An SEO Glossary - Common SEO Terms Defined

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has become an essential weapon in the arsenal of every online business. Unfortunately, for most business owners and marketing managers (and even many webmasters), it's also somewhat of an enigma. This is partly due to the fact that it's such a new and rapidly changing field, and partly due to the fact that SEO practitioners tend to speak in a language all of their own which, without translation, is virtually impenetrable to the layperson. This glossary seeks to remedy that situation, explaining specialist SEO terms in plain English...

AdWords

See Sponsored Links.

algorithm

A complex mathematical formula used by search engines to assess the relevance and importance of websites and rank them accordingly in their search results. These algorithms are kept tightly under wraps as they are the key to the objectivity of search engines (i.e. the algorithm ensures relevant results, and relevant results bring more users, which in turn brings more advertising revenue).

article PR

The submitting of free reprint articles to many article submission sites and article distribution lists in order to increase your website's search engine ranking and Google PageRank. (In this sense, the "PR" stands for PageRank.) Like traditional public relations, article PR also conveys a sense of authority because your articles are widely published. And because you're proving your expertise and freely dispensing knowledge, your readers will trust you and will be more likely to remain loyal to you. (In this sense, the "PR" stands for Public Relations.)

article submission sites

Websites which act as repositories of free reprint articles. They are sites where authors can submit their articles free of charge, and where webmasters can find articles to use on their websites free of charge. Article submission sites generate revenue by selling advertising space on their websites. See also article PR.

backlink

A text link to your website from another website. See also link.

copy

The words used on your website.

copywriter

A professional writer who specializes in the writing of advertising copy (compelling, engaging words promoting a particular product or service). See also SEO copywriter and web copywriter.

crawl

Google finds pages on the World Wide Web and records their details in its index by sending out spiders or robots. These spiders make their way from page to page and site to site by following text links. To a spider, a text link is like a door.

domain name

The virtual address of your website (normally in the form www.yourbusinessname.com). This is what people will type when they want to visit your site. It is also what you will use as the address in any text links back to your site.

ezine

An electronic magazine. Most publishers of ezines are desperate for content and gladly publish well written, helpful articles and give you full credit as author, including a link to your website.

Flash

A technology used to create animated web pages (and page elements).

free reprint article

An article written by you and made freely available to other webmasters to publish on their websites. See also article PR.

Google

The search engine with the greatest coverage of the World Wide Web, and which is responsible for most search engine-referred traffic. Of approximately 11.5 billion pages on the World Wide Web, it is estimated that Google has indexed around 8.8 billion. This is one reason why it takes so long to increase your ranking!

Google AdWords

See Sponsored Links.

Google PageRank

How Google scores a websites importance. It gives all sites a mark out of 10. By downloading the Google Toolbar, you can view the PR of any site you visit.

Google Toolbar

A free tool you can download. It becomes part of your browser toolbar. Its most useful features are its PageRank display (which allows you to view the PR of any site you visit) and its AutoFill function (when youre filling out an online form, you can click AutoFill, and it enters all the standard information automatically, including Name, Address, Zip code/Postcode, Phone Number, Email Address, Business Name, Credit Card Number (password protected), etc.) Once youve downloaded and installed the toolbar, you may need to set up how youd like it to look and work by clicking Options (setup is very easy). NOTE: Google does record some information (mostly regarding sites visited).

HTML

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is the coding language used to create much of the information on the World Wide Web. Web browsers read the HTML code and display the page that code describes.

Internet

An interconnected network of computers around the world.

JavaScript

A programming language used to create dynamic website pages (e.g. interactivity).

keyword

A word which your customers search for and which you use frequently on your site in order to be relevant to those searches. This use known as targeting a keyword. Most websites actually target keyword phrases because single keywords are too generic and it is very difficult to rank highly for them.

keyword density

A measure of the frequency of your keyword in relation to the total wordcount of the page. So if your page has 200 words, and your keyword phrase appears 10 times, its density is 5%.

keyword phrase

A phrase which your customers search for and which you use frequently on your site in order to be relevant to those searches.

link

A word or image on a web page which the reader can click to visit another page. There are normally visual cues to indicate to the reader that the word or image is a link.

link path

Using text links to connect a series of page (i.e. page 1 connects to page 2, page 2 connects to page 3, page 3 connects to page 4, and so on). Search engine spiders and robots use text links to jump from page to page as they gather information about it, so its a good idea to allow them traverse your entire site via text links.

link partner

A webmaster who is willing to put a link to your website on their website. Quite often link partners engage in reciprocal linking.

link popularity

The number of links to your website. Link popularity is the single most important factor in a high search engine ranking. Webmasters use a number of methods to increase their site's link popularity including article PR, link exchange (link partners / reciprocal linking), link buying, and link directories.

link text

The part of a text link that is visible to the reader. When generating links to your own site, they are most effective (in terms of ranking) if they include your keyword.

meta tag

A short note within the header of the HTML of your web page which describes some aspect of that page. These meta tags are read by the search engines and used to help assess the relevance of a site to a particular search.

natural search results

The real search results. The results that most users are looking for and which take up most of the window. For most searches, the search engine displays a long list of links to sites with content which is related to the word you searched for. These results are ranked according to how relevant and important they are.

organic search results

See natural search results.

PPC (Pay-Per-Click advertising)

See Sponsored Links.

PageRank

See Google PageRank.

rank

Your position in the search results that display when someone searches for a particular word at a search engine.

reciprocal link

A mutual agreement between two webmasters to exchange links (i.e. they both add a link to the others website on their own website). Most search engines (certainly Google) are sophisticated enough to detect reciprocal linking and they dont view it very favorably because it is clearly a manufactured method of generating links. Websites with reciprocal links risk being penalized.

robot

See spider.

robots.txt file

A file which is used to inform the search engine spider which pages on a site should not be indexed. This file sits in your sites root directory on the web server. (Alternatively, you can do a similar thing by placing tags in the header section of your HTML for search engine robots/spiders to read.

