SEO Glossary

ALT TEXT - HTML attribute that provides alternative text for images. Search Engine spiders or robots can read ALT text but not the images.

BANNER EXCHANGE - A network where participating sites display banner ads in exchange for credits which are converted (using a predetermined exchange rate usually 1:2) into ads to be displayed on other sites.

BUTTON EXCHANGE - Network where participating sites display button ads in exchange for credits which are converted (using a predetermined exchange rate) into ads to be displayed on other sites.

DEEP LINKING - linking to a web page other than a site's index or main page.

DESCRIPTION TAG - A HTML tag used on the web page to provide a description for search engine listings.

DOORWAY PAGE - A page made specifically to rank well in search engines for particular keywords, serving as an entry point through which visitors pass to the main content. Usually dynamic pages are provided with a doorway page.

FFA - Free-for-all links list

INBOUND LINK - A link from a site outside of your site.

KEYWORD - A word used in a search engine to perform a search. It's necessary for the site content to be keyword heavy.

KEYWORD DENSITY - Keywords as a percentage of indexable text words.

KEYWORDS TAG - META tag used to define the primary keywords of a Web page.

LINK POPULARITY - A measure of the quantity and quality of sites that link to your site.

MANUAL SUBMISSION - Adding a URL to the search engines individually by hand and not automatically.

META TAG GENERATOR - Tool that will output META tags based on input page information.

META TAGS - Tags to describe various aspects about a Web page.

OUTBOUND LINK - A link to a site outside of your site.

PAY PER CLICK SEARCH ENGINE - Search engine where results are ranked according to the bid amount, and advertisers are charged when a searcher clicks on the search listing.

RECIPROCAL LINKS - Links between two sites, often based on an agreement by the site owners to exchange links.

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION - The process of choosing targeted keyword phrases related to a site, and ensuring that the site places well when those keyword phrases are part of a Web search.

SEARCH ENGINE SPAM - Excessive manipulation to influence search engine rankings.

SEARCH ENGINE SUBMISSION - The act of supplying a URL to a search engine in an attempt to make a search engine aware of a site or page.

SERP - Search engine result page.

SPIDER - A program that automatically fetches Web pages. Spiders are used to feed pages to search engines. It's called a spider because it crawls over the Web. Other terms for these programs are webcrawler and robots.

TEXT LINK EXCHANGE - Network where participating sites display text ads in exchange for credits which are converted (using a predetermined exchange rate) into ads to be displayed on other sites.

TITLE TAG - HTML tag used to define the text in the top line of a Web browser, also used by many search engines as the title of search listings.

TOP 10 - The top ten search engine results for a particular search term.

URL - Location of a resource on the Internet.

WEB RING - a means for navigating a group of related sites primarily by going forward and backward.