Glossary

The 200 status is a code sent by the server to signal that the requested operation succeeded. In other words, it shows the page loaded successfully and is ready to use. It is the most wanted code on a site. The more pages return a 200 code, the more pages robots can see and analyse.

An ad is one part of a PPC (paid search) campaign. A campaign can contain several ads.

An advertiser is the site that publishes ads. That means you, if you run PPC campaigns.

Affiliate marketing is a well-known digital marketing lever. A seller promotes its products or services through a network of partners, and pays them a commission based on the sales they generate. It is the same system as a business introducer in offline sales.

The ALT tag, also called the ALT attribute, is the alternative text of an image or visual on a web page. It lets search engine robots read the image and helps visually impaired people understand what the page is about.

The anchor text of a link is the clickable text that makes up the hyperlink. Search engines take it into account and visitors can see it. An anchor is considered optimised when it contains the keyword of the page the link points to. It can also be a generic anchor, to give the link profile a more natural look.

Apache is software that makes your website accessible on the internet. It works as a server: when someone visits your site, Apache handles the request and sends the right page to the visitor. It can also handle security, redirects, and optimising the site’s performance. It is one of the most popular web servers and is widely used to host websites.

The back office is the content management area, accessible only to the site’s administrators. It is where everything to do with the site happens.

To keep it simple, the back-end is everything the user does not see but which lets them take actions on a website.

The beta version of a site is the version the developer uses to build the site. This version goes through all the changes needed to build the site in full.

Google Ads works on the principle of keyword bids. A bid is the price an advertiser is willing to pay to appear for that keyword when an ad is served. Several advertisers bid on the same keyword, and the one willing to pay the most is the one whose ad appears in the results for that keyword.

The bid set by the advertiser is not necessarily the price that will be charged. If the bid is far higher than those of the other advertisers, the price charged will be the lowest amount needed to win the auction.

Broad match is the most common type of keyword targeting. It shows your ads to users who search for any variation of your keywords.

A site counts as a business website (or brochure website) when it presents products or services and you cannot buy directly on it.

A website’s cache is a browser feature that saves data, such as images or HTML, needed to view a website as temporary files. The aim of these saved copies is to reduce bandwidth use. That is why people often recommend clearing the cache regularly.

A click happens when a visitor goes to a web page from the SERP results.

Conversions are the key actions a visitor takes on a site. They are specific to each site. For an ecommerce site, a conversion may be a purchase, but for a business website it may be receiving a lead through a contact form.

The conversion rate is the number of actions completed compared with the number of visitors.

If a site collects data, however small, it must have a cookie system. Cookies are designed specifically for web browsers. They store information about each user’s session.

Users are free to accept these cookies or not. Once they are accepted, that user’s browsing data is collected for Google Analytics, for example. Nowadays, all European websites are required to have a cookie banner under the GDPR (RGPD in France).

CPA, also called Cost Per Action, is a term used by Google Ads for the average amount charged for a conversion made from an ad. It is calculated by dividing the total cost of conversions by the total number of conversions.

CPC, also called Cost Per Click, is a term used by Google Ads for the average amount charged for a click on an ad. It is calculated by dividing the total cost of clicks by the total number of clicks.

CSS is a computer language used to style web pages written in HTML.

CTR, or click-through rate, is a KPI that measures the number of people who clicked on a site’s page in the SERP compared with the number of people who saw that result, known as impressions.

A database is a set of information organised so that it can be easily accessed, managed and updated. It is used as a way to store, manage and retrieve information.

For a website, deployment is the set of actions carried out before a beta version of the site goes live.

In a link building strategy, there are 2 types of links: dofollow links and nofollow links. Dofollow links are the most sought after. They are the ones that pass on a link’s strength. They tell Google to make the connection between the page the link comes from and the page that receives it.

A site is called ecommerce when you can buy products directly on it. It must have a payment module such as Stripe.

For a website, engagement is any action a visitor takes during their session, whether scrolling a page, clicking a button or moving to another page. The engagement rate is therefore the number of events recorded on the site compared with the number of sessions recorded.

