Digital Marketing Jargon Buster


 

DIgital Marketing Tools 2

Welcome to the Conversion Detectives Digital Marketing Jargon Blaster.

Also included are terms relating to Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO)

and a fair few terms regarding Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

 

 

Growing the Digital Marketing Jargon Buster

We’re constantly updating this resource. If you can’t find the term in our digital marketing Jargon Buster then please let us know and we’ll look to add it. We’d like to think this is the most extensive glossary of online marketing terms available.

 

|#| A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H| I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z


#

 

301 Redirect 

A permanent redirect from one URL to another URL. 301 redirects are often used to mask affiliate links.

302 Redirect

A temporary redirect from one URL to another URL

404

An error message when a page cannot be found on a website

500 Internal Server Error

A general HTTP status code that means something has gone wrong on the web site’s server but the server but the server doesn’t know what it is, not that useful eh?

A

 

A/B Page Testing

Testing alternative pages, page A and page B against each other. The page that wins is then tested against another and so on.

Abandonment Rate

Also known as ‘Bounce Rate.’ All pages on your site will have this rate and sometimes it can be a good thing eg a customer visits your Customer Service page or FAQ and gets what they want quickly.

Ad Optimisation

Testing the creative (the words and pictures) of banner adverts. The key here is not to concentrate just on the click-through rate but also on the Landing Page results and subsequent conversion.

Ads, Google

Google Pay Per Click advertising programme seen at the top and bottom of the Search Engine Research Page.

Affiliate (Marketing)

An affiliate markets products or services sold by a merchant on a commission basis. Also known as Performance Marketing.

Agile Marketing

The idea here is to react quickly with appropriate content when an opportunity in the news presents itself. Common sense really, without the need to create a buzz word term.

Algorithm

Clever mathematics that work out what result is shown by a search engine or presents options online or in an app based on your behaviour and selections.

Alt Text

A ‘tag’ that describes what is on a picture. It’s vital for screen readers that allow visually impaired people to ‘hear’ what the picture is and also a part of good SEO practice. Originated in the era of dial up modems to show what the picture would be once loaded.

Amazon Optimisation

Making sure the product listing converts and is optimised for search in the Amazon A9 search engine.

Analytics Software

Google Analytics for example is a free analytics programme and much the standard as it and integrates with other services like Google Ads, Google Shopping and Google Search Console.

One of the keys with Google Analytics is to set up Goals. Which means you can measure the success of your marketing effort.

Anxiety

This is a pretty new term used by Anne Holland’s site ‘Which Test Won?’ It sums up what a potential customer may feel on your site. They might get anxious if they don’t feel ‘secure.’ They will be looking for confirmation of security (familiar signs of trust like testimonials and secure trading icons).

API (Application Programming Interface)

How software talks to each other. The code monkeys will allow outside software to talk to their software. This will be only for particular functions. For example using a product like HootSuite that allows you to post to Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook etc will use their respective API’s.

Attribution (Marketing)

Which traffic channel provided the conversion to a sale?  The main channels are organic search, paid, email and social.

Authority Site

A website which has many incoming links from other expert or authority sites. An Authority Site will also have high PageRank, and search results placement. The site will appear for a variety of keyword terms.

Average Order Value (AOV)

What is the Average Order Value for your customers? It’s a key to the success of any Web site and should be tracked as a vital measure. You can look at Up-Selling (encouraging customers to increase the AOV with more products or more expensive ones) or Cross-Selling (selling another item with the order).

 

B

Top^

Backlink

A link to a page or site from any other page or site.

Big Idea Testing

If you want to be radical you make big changes. Yes there can be huge gains but these types of test can also result in big failures. Look to do incremental changes (small gains that add up) alongside or instead of the more radical tests.

Blog

A website which presents content in a chronological order like a diary. Most blogs use a Content Management System like WordPress. .

Bounce Rate

The percentage of visitors who enter a site and then leave it after viewing one page.

Breadcrumbs

This refers to the Website navigation seen at the top of the page that tells the visitor exactly where they are on your site eg Home > Products > Football.

It’s a best practice in SEO terms as well as it aids the search engines to understand the hierarchy of your site (that means which are the important pages).

