...
SEO/Search Engine Optimization | The practice of improving the presence of a website in search results through keyword research, content curation, technical configuration, and site performance tracking and monitoring. The higher up a website appears in search results, the more likely it is to be clicked on by users. SEO provides a non-paid approach to achieving rankings and improving the potential for generating website traffic. |
SERPs/Search Engine Result Pages | The list of search results that appear when a user types in a search query. |
Organic Traffic | Site visitors that enter into a website through unpaid search results. |
Crawling | The process of search engine bots reading the code of a website to store in an index for relevant keyword searches. (Crawled does not mean it is Indexed or Ranked.) |
Crawlers/Bots | The programs that search engines use to crawl a website; collecting and evaluating content on the websites. |
Indexing | The process for search engines to store website data acquired during a crawl of a website to use as reference to relevant keyword searches. (Indexed does not mean it is Ranked). |
Mobile-First Indexing | Google’s approach to predominantly evaluate the content from the mobile view/version of a website to assign rankings. |
Rank/Rankings | A website’s position/appearance within search results. |
Organic Search | Any unpaid marketing content that users can find naturally through searching/browsing. |
Algorithm | A system for search engines to find web content to that is useful and relevant for users. |
Metadata | Includes the title tag and meta description; the content that appears in search results as a listing. |
Black Hat SEO/Techniques | Detrimental practices to improve website rankings that does not align with search engine guidelines. |
Domain | A website’s address on the internet that is contained in the URL (i.e., |
Domain Authority | A score that measures a website’s probability to rank in SERPs for relevant keyword searches. |
Domain Age | How long a domain has existed and been in use, which search engines can examine to determine a website’s credibility and garnered authority. |
SEF/Search Engine Friendly URLs | A URL structure that defines a clear path to a webpage by using language that is readable to both users and search engines. An example is non-SEF: |
...