EPC, or Earnings Per Click, is the average amount generated by one click on the ad. This amount is based on the revenue generated by the ad and the number of clicks it received.

When designing a website, you must take the needs and expectations of the end user into account so that the interaction is as smooth as possible. That is the very principle of web ergonomics.

An event is a Google Analytics term for an action or interaction that can happen on a website. An event can be turned into a conversion depending on the site’s needs. You can set up an event through a site’s Google Tag Manager.

With exact match, your ads show when people search for terms that include your keywords. The ad can show if the searcher uses a close variant (a spelling mistake, plural, singular, or with or without an accent, for example) or if the exact keyword or phrase is present.

Eye tracking is a technique used in UX to identify where the eye is focused when someone looks at a web page.

Faceted navigation is used on ecommerce sites and marketplaces. It is an interface design technique that makes it easier for users who are browsing a list of products to filter down to the ones they are interested in.

The front-end is the part you use to interact with the website. In other words, the user interface.

FTP, or File Transfer Protocol, is a protocol for transferring files from one computer to another over the internet. A bit like a messaging service, but instead of sending letters, you send files (such as images, videos or documents) from one place to another. FTP is used to update websites, among other things.

GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation (RGPD in France). It is a regulation that governs the processing of personal data within the European Union.

Putting a site live means putting the site online and making it visible to the public. All the changes made on a development version have been approved, and the site can be seen by everyone.

Google Search Console (GSC) is a free tool provided by Google. It helps you optimise a website. Its main aim is to look after the quality of a website’s search presence.

Google Tag Manager is a tag management system that makes it easy to update a site’s tracking codes through Google Analytics.

The H1 tag is part of a page’s semantic markup. The H1 is the title of a web page and is therefore the most important tag on it. This is the title where you should include the page’s main target keyword.

Headings are all the titles on a web page. In webmaster terms, they are HTML markers or tags, which tell Google how important each of these titles is.

The .htaccess file is a tool on web servers that lets you control certain features of the site without touching the code. You can use it to redirect pages, protect sensitive folders, create simpler URLs, display custom error pages, or even speed up the site by managing caching.

It is a file that lets you “configure” the server to handle visitors and performance better.

HTML is a computer language used to create web pages.

The .htpasswd file is used to protect pages or folders on a website with a password. It works with .htaccess and restricts access to certain areas of the site by asking for a username and password. It is a simple way to secure sensitive sections, such as an admin folder, without having to build a full authentication system.

The HTTPS protocol (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure) is an extension of the HTTP protocol. The S stands for Secure. It means the data exchanged between the browser and the site is encrypted and cannot be spied on or altered. To get that famous S, you need to obtain an SSL/TLS certificate.

Impressions are how often a page appears in search engine results.

Indexability is the ability of a web page to be indexed by search engine robots, and therefore added to their database. However, an indexable page is not necessarily indexed.

JavaScript, like HTML and CSS, is a programming language. It covers the scripts sent to web pages, and lets you create dynamically updated content, control multimedia and animate images.

Keyword density is the result of dividing the number of times a word appears in a text by the total number of words in that text. Too high a keyword density can be seen as spam by Google. It is not good SEO practice for ranking on the SERP.

Keyword difficulty is how hard it is to rank for a keyword. It is a score out of 100 given to each keyword. The more competitors try to rank for a keyword, the higher its keyword difficulty score, and the harder it is to rank.

As a rule of thumb, 0 to 30 is achievable, 31 to 50 is hard to achieve and 51 to 100 is almost out of reach. When KD is too high, we often advise targeting more niche or long-tail keywords.

In an SEO strategy, the SEO project manager builds what is called a keyword map, which makes keyword targeting possible. It links pages to specific keywords so that they rank in the SERP.

The term lead is used in a sales context. It is a contact for a potential customer or prospect. Its meaning can vary from company to company. For a business website, for example, a lead is a visitor who has filled in a contact form. They then become a prospect.

A website’s link profile is the set of links pointing to a site: their make-up and their attributes, the quality and quantity of the links, and how relevant they are to the content of the page receiving the link.

Local SEO is an SEO technique that aims to get a website ranking in a specific geographic area.

