While the phrase “SEO acronym” is somewhat redundant, there are many other related acronyms and terms to uncover for this area of digital and web marketing.
SEO stands for search engine optimization. To put it simply, SEO is a strategy for enhancing a website to rank in search listings on Google, Bing or other search engines. There are three key sides to SEO, including: organic, technical, and local. Let’s get in to each.
The Three Sides of SEO
Each of these three components of SEO work in conjunction for your entire online presence.
Organic SEO
Organic SEO applies to your organic listing on search engines. A big factor in your ranking potential depends on the natural use of focus keywords and semantic keywords on-page.
Supporting keywords with quality content and an organized structure for indexing makes an impact for organic SEO. Additionally, user engagement and how well your content answers their search queries comes in to play here too.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO is in reference to the “nuts and bolts” of your website overall. Optimizing functionality and shortening load time are two best practices for technical SEO.
When search engine bots crawl areas of the website, crawl errors like broken links, missing H1 tags, missing metadata and misuse of alt tags in images (and many others) affect your domain authority.
Local SEO
Local SEO refers to increasing your site visibility with geographic location as the primary component.
“Near me” searches increase each year. Optimizing your website for local SEO helps ensure your customers are able to find your location when they are on the go.
An optimized Google My Business profile increased your chances of showing up in Google’s Local Pack, Local Finder, Google Maps, and organic rankings in general.
SEO Acronyms & Terms to Note
Alt Text
Stands for alternative text that describes images on-page for screen readers and Google Image indexing.
Anchor Text
This is the text that appears highlighted in a hypertext link and that can be clicked to open the target web page.
Bot
The bots are what crawl the web from search engines and can also be referred to as “crawlers” or “spiders”.
DA
Stands for domain authority – a search engine ranking score developed by Moz that predicts how well a website will rank on search engine result pages (SERPs).
DNS
Stands for domain name server and allows a domain name to be translated to an IP address.
SERP
Stands for search engine results page.
Featured Snippets
The featured snippet is the search result box that appears at the very top of the SERP. A featured snippet box will only appear for high-volume searches.
Hreflang
This is code on a that communicates to search engines which language the content is in and helps serve the correct language of a page to people searching in that language.
Indexing
This is the process of a search engine collecting data for search engine results. Google and other search engines crawl your site, indexing the content such as text and images, so the webpage can be found after a search query.
IP Address
Stands for internet protocol and is a set of numbers unique to each specific website. Websites live on servers and every device on a network, including the one you are reading this blog post on, has a unique identifier/IP address. Just as you would address a letter to send in the mail, the internet works in a similar fashion with to and from addresses during communication.
Keyword Stuffing
The overuse of keywords on-page. When is too much of a keyword? According to SEO leader Yoast, roughly 3% is a safe target. So that means three out of every 100 words should be a keyword.
Local Pack
This is the first three business listings that appear when a user conducts a local search (like a “near me” query).
Long-Tail Keywords
Keyword searches with a string of more than three words. Tend to be more specific and with a clear intent. Ex: ‘how to restore a bicycle’ or ‘how much is duct cleaning?’
PA
Stands for page authority. Similar to DA (domain authority), page authority is a score developed by Moz that predicts how well a specific page will rank on search engine result pages (SERP). Page Authority scores range from one to 100, with higher scores corresponding to a greater ability to rank.
PAA
Refers to the “people also ask” box that is featured on SERPs with a list of common questions in relation to the query with suggested answers.
Protocol
This is the “http” or “https” (preferred) that appears right before the domain name of a website. The “s” means a site is securely transferred between the server and browser. If your site isn’t secure, follow the HTTPs steps here or work with a web developer to make it secure.
Query
Keywords entered into a search bar.
Redirection
Sends a user from one URL to another. Website owners will often use a redirect when they decide to rename a page or combine content from two pages into one, thus deleting one page, but forcing the old url to redirect to the new url. Ex: yourdomain.com/service redirects to yourdomain.com/new-service. This is helpful for repeat visitors who have saved a particular page as a favorite in their browser. This is also a good practice to avoid showing a 404 or ‘Page Not Found’ after being indexed.
Rel=canonical
Also known as a canonical tag, this is a piece of code that communicates to a search engine which webpage is an original and which is a duplicate. This is implemented to avoid duplicate content crawl errors.
Schema
Structured code that provides additional information about content to search engines.
Sitemap
A map of URLs on a website meant for establishing a hierarchy and assisting with indexation of content.
Status Codes
Requests for a page that were either successful or unsuccessful.
Classes of status codes include: 2xx, 4xx, and 5xx. 2xx status codes means the request for a page was successful. 4xx means there was an error (404 Not Found). 5xx means the server couldn’t perform a request.
Thin Content
When content on-page is too minimal and of low value. Writing content that is informative and enjoyable to your readers is the most important factor involved in writing quality content that will improve your SEO.
Title Tag
Also known as page title, this is an HTML title element for a webpage. The title of this page is ‘A Guide to SEO Acronyms & Terms’.
URL
Stands for uniform resource locator and is the address of a web page. Is a URL the same as a domain name? Actually, the answer is no. But the terms are used so interchangeably. A domain is henkinschultz.com, a url is https://henkinschultz.com/2019/12/a-guide-to-seo-acronyms-terms/
Voice Search
A way of searching with voice commands and questions. The featured snippet or first search result is what is delivered to the searcher.
Could your site use an SEO spruce?
Whether you’re launching a new site or think your site could use an SEO analysis, HS can do both! From keyword research to technical SEO, we take a comprehensive look at your site and provide detailed methods on how we can optimize it for you.
Simply reach out to us and we’ll let you know how our SEO services can improve your online presence.
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