Sandbox

Many SEO experts believe that Google sandboxes new websites. Whenever it detects a new website, it withholds its rightful ranking for a period while it determines whether your site is a genuine, credible, long term site. It does this to discourage the creation of SPAM websites (sites which serve no useful purpose other than to boost the ranking of some other site). Likewise, if Google detects a sudden increase (i.e. many hundreds or thousands) in the number of links back to your site, it may sandbox them for a period (or in fact penalize you by lowering your ranking or blacklisting your site altogether).

SEO

Search Engine Optimization. The art of making your website relevant and important so that it ranks high in the search results for a particular word.

SEO copywriter

A copywriter who is not only proficient at web copy, but also experienced in writing copy which is optimized for search engines (and will therefore help you achieve a better search engine ranking for your website).

search engine

A search engine is an online tool which allows you to search for websites which contain a particular word or phrase. The most well known search engines are Google, Yahoo, and MSN.

site map

A single page which contains a list of text links to every page in the site (and every page contains a text link back to the site map). Think of your site map as being at the center of a spider-web.

SPAM

Generally refers to unwanted and unrequested email sent en-masse to private email addresses. Also used to refer to websites which appear high in search results without having any useful content. The creators of these sites set them up simply to cash in on their high ranking by selling advertising space, links to other sites, or by linking to other sites of their own and thereby increasing the ranking of those sites. The search engines are becoming increasingly sophisticated, and already have very efficient ways to detect SPAM websites and penalize them.

spider

Google finds pages on the World Wide Web and records their details in its index by sending out spiders or robots. These spiders make their way from page to page and site to site by following text links.

Sponsored Links

Paid advertising which displays next to the natural search results. Customers can click on the ad to visit the advertisers website. This is how the search engines make their money. Advertisers set their ads up to display whenever someone searches for a word which is related to their product or service. These ads look similar to the natural search results, but are normally labeled Sponsored Links, and normally take up a smaller portion of the window. These ads work on a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) basis (i.e. the advertiser only pays when someone clicks on their ad).

submit

You can submit your domain name to the search engines so that their spiders or robots will crawl your site. You can also submit articles to article submission sites in order to have them published on the Internet.

text link

A word on a web page which the reader can click to visit another page. Text links are normally blue and underlined. Text links are what spiders or robots use to jump from page to page and website to website.

URL

Uniform Resource Locator. The address of a particular page published on the Internet. Normally in the form http://www.yourbusinessname.com/AWebPage.htm.

web copy

See copy.

web copywriter

A copywriter who understands the unique requirements of writing for an online medium.

webmaster

A person responsible for the management of a particular website.

wordcount

The number of words on a particular web page.

World Wide Web (WWW)

The vast array of documents published on the Internet. It is estimated that the World Wide Web now consists of approximately 11.5 billion pages.

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Video Slide Show Productions

Slide show companies are popping up all over the internet. People are taking their pictures and placing them on CDs, DVDs, or VHS for personal use and for gifts for all occasions. People everywhere are hiring companies to make wedding slide shows for receptions, graduation slide shows, anniversary slide shows, birthday slide shows, memorial service slide shows, vacation slide shows, holiday slide shows, and just about anything you can think of slide shows. But how do you know which slide show company to choose?

It use to be that when we took our photos of our special occasions: weddings, vacations, reunions, birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, family, friends, pets and so on, that wed get the photos developed and place them in a photo album or a shoe box. A couple of our very favorites would be placed in frames. But, the photo album or shoebox would then sit on a shelf or under a bed or in a closet or somewhere where theyd be neglected and hardly ever looked at. In the meantime the photos themselves are drying out, cracking, and turning yellow. When we do go to look at them theyre never as good as we remember because theyve aged.

Placing our photos on CD, DVD, or VHS preserves the photos forever. They will never crack, fade, yellow, or get damaged. Future generations can enjoy the same quality in a hundred years as we can today.

Turning your photos into slide shows, video albums, or photo montages makes the photos fun to watch and more people will enjoy viewing them with you. So how do you know if you've found a quality slideshow company? An important rule of thumb to remember is, "If the price seems too good to be true, then it probably is". Creating slide shows is a service related industry; no real slide show creating company can give you quality work without putting quality time into it. The less the price, the less the amount of time going into it. You might as well go buy yourself the cheapest slide show software you can find and do it yourself.

A quality slide show creating company has invested thousands of dollars to be able to produce the highest quality work for the consumer. In addition, they will spend the time needed to clean up your photos and create a quality CD, DVD or VHS that you can be proud of. Although, like in any industry, you'll need to beware of those who overcharge, the bottom line is; the more time a company puts into creating your slideshow, the higher the cost of that slide show.

When comparing prices, don't forget to compare the contents of the package. This will make a tremendous difference in the pricing and the quality of the slideshow you receive. But don't fall for bogus charges such as transition charges. What are slide shows without transitions? So shop around, compare prices, packages, and view some slide show samples.

Viewing slide show samples is very important to choosing your video slide show production company. If youre satisfied with just the simple fade-in, fade-out photo montage style slideshows, then you have a lot to choose from. If you want something fun, exciting, emotional, creative and unique, then theres very little to choose from. The slide show company you choose should value your precious memories so much that it reflects in the slide shows they create. To a true slide show creator, creating quality slide shows is comparative to an artist who is creating yet another masterpiece: each one is unique, creative, evokes emotion, no two are exactly alike, and all are worthy of displaying to everyone you know. At Sands of Time Multimedia Creations, slide shows are works of art. Visit us today and experience the difference!

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