The meta description is the summary of a web page. It appears in the search results just below the meta title. It has little impact on SEO but it helps convince searchers to click through and land on the site.

The meta title is, in effect, the title of a web page in search engine results. A meta title must be unique and appealing, to catch the searcher’s eye and convince them to visit the site.

We talk about a website migration when a website goes through a major change. In most cases, a migration happens when you change domain name or web host.

When building a site, it is essential to produce mock-ups. They give you a precise picture of a site before it is built. Going through the mock-up stage also saves time and cuts down the back-and-forth between developer and client.

A developer is not a UX/UI designer. The UX and UI work happens at the mock-up stage, where the UX/UI designer works and proposes several versions of the site, to present one that meets UX/UI criteria and the needs of visitors.

Unlike a dofollow link, a nofollow link does not pass on a link’s strength. With a nofollow link, Google is told not to follow its content and not to take it into account for organic search.

A noindex tag is a rule written in the source code of a page to tell Google not to add the page to its index and not to take it into account.

In SEO, off-page refers to SEO actions that take place outside the site. Off-page SEO is just as important as on-page SEO. Its aim is to improve how search engines perceive a website. It is a set of factors that help improve the site’s popularity, relevance, reliability and authority.

Unlike off-page SEO, on-page SEO works directly on the site. It covers improvements to the content, the semantics and the technical side of the site. The aim is to optimise pages so they rank better in the SERP results.

A page SEO score is calculated by tools. It is based on the page’s main keyword and reflects how well the content is optimised. The higher the optimisation, the better the chances of ranking well.

PageRank is an algorithm used by Google to measure the popularity of a web page or site. The algorithm mainly looks at the inbound links (backlinks) to a site. The more inbound links a web page has, the higher its score, but beware: these links must be good quality to really count.

Pagination is a system that presents long content or lists of products across several successive pages. Pagination is most often found on category pages, where dozens of products are shown, or on blog pages with dozens of articles.

People Also Ask, or PAA, is a Google search feature that makes it easier for searchers to find information. It shows the questions most often asked during searches. In an SEO strategy, PAA is a very interesting lever, with search volumes that can be more or less large.

In an SEO strategy, it can make sense to target questions like these to aim for qualified traffic.

PHP is a programming language used to build dynamic websites. Unlike static HTML pages, PHP pages can react to what users do, such as filling in a form, displaying information from a database, or personalising content. In short, PHP makes websites interactive and smarter, while working on the server (users do not see the PHP code, only the result).

Plug-ins are used in CMSs. They are small programs added to the site to give it new features.

Quality Risk is a score given by tools that diagnose the SEO health of a website. It is often a percentage of the pages that carry a risk of SEO non-compliance, which hurts the site’s search performance.

Quality Score is a score given by Google to assess the quality and relevance of the keywords, ads and landing pages in a digital marketing campaign. It is a score from 0 to 10 used to determine the CPC, and therefore the amount to be spent each time a user clicks the ad. A good Quality Score is generally considered to be 7 to 10.

A website redesign means changing the site in depth, whether visually, technically or structurally. A redesign is recommended when changing CMS, when the site is outdated, or when the client’s strategy changes.

Referring domains, or RD, are the sites that have created a link pointing to your site.

A referring domain can of course make several links to the same site. That gives you several backlinks from a single referring domain.

A responsive site is a site that has been developed and designed to adapt to every screen resolution.

The robots.txt file gives search engine robots more information about a website. Its purpose is to tell Google which URLs to take into account or not, and therefore whether to index them. In general, the URLs blocked in robots.txt are admin URLs that are not meant to be indexed by search engines.

The robots.txt file goes hand in hand with the XML sitemap, which should be the last line of the file.

For a keyword, the search intent is what motivates a visitor to run a search. There are 4 different search intents:

• Navigational: the visitor wants to go to a specific site or page

• Informational: the visitor has a question and wants to find the answer

• Commercial: the visitor wants to research before buying

• Transactional: the visitor wants to buy straight away

Search volume is measured for a keyword. It is the number of times a keyword was searched over the last month.

