information to search engines, such as location information and product information. This term is used interchangeably with Structured Data.
Search Engine — A program that indexes webpages and returns results based on user queries.
SEM (Search Engine Marketing) – This is a blanket term that includes both Paid Search and Organic SEO, though some organizations use it only to describe Paid Search.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) – SEO refers to organic search engine optimization, and encompasses all the strategies used to improve a website’s placement on the SERP without paying for clicks.
SERP (Search Engine Result Page) – The page of listings returned by a search engine when one performs a query. There are usually 10 organic results links per page. A SERP may also display Rich Results (including images, videos, questions, answers, etc.), Ads (including Shopping Ads), and Maps. A desired online marketing goal is to be at the top of the list on a SERP for numerous queries indicating interest in the products or services a website offers.
SMM (Social Media Marketing) — A marketing strategy that employs social media to promote awareness of a business and traffic to their website. SMM includes both paid and organic social media listings.
Source — A GA4 dimension that provides more information about how a user came to visit a website, and typically includes the name of the website the user came from, i.e., Google.com, Facebook.com, or topothelist.net. This is paired with Medium to give the most detailed information about the source of traffic, for example Google (organic) or LinkedIn (cpc) or topofthelist.net (referral).
Spam – Junk, nonsense, or non-relevant information. Usually referring to email or website traffic.
Spider – Term for the program used by search engines and other web programs to view or “crawl” websites.
Structured Data — See Schema.
Technical SEO — Website optimization that performs measurable technical improvement to ensure that search engines can index a website.
Total Users — A term used in GA4 to describe any visitor to a site, regardless of whether they have engaged with it.
URL (Uniform Resource Locator) – Refers to an address on the Internet. It has two main parts: Protocol -http:// or https:// and the website’s domain name — example.com.
User Engagement — A term used in GA4 to describe when a user is actively engaged with a website, and includes any time a user has the page in the foreground. This applies to other metrics like Engagement Rate and Engaged Sessions.
UTM Tag — Query parameters added to a URL that signal to GA4 the traffic’s source, medium, campaign and other information about a visit.
Web Host — The server on which a website’s information is stored so that visitors can access it on the internet.
White Hat – The use of ethical, search engine-approved SEO techniques to improve website placement. White Hat methods are acceptable techniques that improve the overall experience for visitors to a website, or things that will help search engines to deliver more relevant results to searchers. Examples of White Hat methods are adding new, original content to a website that attracts natural links, and implementing structured data markup in a page’s code.
WordPress — A CMS that facilitates the development of a website.
WordPress Plugin — A program that allows extra functionality to be added to a WordPress site.
YMYL (Your Money Your Life) Pages — A subsection of web pages identified by Google’s Search Quality E-E-A-T guidelines that impact user happiness, health, finances, or safety. These webpages are held to a higher standard when evaluating E-E-A-T.
Above the fold — Elements that appear visible on a website after it loads without scrolling. This often includes headers, navigation menus, and page headings.
Active Users — A term used in GA4 (Google Analytics) to describe website visitors that have engaged with your website.
Algorithm – The equation in a computer program that search engines use to determine where to place a website on results pages. There are literally thousands of factors that go into this equation, many of which are not shared with anyone.
ALT text — A description of an image added to website code that allows screen readers and search engines to understand the content of the image.
Backlinks – Backlinks, or Inbound Links, are links from a different website pointing to one’s own website. To clarify an often confused notion about backlinks, these are not links on one’s website going to another site. The links must be coming in to the website to be valuable.
Black Hat – “Black Hat” is a term used in the SEO industry to describe frowned-upon practices for improving placement on search engines. Examples of Black Hat SEO include paying for links to one’s website that are created specifically for placement purposes, or using tiny or white text to conceal the use of keywords on a page. Black Hat SEO techniques may work for a short time initially, but will eventually result in penalty from the Search Engines, and in rare instances, search engines will blacklist a website from search results permanently.
Bounce Rate — The percent of users that are on a site less than 10 seconds, do not convert, only view one page, and/or have no user engagement.
Channel — A term used in GA4 to describe the top-level manner in which a user found their way to the website. Channels include Direct, Organic, Paid, Email, Social, and many others.
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) — Measures visual stability of the webpage by indicating how much the elements on the page shift after loaded. This is one of the metrics in Core Web Vitals.
CMS (Content Management System) — Software that allows users to create websites, manage assets, and modify content. Examples include WordPress and Webflow.
Code – A broad term for behind-the-scenes computer programming text or instructions used to create, design, or enhance a website. Code can also be used to provide additional information to search engines, such as schema markup.
Conversion – When a visitor to a website performs an action that has been defined as valuable to the business, such as making an online purchase, downloading a white paper, or watching a video. Many conversions can be measured through analytics software, and used to determine ROI for their online marketing efforts.
Conversion Rate — The percent of visitors that complete conversions.
Cookies — Pieces of information stored in the web browser when a user visits a website. This allows websites to gather information about user activity and patterns. Some cookies are essential, like ones that keep users logged into websites if they browse away from the page. When non-essential cookies are used, like those left by analytics tools, the website needs to inform the user of their existence.