Digital marketing Jargon Buster Image 3

C

Top^

Call to Action

The classic marketing term, which just means signposting what the visitor, should do next. It’s one of those myths that all you have to do to increase conversion is get the colour of the ‘Call to Action’ button right. It’s more to do with the clarity of copy around the button or text link and sometimes the size of the button

Canonical Tag

(Duplicate content) canon = legitimate or official version. A way of telling the Google Search Engine ‘Spider’ which content to use when you have similar content on your site.

Cart Checkout

Testing the checkout and looking at ‘Shopping Cart Abandonment’ is one of the first places to start in any testing programme. Ideas and tests can include:-

– Reducing the number of pages

– Highlighting required fields

– Removing any need to “start an account” or “register” prior to checking out

– Adding trust icons such as Secure Trading icons

– Showing the number of steps/not counting the number of steps left

Clarity

A simple word that offers an approach to your testing; is everything clear on the Website? Have you made sure the steps through to the Conversion are clear? Steps to help you understand if everything is clear for the visitor include Usability Testing, talking to your sales staff and examining your internal search (what can’t visitors find)?

Clickstream

The list of pages a visitor clicked on during a single visit to your site.

Clickthrough

This is when a visitor clicks on any link.

Clickthrough Rate

The percentage of people who clicked a specific link on a page.

Conclusive Results

These are valid results that you can safely draw a conclusion. Also known as Statistically Valid Results. In order to achieve this, you need a volume of conversions – around 350 – within a short time period – at maximum perhaps four weeks.

Use your current conversion rate to calculate how much unique traffic you’ll need to the test for the estimated time period.

Content Management System (CMS)

This is a type of software that allows non-technical people to add words and pictures (content) to a website.

Content

Content means anything that can be put on a website and refers in the main to text and copy. Rich Content refers to video, slideshows and audio.

Content Marketing

Content marketing is the creation and distribution of valuable ‘content’ (videos, blog posts, social media posts, infographics, calculators etc.). Content must be relevant, consistent and fun. The aim being to create an action, not just a sale but something worth commenting and sharing.

Control

Sometimes call the Control Page or the ‘original.’ This is the existing page, the one you should have a lot of data on and wish to improve the conversion for.

The goal of the test is to see if any changes to the control – or completely different variations – will work better than the original control. The control is considered the baseline that you want to beat.

Conversion

Conversion is the goal for your Web site. A goal (conversion) can be what you define it so a sale, a sign up to a newsletter or filling in a form.

Other conversion actions can include:-

– Playing a video

– Joining a mailing list

– Filling in a lead form

– Calling your sales or customer care phone line or emailing

– Posting a comment or review

– Starting a survey

– Clicking on a navigational link to visit another page on your site

Conversion Driver

An aid to conversion either an offer or an advert on or some element that overcomes resistance to the conversion. Like free shipping or a customer review, or celebrity endorsement or testimonial could be considered as Conversion Drivers.

Conversion Rate

The percentage of your visitors that convert to the goal you define.

Conversion Optimisation (CO)

The process of creating an experience or best practice for a website (or landing page) visitor with the goal of increasing the amount of visitors that convert into paying customers or leads.

Also known as Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO).

CPC

Cost Per Click or Cost Per Conversion.

CPM

Cost per Thousand impressions. The cost of Pay Per Click advertisements.

M = the Roman numeral for one thousand.

CRM

Customer Relationship Management really means a database that allows you to gather and track all the different ‘touches’ your customer has with your organisation. A good CRM system will allow you to segment your customers for marketing campaigns and give them the best possible service.

Credibility

Is your site credible to a visitor? If you are an established brand you are halfway there. If you don’t have the brand then you’ll have to work harder. Professional design, confidence boosters like ‘trust icons’ and testimonials will all help your site be more credible.

Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA)

Classic jargon meaning what are your customers thinking when they are on your site. If you want to find out then use Usability Testing and ask your panel.

Digital Marketing Jargon Buster Image 2

D

Top^

Depress Conversion

This really means looking at the opposite of conversion ie what is stopping customers convert? This will come about after your research and you start to form the hypothesis that you are going to test and confirm. Examples include lack of signs of trust.

Digital Marketing

Encompasses everything marketing that can be done online or on an electronic device.

Digital Marketing Activities include:

  • Affiliate Marketing
  • Content Marketing
  • Email Marketing.
  • Instant Messaging Marketing
  • Podcasts
  • Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
  • Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
  • Social Media Marketing (SMM)
  • Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC)
  • Video Marketing

Distraction

How can you remove the distraction from your pages, what can you take out and still impress the visitor into a conversion?