SEO segmentation means dividing your site into different sections or groups, based on criteria such as the type of content, the most important pages, or the targeted keywords. It lets you optimise each part of the site for search engines, focusing on what is relevant to each group.

In short, it is a strategy to improve the rankings of different parts of your site by treating each according to its own SEO needs.

The semantic field of a keyword is a group of words related to the main keyword chosen for a page. This semantic field should be used in the page content so that the page is optimised for that specific keyword and Google clearly understands what the page is about.

When you write content and add it to a web page, semantic markup is a must. It is the “headings” of your content. They tell search engines how important each element on the page is and what it is about.

This markup is also the place to include the main keyword of the page, which gives you a better chance of ranking on the SERP.

The SERP, Search Engine Results Page, is simply the web page generated by search engines after someone runs a search query. Once a visitor has typed a keyword in the search bar, the SERP comes into play and gathers all the results that seem relevant.

A server is a computer system combined with software for storing and delivering a website’s files. As soon as someone visits a website, their browser asks the web server for the content of the page. For a website, a server must be fast and efficient so that it does not hurt the site’s search performance, because in Google’s eyes a slow site deserves to rank less, or not at all.

We talk about sessions when using Google Analytics. In GA4, a session starts as soon as a visitor arrives on a site. A session has no time limit, but after 30 minutes of inactivity on a website the session ends.

A sitemap page is a page that lists the structure of a website. On this page you find all the important pages of the site. There is no need to include pages that add no value to the site, such as the Legal Notice or Privacy Policy pages.

SMA, or Social Media Advertising, means paid advertising on social networks. It includes targeted ads that appear in users’ news feeds or on their profiles. The aim is to reach a specific audience, raise brand awareness, and generate clicks or conversions. In short, it is paying to promote a brand on social networks.

SMO, or Social Media Optimization, covers all the techniques used to improve a brand’s visibility and engagement on social networks. It includes creating engaging content, interacting with users and optimising profiles to attract more followers and generate shares. In short, it is making a brand more popular and active on social networks.

An SSL/TLS certificate is a digital object that lets systems verify identity and set up an encrypted network connection with another system using the SSL/TLS protocol.

SXO, or Search Experience Optimization, combines search engine optimisation (SEO) and user experience (UX). Its aim is not only to improve a website’s ranking in search results, but also to make sure visitors have a pleasant, intuitive experience on the site.

In short, it means making sure the content is well optimised and that users easily find what they are looking for. Combining the two approaches makes the website more effective.

Every site is assigned a topic. For Google, there are thousands of topics. To find our way through them, we have a metric called Topical Trust Flow.

It goes hand in hand with Trust Flow. Take a car website: it might have a TF of 50 for the TTF “Auto / Motos Business”. The same site can perfectly well have a TF of 20 for the TTF “Shopping Travel”.

The site’s highest TF is the main topic Google interprets. That means the site’s TF is highly relevant.

Trust Flow, also called TF, is a metric closely watched by SEO consultants. It assesses the quality of backlinks. You can think of TF as a trust indicator.

Trust Flow is often analysed alongside another metric. Knowing the quality of the links pointing to a site is good. But take this example: a site with a TF of 60 that receives only 2 links from external sites. That metric is not worth much.

That is where Citation Flow, CF, comes in, to show the quantity of links to a site. Trust Flow and Citation Flow are there to assess both the quality and the quantity of the links pointing to a site.

In Google Analytics, a unique visitor shows the number of individual visitors, whether that visitor made one visit or ten.

A user journey, or customer journey, is the path a person follows when they arrive on a website. This path is the ideal route a user should take when they discover a product, service or brand, find out about it, consider buying it, and then decide whether or not to buy.

In Google Analytics, a user is a visitor who goes to a site.

A UTM is a snippet added to a URL to enable tracking. A UTM gives you valuable information about the people who visit a website, such as where they come from. It works on the principle of parameters: there are 5 of them, used to define and name the traffic source, to define the campaign, to set the keywords and to identify where the content comes from.

In Google Analytics, a visitor is a person who goes to a site.

WordPress is an open-source CMS that lets you build a website without any programming knowledge. Thanks to plugins and themes, a website can be customised endlessly.