CPC (Cost Per Click) – Used in paid search, the amount charged for a click on a paid search ad.
CPM (Cost Per Thousand Impressions) – Used in paid search, a cost structure where one pays the search engine based on the number of impressions or times its ads are shown, instead of paying for each click on the ad.
CTA (Call to Action) — An element added to websites or social media pages that encourages visitors to perform a certain action. Types of CTAs include links to a contact page or buttons to purchase products or services.
CTR (Click-Through Rate) – The percentage of how many times an ad or search result was clicked out of all impressions (how often a search result or ad is displayed on a SERP) For example, if an ad displayed 20 times on Google, but was only clicked on once, the CTR would be 5%. CTR can be used to gauge how well one’s keywords and ads are performing.
CWV (Core Web Vitals) — A collection of metrics that Google uses in their algorithm to rank webpages on the SERP. These metrics are based on website quality from a technical standpoint and pertain to how quickly a webpage loads. Core Web Vitals includes LCP, INP, and CLS.
Direct Traffic — Website visits where the user goes directly to the site without going through another channel. This includes the user typing the URL into the browser or clicking on a saved bookmark, as well as other use cases. In GA4, it also includes any traffic that can’t be attributed to any other channel.
Domain Authority — A metric provided by MOZ between 0 and 100 that indicates the strength of a website based on the quality and quantity of its backlinks.
Domain Name – A character string that identifies a website. This is typically the business name but can be any string. It includes a dot in the middle that is followed by the top-level domain (TLD). Ex: .com, .net
Duplicate Content – Having the same text repeated on a page, or on more than one page of a website. Duplicate content can also appear on more than one website, for example, a press release that’s syndicated by multiple news sources. If discovered, search engines will choose one duplicate content page to index (include in search results), and will ignore the other page(s) with the same content.
E-E-A-T (Experience – Expertise – Authority – Trustworthiness) — A set of guidelines set by Google Quality Rater Guidelines that instruct what information to include on a website in order to signal that it is reliable, high-quality content.
Evergreen Content — Website content that is appropriate to stay on a website for a long time. It is not time-dependent.
External Link — A link that connects outward from one’s own site to another.
FID (First Input Delay) — A metric that measures the time from when a user first interacts with the webpage to the time when the browser begins to respond. This metric was removed from Core Web Vitals in March 2024 and replaced with INP.
GA4 (Google Analytics 4) — Google’s program for measuring metrics about users that visit websites and their activity.
Google Ads — Google’s platform for creating and promoting paid ads on their SERP.
Google Business Profile (GBP) — A service from Google that allows businesses to add and manage information about their company. This information appears in other Google products like Local Search and Maps.
Google Tag Manager — A program that manages the deployment of tags on a website. Tags it can deploy include GA4 and Microsoft Ads.
Impression – The number of times a webpage or paid search ad is shown on a SERP or page within a search engine display network. An impression doesn’t always indicate a result is seen by a user — only that it was shown on the page.
INP — Interaction to Next Paint. One of Google’s Core Web Vitals that influences the search algorithm. This metric measures the responsiveness of the page when a user interacts with it, such as clicking with a mouse or tapping an element on a touchscreen, on a wider scale than FID.
Internal Links – Links within a website directing users from one page on the website to another page on the website.
Keywords – Words or phrases that are used to match a website or ads with the terms that people query.
Keyword Placement — Where selected keywords are ranking on SERPs when queried.
Keyword Stuffing – Putting too many keywords or instances of keywords within the text on a page for the purpose of trying to place higher on search engines. Search engine algorithms in general will lower placement of a site’s page on the SERP when it detects keyword stuffing.
Landing Page – The web page to which a visitor is directed when clicking on a paid search ad or an organic listing. The term is also used in email marketing, where a user opens an email and clicks on a link, arriving at a specific landing page.
LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) — A Core Web Vitals metric that measures the time it takes for the largest element above the fold to load. This is often the first image or section of the page.
Link Building — An SEO strategy where the number of inbound links to a site are increased in order to improve search engine rankings.
Link Juice – The power of a link. The more respected or credible the source website or domain is, the more powerful the outbound links it sends to other websites. Link juice can be hypothesized by looking at the Domain Authority of the linking website. Link juice improves search engine ranking.
LSO (Local Search Optimization) – Also known as Local Search, LSO refers to optimizing a website for placement in the local (or maps) portion of search results. LSO is typically used by businesses targeting a local audience, like restaurants or doctors.
Medium — A term used in GA4 to describe the middle-level manner in which a user found their way to the website, following the Channel. Examples include cpc, direct, organic, and referral. For example, if a user came from a Facebook post, the Channel would be Social, and the medium would be Organic; if they came from a Facebook ad, the Channel would be Social and the medium would be CPC.
Meta Description — Metadata added to a page’s code that describes what the page is about. This description is often displayed in search results.