Duplicate Content

This is a big no as your Web site can be penalised by search engines for having the same content on the site twice or more. See ‘Canonical Tag.’

Dynamic Content

Various rules are used to build a page for a specific type of visitor. Usually, a page is described as ‘static’ that is one page that does not change (also known as hardcoded).

 

E

Top^

E.A.T (Google)

Is an acronym that Google uses for understanding the page quality of your pages:

  • Expertise
  • Authority
  • Trustworthiness

eCommerce

Buying online.

Engagement 

When a visitor, follower or subscriber takes an action. They do something. They comment, they react or they share something on your website or on a social profile.

DO NOT be fooled by ‘engagement values’ stated by some social networks.

For example Facebook still claims a three-second view of a video as an engagement. Really? You know people are scrolling through stuff don’t you?

Entry Page

The page a visitor enters the Website.

Evergreen Content

Evergreen content is search-optimised content that is always going to be relevant and stays ‘fresh’ for readers over a long period. Find content that is consistently ranking and refresh at regular intervals to help your site appear in search.

Exit Survey

Why are you leaving my site! Keep it simple. There is a lot of good software out there that will trigger on a visitor exit and you can ask them what led them to leave?

Experience Testing

What is the experience for your visitors and potential customers?

Also known as ‘Walking in your customer’s shoes.’ You actually go through the process you want the customer to achieve. Simple but effective.

External Factors

Everything off your site that might affect conversion including your competition.

Eye Flow

How your eyes ‘travel’ over the page. Different from print and something a good designer will take into account when building the page.

Eye Tracking

Software that shows you where a person looks on the page and in what order they look. Usually presented as a ‘heatmap’ a page will look very different to a visitor.

 

 

F

Top^

Factorial Test Design

Any factor affecting conversion can be checked with multivariate testing software.

Feedback

Specifically, how is a site performing and different from a survey.

Feed Content

A feed delivers customers information via websites or programs such as news aggregators.

Fold

Often referred to in the phrase ‘beneath the fold’ meaning a visitor has to scroll down the page. Originates from the newspaper publishing industry.

Funnel, The Sales

You start with a large number of prospects and end with conversions. They go through a ‘funnel’ from ‘awareness’ through ‘consideration’ to finally ‘purchase’.

Digital Marketing Jargon Buster Image

G

Top^

 

Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO)

If you start a digital growth methodology without knowing your conversion goal you’ll result will be rubbish.

Goals (Analytics) 

This refers to analytical goals. It is easy to set them up in Google Analytics. Try to create goals that are relevant to actions. For example subscribers to newsletters or time on page for important content. You must be able to measure all your activities to see your return on investment.

Google Dance, The

Google is always trying to improve searches for its users, therefore, the algorithm is being updated and tested often and so your site may jump up and down positions on the Google results page.

Google Optimizer (GO)

It’s a free tool for A/B page testing. Compare with some of the newer software like Visual Website Optimiser.

Google Shopping

A feed driven price comparison service. Usually seen with images, as a carousel, at the top of the Google search page.

Growth Hacking

Is not a magic bullet. Growth hacking is a process. That process should be repeatable and scalable. It involves all manner of cross-disciplinary skills, a work flow, hypothesis, hard work and creativity.

Heat map image for digital marketing jargon buster

H

Top^

Heatmaps

Software like CrazyEgg or HotJar, create overlays on your site pages and shows, by colour, which parts of the page are clicked on the most.

  • Heatmaps also include scroll maps showing how far down a page a person goes.
  • Clickmaps give a good idea of what is going on but are not that accurate.
  • Scrollmaps show where to put your most valuable content, that is above the fold, meaning the higher up the page the better.

Hits

This is a term only to be used by technical bodies and refers to each part of a page being downloaded. Therefore a single page that is downloaded will create several ‘hits’ as documents (like PDFs) images and sound files each count as one ‘hit.’

Hitwise

A rather expensive online intelligence system and one of the most valuable tools you can use for finding out about competitors. It can tell you where customers come from and where they go to and opportunities for certain key word terms.

Home Page

Not necessarily where all your visitors start their journey on your Website but certainly very important. Show signs of security, social testimony and reviews to show signs of confidence.

Hub Pages

A trusted page with good quality content that links out to related pages.

