Written by Fraser McCulloch.An A to Z glossary of 120 SEO and marketing terms with a touch of dry Scottish sarcasm.
A
A/B Testing
Same as tossing a coin when undecided.
Algorithm
The recipe used to show Google results.
A/I
A thing that replaces your job by robots.
Anchor Text
The text on top of highlighted text on a web page that links to another page.
Average Position
A fake number that describes where your page appears in Google search results.
B
Back End Developer
Bearded guy kept in basement of digital marketing agency, eats pizza, drinks RedBull, clever bastard.
Backlink
When one website likes another and links to it.
Big Data
Reams of useless information.
Bitcoin
Money that is not real.
Bounce Rate
A person who visits the wrong web page and leaves immediately.
Blackhat
No idea.
Blog
A boring diary on a website.
Breadcrumbs
Little links on a website that show you where you are.
C
Canonical
A link that tells Google which one of your identical pages is more important.
CTR – Click Through Rate
The number of times your page is clicks divided by the number of times people see the page.
Chatbot
Annoying box in the bottom right corner of a web page pretending to be real person that chats with you.
Contact Form
A form on a website used by spammers or people offering to write you a guest post.
Content
Any words or pictures that appear on your website or social pages.
CTA – Call To Action
Green or red coloured words on a website encouraging you to download a guide you’ll never read or buy a product you’ll regret.
Client Centric Marketing
Marketing aimed at clients as opposed to marketing not aimed at clients.
Cloud
Big white thing in the sky that stores all your computer data.
Content Amplification
Shouting really loudly about your content.
Content Curation
A summary of other people’s web pages created by marketers too lazy to create useful and valuable web page content by themselves.
Content Hub
A bunch of related web pages.
Crawler
A creature that runs around the internet finding web pages.
Creative
A title used by people in advertising and marketing agencies who cannot figure out how to solve problem for customers.
CRM – Customer Relationship Management
A spreadsheet containing a list of customers and non customers.
Customer Journey
How people have been discovering and buying stuff for 150 years.
Crowdsourcing
You give me money, I give you a cheap t-shirt.
Customer Avatar
A make believe concept created by web designers and marketing agencies to steal your money.
D
Data Blending
Putting spreadsheets in a blender and getting shit out.
Digital Marketing
Any activity that exchanges customer value for profit done through computers and phones.
Digital PR
Link building done by girls.
Discovery
How consultants charge you for a meeting.
Dofollow
A link on a website to another website that the crawling creatures do follow.
Duplicate Content
You wrote the same shit on two different web pages.
E
E-commerce
People who buy things on the internet whilst under the influence of ecstasy.
Email List
A list of people’s email addresses on your spreadsheet.
Engagement
When 2 popular people on Instagram arrange to get married.
F
Facebook Business Page
A place no one goes anymore; similar to the high street or a ghost town.
Facebook Like
Something friends and family do out of pity.
Featured Snippet
A feature that appears after you search on Google created by Google to steal your web page copy and pass it off as their own copy.
Forum
A pub of like minded people chatting without alcohol.
Front End Designer
Draws pretty pictures on web pages, pretends to write codes and can’t spell.
Full Stack Developer
Jack of all trades for websites.
Full Stack Marketer
Poor jack of all trades.
G
Noun; the words you type into a search engine box.
Google My Business
Yellow Pages for local business owners.
Google Search Console
Cockpit to help people fly websites faster and higher in Google.
Google Tag Manager
A cupboard that stores code web people add to your website.
G
Growth Hacker
Marketing for businesses with no money.
H
Header Tag
Top part of your web pages containing your logo, phone number and important page links.
H1 Tag
The words in big letters at the top of your web pages.
Heatmap
Shows you where people hang out on a web page.
HTTPS
The first 5 letters at the start of a web page address.
Hyperlink
A link on a web page that transports you to another web page or website.
Home page hero
A new tv series on Netflix.
Hustle
People who work night and day to earn a MacDonald’s salary.
I
Idea Validation
Confirmation your business idea won’t be successful.
Impressions
The number of times people did not see your page in Google minus the clicks you got.
Indexing
A library where Google store all web pages.
Influencers
Fake people you pay money to promote your products and services.
Infographics
A really long graphic with useless information that no one links to anymore.
