SEO Lingo for Beginners - 21 SEO definitions to know in 2020

Are you starting to research Search Engine Optimization for your website but have NO idea what some of these phrases or words mean? Let me break down the mumbo jumbo for you and give it to you clearly and concisely so you can actually digest what you are reading.

And, If you haven't already, head over to my FREE SEO Checklist download. There are 30 action items that you can take to get your website up in the search engines so you can start bringing in the business!

Here is a good starting point of words and phrases you should know. They are listed alphabetically.

1. 301 Redirect - A rerouting from an old URL to a new URL. This is important if you ever change your landing page URLs. This way if anyone has linked to your old URL, they will still be able to land on your website.

2. Algorithm - A program used by search engines to determine what pages to suggest for a given search query and how to rank them.

3. Anchor Text - A part of text in the content of your webpage that links to a different page on your website.

4. Backlinks - Links pointing to your website from other websites (called referring sites).

5. Doctype - This is a declaration at the very beginning of website code that instructs web browsers what version of HTML the page is written in. This is to ensure that Google reads your code properly.

6. Encoding - Refers to the coding language being used by a computer software program. This is to ensure Google reads your code properly.

7. Favicon - The icon associated with a URL that is displayed in the website tab at the top of a browser, next to the website name and page title.

8. Flash - Software program used for different types of animation. Flash is not SEO friendly as it reduces the amount of content that's visible to Google's indexing bots, lowering search engine visibility.

9. Heading Tags - Part of HTML coding for a web page that outlines the important headings on that page. It helps Google organize a web page. H1 being the most important heading, H6 being the least important.

10. HTML Sitemap - This is a page on your website that has a link to every page on your site that you want Google to see. This helps Google more quickly find pages on your website.

11. Image Tags (Alt Text) - Keywords assigned to a certain image that has been uploaded to a website. Helps Google understand what the image is about for indexing.

12. Keyword Cannibalization - The overuse of the same keyword on too many web pages within the same site that creates competition between the pages making it more difficult for them to rank higher.

13. Link Building - The act of obtaining incoming links from other websites in order to become in better standing with search engines.

14. Meta Description - A tag in HTML that summarizes a page's content on your website. This is shown in search results under the title tag.

15. No Follow Tag - A part of code you can put in the head section that tells Google not to give SEO credit to the links on a page that you have leaving your site to another website. You will want to use this unless you are linking out to very high-quality, well-known websites as it gives Google am impression of a good reputation.

16. Page Rank/Index/Keyword Rank - Where your website is showing up on a search engine when a consumer types in a certain keyword query.

17. Robots.txt - A file placed on the website (or can be done in code) that directs Google exactly what pages to look at and what not to look at when indexing a site.

18. Search Engine - Any type of platform that uses a search function. Examples are Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Amazon, Etsy, etc.

19. Title Tag - HTML element that specifies the title of a web page. They are displayed on search engine results pages (SERPs) as the clickable headline for a given result and are important for SEO.

20. URL - Your website's web address.

21. XML Sitemap - A file placed on the website that outlines your website hierarchy for Google so it can more quickly find pages on your website.

Still have questions on the above? Reach out to one of our SEO specialists. Looking for help with your website SEO? Check out our SEO services and learn how we can better help you rank on all the major search engines!