List of SEO Terms | SEO Definitions | SEO Glossary | SEO Terminology

In this post I had tried to provide better understanding of SEO terms for you. Following is the list of seo terms and definitions. Sometimes SEO terminology can be very puzzling for website owners, who perhaps have an unclear idea about the meaning of the term, but don’t understand the complete process involved.

301 Redirect (Moved permanently) – Most preferred method of redirecting an old webpage, website or blog to a new location or URL.

302 (Found) – Temporary redirect method used to move a URL to a different location but it will found at original location in due course.

404 (Not found) – This message is flashed when server cannot find the URL requested

A

AJAX – Shorthand for asynchronous JavaScript and XML. It is a web development technique use for updating a specific section of content on a web page, without completely reloading the page.

Absolute URL’s Link – Absolute URLs specifies the exact location of a file/directory http://www.example.com/image/xxx.gif

Algorithm – It is a procedure or formulas that search engines uses to index listings and returns relevant results in response to a search query.

ALT Tag – HTML tag used to provide images with a text description for search engine crawlers, also known as alternative text or alt attribute.

Anchor Text – Text used as link label or link title or clickable text in a hyperlink to a page is known as anchor text.

B

Backlinks – All the incoming links to a website or web page are known as Backlinks or inbound links.

Bots – Refers to search engine’s software programs that scan the web world, also known web crawlers, spiders.

Broken Links – Hyperlinks which are not functioning or not leading to the desired location.

C

Canonicalization – This is the process of picking the best url when there is more than one option available, generally for home page. Ex. www.xyz.com, xyz.com, www.xyz.com/index.htm

Cloaking - It is technique used to show an optimized or a keyword-rich page to the search engines bots and a different page to humans. Most major search does not approve this practice.

Copyright – Copyright gives the website owner the exclusive right to copy, display, license, or expand the content or images.

Crawler – See ‘Bots’

Crawl Depth – How deeply a website is crawled and indexed.

D

DHTML – Stands for Dynamic Hypertext Markup Language.

Deep Linking – A link which points to a specific webpage within a website.

De-Listing – A website temporarily or permanently getting out of search engine index.

Description Tag – This tag is used to give brief description of web page and the information provided is displayed as snippet in search engine result pages.

Domain –Web site address.

Doorway Page – This page is used for spamming the search engine by inserting results for particular phrases or keyword and then redirecting the searcher to another page.

E

Entry Page – The page which a user enters your website is known as Entry Page.

External Link – Link which point to other domain or website

F

F.F.A – Stands for Free for All link pages i.e. anyone can add link to them.

F.T.P – Stands for “File Transfer Protocol.”

Feeds – A web document that is a shortened or updated (revised content only) version of a web page created for syndication.

Flash – Flash is a technology used to add animation and interactivity to web pages.

Frames - HTML technique used to display multiple smaller pages in one browser window

G

Gateway page – See Doorway Page.

Geo-Targeting – Geo-targeting allows you to specify location worldwide where your website should perform well in search result especially Google.

H

Headings – Heading elements go from H1 to H6 to display titles or subtitle, where the H1 being the most important.

Head Terms – The short and popular search term are known as head terms.

Hidden text – SEO technique used by which text is only visible to search engine bots not the visitor.

I

Index – A search engine’s index is collection of data crawled by a search engines bot on the web.

Inbound Link – Link pointing from other website to your website.

Internal Link – Link from one page on a site to another page on the same website.

J

JavaScript – Language embedded into HTML documents to add dynamic features.

K

KEI – Keyword Effective Index.

Keyword – A single word that is used to search a specific subject or topic.

Keyword Phrase – Combination of keywords that a searcher uses in search field.

Keyword Density – How significantly a keyword or keyword phrase is used in the body of a webpage.

Keyword Research – The process of searching significant keyword and keyword phrases to focus your SEO campaign.

Keyword Stuffing – Generally refers to the act of using excessive amounts of the keywords in the content.

Keyword Tag – Refers to the META keywords tag within head section of web page.

L

Link Building – The process of doing anything to build links to a website.

Landing Page – The web page at which a searcher arrives after clicking on a link or advertisement.

Link Farming – Process of developing artificial and irrelevant links to a website.

Link Popularity – Link popularity generally refers to the total number of links pointing to any particular URL.

Linkbait – Create such a content or article or information on your website, that people should notice and link back to your website.

Long-tailed Keywords – These are Keyword phrases with at least 2 or 3 words in them.

M

Meta Search – Search engines that pull results from other major search engines and rearrange them.

Mirror Sites – Making an identical or duplicate page of a webpage to target different keyword.
Meta Tags – Meta descriptions and Meta keywords as referred as Meta tags.

N

No Follow – No Follow is an attribute webmasters use to tell search engine not index particular link.

O

Organic Results – Listings on SERPs that are not paid for and found routinely as per search engine indexing.

Organic Search Rankings – Search engine ranking of web pages found in SERPs.

Outbound Link – A link from one website pointing at other website.

P

PageRank (PR) – PR is the Google logarithmic scale based on link popularity for placing importance of web pages and web sites

Paid Inclusion (PFI) – Some search engine or directories ask for a fee for guaranteed inclusion.

R

RSS –Real Simple Syndication, a family of web feed formats that leverage XML to distribute and share web content.

Reciprocal Link – Two different sites that link out to each other.

Robots.txt – A text file present in the root directory of a website which is used to direct the search engine crawlers to which files not to crawl.

S

SEM –Search Engine Marketing, a form of internet marketing that seeks to promote websites by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages (SERPs).

SEO –Search Engine Optimization, process of optimizing a web site’s content and code in order to found in organic search engine result pages.

SEO Copywriting – Writing or editing content in a way to make the content appear significant to search queries.

SERPs –Search Engine Results Pages

Search Engines – A search engine is a database of many web pages, used to find information about anything.

Search Query – The word or phrase a searcher types into a search field.

Site Map – Page used to give search engines and visitors a secondary route to navigate through website.

Siloing – Siloing is a site architecture technique used to split the focus of a site into multiple themes.

Spamming – Tricks and techniques used to misguide the search engines are known as spamming.

Spider – See bots

Splash Page – Refers to an entry page a web site that is interactive or graphically intense.

Sponsored Listing – Paid listing that appers on top of the SERPs

Stemming – Using the stem of a word to suit search relevancy requirements.

T

Tier I Search Engines –Top three, search engines i.e. Google, Yahoo and Bing.

Tier II Search Engines – Smaller, vertical and specialized engines, such as Ask.com and AOL.

Tier III Search Engines – Small providers of pay per click advertising that usually do not feed other search sites with PPC results.

Title Tag – HTML tag appearing in the tag of a web page that contains the page title.

Trackbacks – A protocol that allows automated notification that another website mentioned your site.

Traffic – No. of visitors a website receives.

U

Usability – This term define how much a website and its functionality is user friendly.

URL – Uniform Resource Locator is the unique address of any web document.

URL Rewrite – Technique used to make URLs more unique and descriptive for better indexing by major search engines.

User Agent – Identity of a web site visitor, spider, browser, etc.

W

Web analytics – A program which assists in congregation and analyzing data about website usage.

Wiki – Software that allows people to contribute knowledge on a particular topic.

Word Count – The total number of words contained within a web document.

X

XML – Extensible Markup Language, a data delivery language.

contributed by, ABHISHEK SEO