IP Address
Your website’s computer name before it married you and changed its name to your name.
J
Javascript
Japanese handwriting, ignore.
K
Keyword
Any word or sentence you type into that little Google search box.
Knowledge Graph
Who cares.
Knowledge Panel
Things Google show to people after they search by taking information from other websites and passing it off as their own.
L
Landing Page
A page that people land on after clicking an advertisement.
Long-tail Keywords
People who type really long questions into Google.
LSI
A song from 1992 by Scottish band; The Shamen.
Link Bait
Bait disguised in a word format to encourage you to click a link.
M
Map Pack
A bunch of maps showing the nearest businesses when you search Google for a local service.
Marketing Automation
Doing it yourself is faster.
Meta Description
This used to be 2 sentences you wrote about your pages to persuade people to click your web page and not the other guys.
But Google now rewrite this information.
Millennials
People born between 1980 and 2000 with a mobile phone permanently attached to their hands.
Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
Can’t get an investor, funding this business on my credit card.
N
Native Advertising
An advert in disguise.
NAP (Name, Address, Postcode)
The name, address and postcode of your company that Google use as a reference to check you are a legitimate company before ranking you in their search engine.
Nofollow
A link on a website to another website that the crawling creatures do not follow.
O
Organic Traffic
Visits to your website from people who don’t click the adverts.
Outreach
An email tactic that begs strangers to link to your website.
On-boarding Version 1
A set up cost.
On-boarding Version 2
Corporate brainwashing during your first week in a new job.
Optimisation
A technique that makes shit stuff better.
P
Partnership
A marketing tactic done by companies with no money where you do all the work on a commission only basis.
Pillar Page
A really long boring page that people scroll 30% down and realise it’s boring.
Pop Up
A box on a web page that appears just as you start to read the page.
Presser
A press conference.
Q
Query
Any word or sentence you type into that little Google search box.
R
Rankings
A daily activity of hoping your page appears on the first page of Google.
Reciprocal Link
You link to my website, I link to yours.
Redirect
A postcard you send to the crawling creatures telling them your web page or website has changed address.
Remarketing
Marketing to people who left your website and didn’t buy or subscribe.
Responsive
A bendy web page that looks shit hot on your computer, iPad and iPhone.
Revenue Share
Similar to a partnership when you do all the hard work and get 30% of income generated.
Retargeting
Same as re-marketing; marketing to people who left your website and didn’t buy or subscribe.
RoadMapping
Pay someone to write a strategy or marketing plan you’ll never act upon.
Robots.txt
A robot who lives inside your website that fends off the crawling creatures from finding pages you don’t want anyone to see.
ROI (Return on investment)
Pay for something now, get more than you paid whilst waiting 4 years or more.
S
Schema Markup
Posh term for telling Google your page is either a recipe, article, event, local business, movie, book, flight, restaurant etc.
Sales Funnel
A tactic that tells you 99% of people think your product is shit.
SEO
Often confused with the top person in a company, SEO is the art of getting people to visit your web pages after they search Google.
SERP – search engine results pages
Top 10 results in Google that people look at to get the answer they searched; on occasion they click a web page for further information.
Silo
A bunch of well organised web pages.
Sitemap
An organisational chart made by web designers.
Slide in form
A form that slides into the page you are reading offering a free subscription or download.
SSL
A socket you plug your website into that keeps it safe and secure.
Stylesheet
A stylish sheet of paper that web designers and web developers use to make your website look really cool.
Story brand
Froda goes on a journey to destroy a ring, encounters problems, then his guide, Gandolph gives him a plan to chuck the ring in a fire and lives happily ever after.
T
Title Tag
A sentence you add to describe your web page and encourage people to click on it in the search results.
Tracking Code
Code to keep a track of people who visited your web site so you can advertise to them or see how they used your web pages.
U
URL
The unique address for a web page.
UX (User Experience)
Web designers who wear bow ties.
Usability
A measure of how well people use your web page(s).
User Generated Content
Steal other people’s web content and pass it off as your own.
V
Viral
An idea that never takes off.
W
Webinar
An online version of going to a timeshare presentation.
Welcome Matt
A big curtain that comes down over your screen when you’re trying to read a web page.
X
XML Sitemap
A posh name for a list of all your web pages.