Digital Marketing Glossary

A

A/B testing - The process of making two live versions of any marketing piece such as email, web page, image, and ad copy among others. Its goal is to find out which of the two versions you created will generate better results.

Above the fold - The upper part of a web page where you can see either a video, images or other key information without scrolling. Companies prefer to put important business details on this area for visitors to see right away.

Algorithm - A set of rules for solving a problem step by step. Online platforms use this process to deliver the most relevant search results for a query. It is also used to identify which ads to serve first based on the user's interests and digital behaviour. Google, Facebook, Instagram, and Youtube are the big players that use complex algorithms in their applications.

Alt text - Or the alternative text is also sometimes called alt tags and alt description. It is the written description of an image in case it fails to load on your webpage. Relevant keywords can also be used in writing the copy as part of your website’s SEO strategy.

Anchor text - A clickable text on a web page to link visitors to another page or website. It is usually an underlined blue text but can be customised to a different color too. Keywords used should be relevant to the linking page for better SEO results.

Audience - It is the specific group of people you want to get in front of to share your products and services with. Your audience may vary depending on the marketing strategy you're going to use.

 

B

Back End - The technology responsible for running a website to make it work. This part of the website is not visible to users and visitors.

Backlink - Also called “inbound links”, are the links from a website to another. The more backlinks you get from other websites, the more you will likely improve your Google rankings.

Black Hat SEO - A practice that violates SEO guidelines to increase ranking in search engines. There are a lot of types of Black Hat SEO, one of which is hiding text or links by using white texts with a white background within the webpage.

Bots - An automated program that performs tasks on the internet. There are different types of bots or internet bot,  and “web crawlers” is one of them. Its responsibility is to scan the internet to find out which websites are updated. Google can now show relevant results because of the collected data of these bots based on searchers’ inquiries.

Bounce Rate - It is an analysis of website traffic. A percentage of visitors who just leave and didn’t continue browsing your site after seeing one page of it.

 

C

Campaigns - Strategically planned activities to promote the products and services of a business. Campaigns are done to reach specific goals and are part of the overall marketing strategy of a company.

Channel - The chosen platform of businesses to communicate with customers about their brand. Some of the most popular marketing channels are websites, email, social media, SEO, and SEM.

Captcha - Or Completely Automated Public Turing test is a challenge-response test used to identify if the user is a human or a bot.

Chatbot - A software application that creates automated responses to users via text or text-to-speech to substitute human interaction. Chatbots are commonly used to provide customer support.

Citations - A reference or mention of your company name from other sites, online ads, blogs, or applications. Another type of citation is found in digital business directories such as Google Maps and Yelp.

Clickbait - Attention-grabbing headlines to entice readers to click a link. Oftentimes, the content is misleading.

CMS (Content Management System) - A software used in building a website without coding and programming. It allows users to edit and manage content on their site.
WordPress, Wix, and Squarespace are some of the popular CMS platforms.

Code - A programming language that the computer understands to perform tasks such as designing a website, creating software and applications, and other requests.

Conversions  - The desired response of a user to an advertisement initiative. An example of a conversion is when someone registers to your landing page or a website visitor buys your products.

Conversion Rate - The percentage rate of users who actually clicked a call-to-action versus the total number of website visitors. If your website has 200 visitors and you have 80 product buyers, your conversion rate is 40%.

Cookie - A piece of information saved by web browsers to improve your browsing experience. An example of a simple function is to save your password and/or username for a website so that when you visit that site again, there's no need to re-enter your login information.

CPA (Cost Per Acquisition) - It measures the amount of one conversion from an advertisement. Let's say you spend $300 on your ad campaign and your conversions are 50, this means your CPA is $6 (300 divided by 50).

CPC (Cost Per Click) - Or the Pay-Per-Click is the amount spent by advertisers per one click of an ad.

CPM (Cost Per Thousand Impressions)  - The amount spent in an advertisement per thousand impressions. If the total ad amount is $100 and your impressions are 50,000, your CPM is $2. (100 ÷ (50,000 ÷ 1,000) = 2)

Crawl or Crawling - It is when a search engine scans your webpage with the help of web crawlers or internet bots. It is the first step towards appearing in a list of search results.

CRM (Customer Relationship Management) - A system that helps businesses manage their relationships with their existing and potential customers to help you with customer service and sales increase. Hubspot and Zoho are some of the examples of CRM tools.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) - It is the language used in formatting website layout and structure.

CTA (Call to Action) - In marketing, CTA refers to the desired response or action from the audience. "Register Here", "Buy Now!", "Click this link" are some of the most common CTAs used by marketers.

