Glossary

Welcome to the glossary section of our site please feel free to search through here for any terms you want to learn more about.

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B2B

Abbreviation for Business to Business

Topic/s: Marketing Jargon

B2C

Abbreviation for Business to Consumer

Topic/s: Marketing Jargon

Back Links

A link from one website to another. A site’s links and the anchor text used (see the entry on anchor text for further info) are key factors by which search engines rank sites for keywords. See also link building, paid links, reciprocal links and link farms.

See Also: In Links

Topic/s: SEO
Related to:

Bait and Switch

Term ‘bait and switch’ was originally coined for a tactic utilised by unscrupulous retailers, who would draw customers in with a very low price for a given product, but then tell them that the low-price product was unavailable and attempt to sell them a higher priced alternative. In online marketing this refers to the somewhat dubious practice of creating content which is spidered by search engines and indexed, then switching the content to something else. Or, in a social media context creating content which various people link to, then switching the content once the links are in place.

Topic/s: SEO

Banned

When a search engine prevents your content from appearing in any search engine results pages. When this happens via Google this is sometimes referred to as the sandbox.

See Also: Sandbox

Topic/s: SEO

Banner Ad

An online ad which is typically 468 x 60 pixels. See the Internet Advertising Bureau website for further information on ad unit guidelines http://www.iab.net/iab_products_and_industry_services/1421/1443/1452

See Also: Button Ad, Beyond the Banner

Topic/s: Advertising

Beacon

Coding which enables website owners to track visitor interactions e.g. email sign ups, purchases etc

Topic/s: Coding

Bebo

A social networking site founded in January 2005. Bebo stands for blog early, blog often.

Topic/s: Social Networks

Behavioural Targeting

Targeting of advertising based on previous behaviour. This can be witnessed on when searches are conducted via Google in quick succession.

Topic/s: SEO

Beyond the Banner

An ad which is not a banner or button e.g. Pop Up or Pop Under. See the Internet Advertising Bureau website for further information on ad unit guidelines http://www.iab.net/iab_products_and_industry_services/1421/1443/1452

See Also: Banner ad, Button Ad

Topic/s: Advertising

Bidding

Within an auction environment participants place bids (essentially state how much they are willing to pay for a given item). With reference to paid search advertisers bid (i.e. state the maximum they are willing to pay) on a per click basis for someone who is searching for a particular keyword or search term.

Topic/s: Paid Search

Bid Management Tool

As paid search campaigns become increasingly complex, some advertisers elect to utilise bid management tools to assist them in managing their spend. These tools integrate with analytics packages – to amend bids according to conversion rates and ROI; and / or stock control systems (in the case of e-tailers) to ensure clients are not bidding on terms pertaining to items which are out of stock.

Topic/s: Paid Search

Black Hat SEO

A term coined for unethical SEO. Essentially this is the practice of optimising a site with a view to deliberately mislead a search engine in order to rank well for search terms. Black hat methods include ‘cloaking’ and ‘keyword stuffing’

See Also: Cloaking, Keyword Stuffing

Topic/s: SEO

Blended Search Results

Blended search results incorporate many sources into the results pages of a search rather than simply web pages. The results may include: images, videos, maps, products, news and books. Google call this universal search.

See Also: Universal Search

Topic/s: Search Engines

Block Level Analysis

Major search engines continually evolve their algorithms in order to keep one step ahead of unscrupulous SEO’s and to attempt to improve the relevance of their results. One such element is block level analysis. Block level analysis attempts to weight links according to where they appear on the page, and weight them accordingly. As such a link from the content block could be considered as more likely to be a true recommendation than a link from a text link advertisement block.

Topic/s: SEO

Blog

An abbreviation for weblog. A blog is (normally) regularly updated and allows it’s readers to interact with the blogger by leaving comments which will normally elicit a response from the writer. Readers can also elect to sign up to RSS feeds. Good blogs will attract links from their readers who find their content relevant / interesting, and / or readers may submit articles of interest to other social media sites such as Digg.

See Also: Weblog

Topic/s: Blogs, Social Media

Blogroll

A list of links to other weblogs or websites which are recommended by the author of the blog.

See Also: Blog, Weblog

Topic/s: Blogs

Body Copy

Refers to the written content on a web page as opposed to graphics, navigation, menus etc

Topic/s: SEO

Bookmarks

A list of links to websites and / or specific content within a given site. Within Internet Explorer bookmarks are stored in ‘Favourites’

Topic/s: Internet, Web Tools

Bot

Short for Robot. A bot is an agent sent out by a search engine to catalogue websites for indexing purposes.

See Also: Crawler, Robot, Spiders, Web Crawler

Topic/s: SEO

Boudica.com

A social news site for women. Similar to Digg – users submit content and are encouraged to vote for the content which they appreciate. http://www.boudica.com/

See Also: Digg

Topic/s: Social Networks

Bounce Rate

Normally expressed as a percentage – this is the number of visitors who land or a site and leave without viewing any other pages

Topic/s: Marketing Metrics

Branded Keywords

This refers to any keywords which contain a brand e.g. ‘Cheap iPod’. When building a paid search campaign many advertisers elect to bid on a variety of generic and branded terms.

Topic/s: Paid Search

Bread Crumb Navigation

Navigation system which allows users to understand how each page on the site relates back to root areas and ultimately the homepage.

Topic/s: Internet

Bridge Page

Also referred to as a doorway page or a gateway page. Refers to a page whose sole purpose is SEO. It contains keyword rich copy and a link into a website.

See Also: Doorway Page, Gateway Page

Topic/s: SEO

Broad Match

One of the keyword matching options available via Google Adwords. As the name suggests this option if selected, will display your ads when the broad matched keyword appears anywhere within a given search query. It will also show for common misspellings and for synonyms.

See Also: Keyword Matching, Phrase Match, Exact Match, Negative Match

Topic/s: Paid Search

Browser

Application used to view web pages on the internet, popular examples include Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari and Opera

Topic/s: Internet

Bulk Submission Services

Services which submit your web pages to search engines.

See Also: Automated Submiting

Topic/s: SEO

Button Ad

An online ad which is typically 125 x 125 pixels. See the Internet Advertising Bureau website for further information on ad unit guidelines http://www.iab.net/iab_products_and_industry_services/1421/1443/1452

See Also: Banner Ad, Beyond the Banner

Topic/s: Advertising

Buying Cycle

The buying cycle is a theoretical illustration of how people decide on a particular purchase. Commonly the stages are referred to as follows: identify need, search, evaluate, decide, purchase, feedback. The theory behind it is, that if you can identify where people are in the buying cycle, you will be able to target them more appropriately and ultimately achieve more conversions.

Topic/s: Advertising