Meta Title — Metadata added to a page’s code that indicates the Title of a webpage, and appears in the browser tab and in the search result. This is shorter than the meta description.
Microsoft Ads — Microsoft’s platform for creating and promoting paid ads on Bing and Yahoo SERPs.
Organic Search Results – Organic search results are displayed below the Paid Search Results and Rich Results at the top of a search engine results page. Additionally, if local search results appear on a query, organic search results will appear below the map results that appear on the page. Organic search results are presented as a result of the search engine’s algorithm.
Page Rank – A score or rank given to a website by search engines based on the number and quality of links to the page. Similar to Domain Authority, but only applies to a single page rather than an entire website. The higher the page rank, the more credible or respected the webpage is.
Page Redirect — A code set up to direct a user from one URL to another. Typically put in place if a page URL or domain changes. Some link juice is retained from the original URL when redirected to another.
Paid Search Results – Paid Search Results display at the top, side, and very bottom of Search Engine Results pages on highly competitive keywords. Paid search results have the word “Sponsored” listed above them. They are obtained by using PPC Marketing.
PageSpeed Insights — Google’s testing tool that measures Core Web Vitals and assigns a score to web pages based on performance metrics.
PPC (Pay Per Click) – Commonly known as Paid Search (for example Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising), PPC is an internet advertising model that directs traffic to websites. Search engines charge a fee to the sponsoring company for every click on an ad. The fee charged depends on a variety of factors including the competitiveness of the keyword, the quality of the ad, and the keyword bid, among other things.
QS (Quality Score) – Used in paid search, a 1 through 10 score given to each keyword in one’s paid search account. The score is based on the expected click-through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. A high quality score reduces the cost per click, and impacts where the ad is displayed on the SERP.
Query – Also known as search query or search term. It is the term or phrase entered in the search engine by a person in order to find relevant results, products, or answers to what is being searched on.
Reciprocal Link – When one site links to a website, and that same website links back. Reciprocal links can aid a website visitor in finding additional relevant information, and should be used for that purpose. However, search engines do not apply as much link juice to reciprocal links as they do to one-way links.
Referral Traffic — Website visits that come from links clicked from another website.
Schema – Also known as schema markup, it is code that provides additional information to search engines, such as location information and product information. This term is used interchangeably with Structured Data.
Search Engine — A program that indexes webpages and returns results based on user queries.
SEM (Search Engine Marketing) – This is a blanket term that includes both Paid Search and Organic SEO, though some organizations use it only to describe Paid Search.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) – SEO refers to organic search engine optimization, and encompasses all the strategies used to improve a website’s placement on the SERP without paying for clicks.
SERP (Search Engine Result Page) – The page of listings returned by a search engine when one performs a query. There are usually 10 organic results links per page. A SERP may also display Rich Results (including images, videos, questions, answers, etc.), Ads (including Shopping Ads), and Maps. A desired online marketing goal is to be at the top of the list on a SERP for numerous queries indicating interest in the products or services a website offers.
SMM (Social Media Marketing) — A marketing strategy that employs social media to promote awareness of a business and traffic to their website. SMM includes both paid and organic social media listings.
Source — A GA4 dimension that provides more information about how a user came to visit a website, and typically includes the name of the website the user came from, i.e., Google.com, Facebook.com, or topothelist.net. This is paired with Medium to give the most detailed information about the source of traffic, for example Google (organic) or LinkedIn (cpc) or topofthelist.net (referral).
Spam – Junk, nonsense, or non-relevant information. Usually referring to email or website traffic.
Spider – Term for the program used by search engines and other web programs to view or “crawl” websites.
Structured Data — See Schema.
Technical SEO — Website optimization that performs measurable technical improvement to ensure that search engines can index a website.
Total Users — A term used in GA4 to describe any visitor to a site, regardless of whether they have engaged with it.
URL (Uniform Resource Locator) – Refers to an address on the Internet. It has two main parts: Protocol -http:// or https:// and the website’s domain name — example.com.
User Engagement — A term used in GA4 to describe when a user is actively engaged with a website, and includes any time a user has the page in the foreground. This applies to other metrics like Engagement Rate and Engaged Sessions.
UTM Tag — Query parameters added to a URL that signal to GA4 the traffic’s source, medium, campaign and other information about a visit.
Web Host — The server on which a website’s information is stored so that visitors can access it on the internet.
White Hat – The use of ethical, search engine-approved SEO techniques to improve website placement. White Hat methods are acceptable techniques that improve the overall experience for visitors to a website, or things that will help search engines to deliver more relevant results to searchers. Examples of White Hat methods are adding new, original content to a website that attracts natural links, and implementing structured data markup in a page’s code.
WordPress — A CMS that facilitates the development of a website.
WordPress Plugin — A program that allows extra functionality to be added to a WordPress site.
YMYL (Your Money Your Life) Pages — A subsection of web pages identified by Google’s Search Quality E-E-A-T guidelines that impact user happiness, health, finances, or safety. These webpages are held to a higher standard when evaluating E-E-A-T.