CTR (Click Through Rate) - It is the ratio of your impressions versus the click it gets. If your website gets 2000 impressions and resulted in 1000 clicks, your CTR is 50%. If you get a higher CTR percentage, it means your ad is relevant to the users.

 

D

Database - Ordinarily it refers to a list of compiled names, contact numbers, addresses, email addresses, and other customer information to manage and understand their needs. In regard to websites, it is an organised collection of most of the data required to run a website. Databases need management software to run...The system WordPress uses is MySQL.

Demographics - Statistical analysis of populations based on different categories such as age group, gender, social status, nationality, religion, etc. Marketers use demographics to determine the ideal customer of the products and services offered by companies.

DNS (Domain Name System) - The process of translating IP addresses to domain names so that users don't need to input a long set of numbers (IP address) to locate a website.

Domain Authority - Created by Moz company, Domain Authority is a search engine ranking score to determine how well a website performs in search results. It measures the power of websites by giving scores between 1 to 100, the latter being the highest. Root domains and backlinks are some of the important factors considered in calculating the DA score.

Domain Name - It is the unique name that serves as an "address" to identify a website. Here in Design Diva, our domain name is "designdiva.com.au".

E

EDM (Electronic Direct Mail) - Refers to building an email database of current and potential clients to communicate and engage with them directly. This can be done by sending out promotions, updates, and other relevant email campaigns.

Email List - Also known as "mailing list", is a collection of email addresses used to send marketing collaterals to different groups of subscribers from your website, email, and business.

Email Marketing - A kind of digital marketing to help engage and build relationships with customers and prospects by sending them emails of the newest product, service updates, promos, and content of businesses.

Engagement - Any kind of reaction from the consumers. This term is commonly used in social media to measure content "likes", "views", and "comments" received from the users.

Evergreen Content - A type of content that is always relevant and useful to users. Some examples of evergreen content are tips, "how-to" and product reviews.

 

F

 

Featured Snippet - An extracted piece of information from a website to answer a user's inquiry. Google puts this info on top of search results together with the title and URL of the webpage.

Front End - The overall look and feel that web visitors see and experience in a website. A well-developed front-end website's goal is to provide a frictionless user experience.

FTP (File Transfer Protocol) - A process of transmitting files from one computer system to another. FTP is considered outdated and is now replaced with safer protocols such as FTPS or SFTP.

 

G

Geotag - A digital tag (code) to connect a geographical location to an image, video, website, QR code, or any kind of media.

GMB (Google My Business) - A free directory tool to help businesses manage their information and presence online. GMB lets you showcase your offerings and business details such as store/office hours, website, and street address on the front page of Google Search.

GSC (Google Search Console) - Previously called Google Webmaster, its purpose is to help you maintain your site's Google ranking performance. Through GSC, you can check if your site can be found by Google web crawlers. It can also fix your indexing issues and troubleshoot mobile usability and search feature problems.

GTM (Google Tag Manager) - A free tool to help you manage your website tags and scripts without modifying codes on your website.

Guest blogging - The process of creating content for someone's blog as a guest to expand your own website's reach. It is also an SEO technique used in order to get good quality external backlinks to your website.

 

H

Hashtag - It is used in social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest to label keywords or topics, preceded by the symbol #. If you're looking for let's say a web designer, you can type #webdesigner on the search bar to see all the posts with this hashtag.

Hosting - Or Web Hosting is used to be able to publish a website on the internet. In order to view the images, videos, and content of a website, it has to be stored on a "server". Flywheel, Dreamhost, and Siteground are some examples of good web hosting service providers.

.htaccess - Also known as "hypertext access", is a hidden file used to control the access of a user in a directory on a web server.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) - A type of coding used in creating webpages. It is composed of simple code formats within a text file to make web paragraphs, links, heading, etc.

HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) - A network protocol standard like HTTP, but with additional security called SSL or the secure socket layer. This is to make data transfers in web servers safe, an assurance to users that the information they input into the website will not be viewed by internet attackers.

I

Impressions - It is the number of times users were able to see an ad or any digital content whether they clicked it or not.

Inbound Link - Or backlink is a link coming from another website to point users to your site.

Inbound Marketing - A business technique to attract and build relationships with potential customers by providing valuable information to them. Content marketing, blogs, events, social media, and SEO are some tactics you can use to execute inbound marketing.

Infographics - A visual presentation of data and information using graphic design. Its intention is to showcase available info in a more understandable, comprehensible, and aesthetically pleasing manner.

Index - A database of collected web information of search engines. Indexes have all the content, images, and videos that web crawlers were able to scan. In order to be recognised by Google, your website must be found and indexed to become visible in web searches.

