Glossary of SEO Terminology

An SEO Glossary of common terms, acronyms and related web terminology.

We have provided this glossary of search engine optimisation terms to help both, newcomers, and the more experienced SEO'rs out there. It is by no means complete though we have tried to include as much as we can.

Help us improve the glossary by submitting new terminology here.

Cache

A computer term pronounced “cash” a temporary storage area where information can be accessed quickly. Search engines cache pages for quick reference so they can give results quicker.

Code

Code is the actually information that a computer sees. When designing a webpage the most common code used is HTML, which is used by a browser to display the desired information.

Cookie

Information that is stored on your computer by a website. Most commonly a cookie is used to collect data on your habits on a website; your surfing history etc. and used to help display relevant information to the end user. Cookies have received bad reputation over the years as spammers used them for unethical gains to collect data from the users without their consent.

Cloaking

Cloaking is a term used when a website displays different information to a search engine than that of the end user. This technique is described as spamming and can most defiantly get your website banned from the search engines.

CSS

CSS stands for cascading style sheet which is a file normally attached to a webpage or website to structure the look and feel of a website, most web developers now use this as separate file which helps the search engine as it has less code to spider which in turn yields quicker results. CSS became popular because it allows you to globally style a website and quickly make changes throughout the whole site without having to change individual pages. Using CSS is regarded as a W3C web standard. The validity of a webpage can be checked by using the W3C CSS validation software.

Conversion Rate

Conversion rate is the percentage of visitors who visit a website and do the desired actions set up by the website owners. This may be to make a purchase or subscribe to a mailing list.

CMS

CMS or content management system is a backend solution for website administrators to quickly make changes to the content of a website. In the case of ecommerce sites this could involve added and deleting products. This system is an effective way of web designers to put the content in the hands of the client who may not be of a technical mind.

Content

Content is main body of a webpage usual text. This area is deemed as most important and usually contains the most relevant content for the website visitor.

Crawler

Crawler also known as a spider or bot. A small program used by search engines, the crawler crawls the internet looking for webpage’s and brings back information to the search engines. Some of the information it gathers is linking structure and page content.

Cyber squatting

Buying domains relating to a brand in the attempt to make
money on the back of a well know name or brand.
Many cyber squatters have been prosecuted
in the past for this technique.