Influencer & Influencer Marketing - An influencer is an online personality with a large number of followers on social media and an established reputation and credibility. Marketers seek to collaborate with influencers to be able to use their "power" to persuade their audience in making product purchases.

J

JavaScript - The most popular web development programming language used to create interactive web pages. It provides a better user experience by creating animated graphics, slideshows, and other interactive forms.

 

K

Keywords - Refers to the primary words, phrases, and sentences used to search for content online. In SEO, the use of keywords in websites is important to optimise webpages and increase rankings in search results.

 

L

Landing Page - A specific web page which is part of a marketing campaign that is used to direct users through a series of steps and ultimately to a sale. A landing page is often where you arrive after clicking a promotional link or an online ad. It can be a blog post or any page on a website, but it is often designed with no distracting peripheral information or menu options so that you are directed to follow specific actions.

Lead - A contact that could be a potential customer and has shown interest in purchasing your products.

Lead Magnet - A marketing technique used to gather potential customer contact details by giving away free products or services to them. Examples of lead magnets are discovery calls, trial subscriptions, and downloadable guides.

Link Building - The practice of getting relevant links on other websites to your site. Link building is important to include in your SEO strategy for a better chance of increasing your rank in search results.

Livestream - A live event happening online through an audio or video broadcast.

Long Tail Keyword - Refers to longer keywords in phrases. These are more specific searches as opposed to commonly used keywords. In SEO, Long Tail Keyword is proven effective because of lower competition and better conversion rate.

 

M

Map Pack / Local Pack - A Google feature in search results that displays the "Local 3-Pack" or the top three local businesses and a map relevant to the user's inquiry.

Marketing Automation - The use of software to automate marketing campaigns and processes. Marketers use such tools to become more efficient in implementing time-consuming and repetitive tasks like sending emails, posting on social media, or doing transactional messages. Hubspot, Mailchimp, and Customer.io are some examples of marketing automation software.

 

Marketing Funnel - It is the process of creating the steps your potential client needs to go through in order to make a purchase decision and beyond. Let's say you're looking for someone who can create your website, here's how the funnel would look:
Search for a web designer
Click on a Google ad
Arrive on a Landing page for a free offer
Sign up for the offer
Receive the offer
Receive a sequence of emails with more info and other product offers
See their brand ads 'following' you around social media and other websites
Become familiar with the brand
Trust the brand
Buy their products

Metadata - Data that gives information about other data. It contains keyword rich information of a web page's content.

Meta Description - The summarised description of the content of a webpage. It is also the description you see under the URLs listed on a search page. It should be optimised for Google and also inform visitors in a way that inspires them to click and visit your site.

 

N

NAP - Stands for the important details of your business such as the Name, Address, and Phone Number. Having an updated and consistent NAP listing on every platform on the internet is crucial to be able to rank well in search engine results.

Navigation (website) - A structure within a website that consists of menus and bars with several links placed vertically or horizontally. Website Navigation plays an essential role in having a frictionless user experience.

Nofollow - A type of hyperlink with the rel="no follow" tag. Links with this tag simply means that it won't be recognised by Google or other search engines, and will not be included in the ranking.

Noindex - A hyperlink with the rel="no index" tag. It is used to control the indexing of a webpage. If a webpage has this attribute, Google will not include it in the index.

O

Off-page Optimisation -  Also called "off-page SEO" is a way of telling Google how popular your website is. If you've got a lot of backlinks on your website, search engines will recognise you as a site with quality content.

Opt-in - When a person has agreed to receive promotional emails from someone. Opt-ins are a type of inbound marketing that has strict guidelines to follow when practiced.

Organic Listing - Refers to the natural listings that appear on search engines because of their relevance to the searcher's inquiries. These webpages were crawled and indexed by Google because of their valuable content.

Outbound Link - It is the link in a website that when clicked, will direct users towards another website.

 

P

Page Authority - Developed by Moz company, PA is a scoring system to determine the performance of web pages in search engines. Scored from 1 to 100, with the higher number meaning a more valuable website.

Page View - Refers to the number of times a user visits a webpage.

PageRank - Used by Google to determine the importance of a website by the amount and the quality of the inbound links associated with it.

Page Speed - The amount of time it takes for a web page to load on to your browser or mobile. Page speed affects the user experience, therefor slower loading of pages is equivalent to customer inconvenience, therefore, results in lower conversions and higher bounce rate.

Phishing -  An act of trying to get confidential information like usernames, passwords, banking, and credit card details by pretending to be someone from an established institution.

Pixel -  1. The smallest unit of a digital image or graphic. The more pixels in an image (or a computer screen), the higher the quality of the image. Image resolution is measured by pixel density or PPI - pixels per inch. The higher the PPI, the better the image quality.
2. A piece of code that you install on your website to track your advertising efforts for reporting, optimising, and retargeting.

Plugins - Software add-ons or extensions to a program to create additional functions. Browsers offer plugins and extensions to expand on features. WordPress depends on plugins to make websites function as required.

PPC or Pay-Per-Click Advertising - It is a type of online advertising in which an advertiser pays a fee every time an advertisement is being clicked by a user.

 

R

Reach - Refers to the total number of views your content received.

Registrar (domain name) - It is the organisation that provides the reservation of domain names and their equivalent IP address.

Rel=canonical -  It is an HTML element used to avoid duplicate content issues. If you use this tag, it gives the message to Google and other search engines that it is your preferred version of a webpage.

Remarketing/Retargeting - A paid ad that is designed for the users who have previously visited a website or have prior interaction with the products and services you offer.

Responsive Website Design - A website is considered responsive if it adapts to different display sizes. Responsive design is paramount with more than 50% of website views coming from mobile devices. Many web designers have a 'mobile first' approach where they begin with the smaller screen layout.

ROBOTS.TXT - A text file to tell web crawlers if they are allowed or not to search parts of a website.

ROI - Or Return of Investment, is used to measure the investor's benefit compared to its cost. To calculate your ROI, the formula is net income divided by the capital cost.

 

S

Search Engine - A website where users can search for different kinds of content. Through the search engine results page (SERP), users can choose the most relevant results to help them answer their queries. Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, and Yahoo are the main ones.

SEM (Search Engine Marketing) - A type of internet marketing that uses paid advertisements to appear on search engine result pages. One of the advantages of SEM is that it gives the advertisers the opportunity to showcase their products to the users who are actually looking for the kind of product they are offering.

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) - The process of getting websites to rank higher on Google and other search engines. It involves a variety of techniques to optimise your website for the search engine's algorithm. Ranking well results in more visibility in search results.

SERP (Search Engine Results Page) - The webpage where the list of search results is displayed in response to a user's inquiry on search engines. Appearing high up in the SERPs is the goal of all website owners.

Sitemap - A list of the web pages within a website that serves as a guide to web crawlers and users to easily navigate the site and find what they are looking for.

Slug - The text that comes after the domain name in a URL (after the slash)Here's an example: https://designdiva.com.au/resources/ the slug here is "resources".

SMM (Social Media Marketing) - A type of internet marketing that uses social media to increase awareness and achieve brand goals by sharing and creating valuable content.

SSL (Secure Socket Layer) - A protocol to activate security to users when browsing a website. If a website is SSL encrypted, it means that any sensitive data that a user provides to the site is safe and secured.

Staging Site - It is a duplicate of your live website where you can test functions, make changes, and fix errors before putting everything on the internet.

Structured Snippet - A type of Google Ads extension used to showcase the highlights of the products or services you provide.

Subdomain - An optional addition to your domain name which in effect creates a second stand alone domain. A subdomain is commonly used for a separate but relevant platform to the primary website website like an eCommerce store, training platform, or blog.

 

T

Title Tag - The clickable title text displayed on search engine results pages. It describes the content topic of a webpage.

Tracking Code - A small snippet of code (sometimes called a pixel) added to the HTML source code of a website that allows for the tracking of activities of the web visitors. The information is used for the optimisation of ads and analytics.

Traffic - Refers to the number of users visiting a website.

 

U

URL (Universal Resource Locator) - Or web address, is used to locate a specific website. Design Diva's URL is https://designdiva.com.au/

UX (User Experience) - Refers to the interaction or experience of a user in a website or application. It is about how they feel in terms of usability, functions, and efficiency of a system.

 

W

Web Directory - Or link directory is an organised listing of websites online. Its purpose is to help users find the websites they are looking for.

White Hat SEO - A practice of optimising a website to increase its ranking in the search engine result pages by implementing ethical techniques of SEO

WireFrame - A design layout to help web designers visualise the journey of a user in navigating a website. Just like a blueprint, it contains the overall structure, details, and sections of a website.

WYSIWYG - Also known as What You See Is What You Get, it is an editor program that allows you to see the actual look of content as you create it when published online.

 

X

XML Sitemap - Contains a list of subpages of a website. Having an XML Sitemap helps the search engine crawl process to be more effective and efficient.

301 Redirect - It is a status code that means a web page is permanently moved to another web address.

404 Error - It is an error code that means the content is removed or moved to another URL. Broken connections and incorrectly written URLs are also some of the reasons that the 404 error code occurs.