HTML

Hyper Text Markup Language. This is what a search engine is reading on your site. HTML tells the story of the page and the different elements on that page.

Hypothesis

Before you can start a page test, you must create a hypothesis that explains what you are testing. Make sure you are happy with the fact that you will, on occasions, be wrong.

 

I

Top^

 

Impression

Simply means a page loading in a browser.

Inbound Link

Inbound links from related pages on other sites are the source of trust and PageRank according to search engines.

Incremental Testing

Testing only a part of a page. For instance a headline, button size, button copy, images etc.

Indexed Pages

Pages on your site that have been ‘crawled’ and added to a search engine’s database (index) of pages.

Infographics

A fun way to show information with pictures. Figures can be boring and using funky graphics gets a message across in an engaging manner.

Internal Search

It is vital to have an internal search facility on your site. A visitor who searches is around 12% more likely to buy (eConsultancy Report 2008). You can also find out a lot that helps the site. Including keywords to add to your content and what a visitor can’t find.

Interaction Design

Jargon. You want all your visitors to ‘interact’ with your pages, don’t you? I suppose it’s a way of looking in a different way. Perhaps you want to ‘engage’ visitors, make them active on the page by clicking on slideshows or watching video or clicking on a call to action button. How do you ‘interact’ with pages? Your visitors will most likely be just like that.

 

J

Top^

JavaScript

A programming language commonly used for building website features that require user interaction.

Jump Links

These are also known as anchor links. Jump links are links that take you to a specific part of a page. As on this page. When you click on the ‘J’ in the navigation above you are taken to this listing.

Keyword Research for digital marketing jargon buster

K

Top^

Kaizen Method

‘Kaizen’ is usually translated as the process of continuous improvement. Another overworked term; you want your site to keep improving, don’t you?

Keyword

Or ‘Keyword Phrase’ The word or phrase that a potential visitor to your site enters into a search engine. Visitors rarely use a single word (unless it is a brand name). Visitors are much more likely to use 2, 3 or 4 words or more. Longer terms would indicate that voice search is being used.

Keyword Density

The amount the Keyword is used on a page (you can be penalised by the search engine if you overuse them).

Keyword Research

Keyword research can rely heavily on Keyword Search Tools. There are many on the market including Google’s Keyword Planner in Adwords.

It’s handy to look at the variations of words. See ‘Long Tail’ for more about this aspect of SEO. These Keywords can be added to the copy on the page and that will aid natural search traffic.

There is another aspect to Keyword research. Writing copy that appeals. Which words work best for your copy? We all scan pages don’t we? We become very adept at finding the word. That word can make a sale.

How do you give your site the best chance of influencing your visitor? Employ a decent copywriter. Where do you find the best words to use? We’ll Keyword tools are a start, a copywriter is an excellent source and your Web Analytics package is very useful but the best is to invest in your internal search engine. With internal search, you’ll find what your visitors are looking for and in a lot of cases not finding.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

The most important measures of your business; usually presented in the form of a spreadsheet.

 

L

Top^

 

Landing Page

The first page a visitor ‘lands’ and not always the Home Page.

Landing Page Optimisation

Testing a page to establish which tweaks make that page more likely to convert a visitor to a sale etc.

If you change your pages in any way you should be monitoring how it affects your conversion (and quality score for search engines)

Latent Conversion

Visitors that don’t convert immediately; they go deeper into your site, go off and do something interesting and purchase some time after. We’ve seen figures and had experience of ‘latent conversion’ being 40% or higher. Do you always buy on your first visit to a site? Most people don’t unless driven by an offer.

Lead Generation

The jargon for creating a possible customer; a whole industry revolves around this term and many agencies and individuals specialise in creating lists of possible customers.

Life Time Value

How much a customer will spend with your company over a lifetime of need.

Lift Analysis

How much increase you have had when compared to a control. Lift Analysis can only be an approximation as there are so many factors involved when working on the conversion. You’ll also find that the ‘lift’ is likely to fall back as other factors take effect.

Link

Anything on a web page that can be clicked that takes you to another part of the page or another page entirely.

Link Bait

This can take various forms but it is in the main a way of attracting other sites to link to the bait. Link Bait is usually something interesting but it can also take the form of something contentious.

Link Building

Encouraging incoming links to your site.

Link Exchange

A link swapping- scheme. Best avoided as Google and the other search engines state this is against their policies.

Link Text

Also known as Anchor text, this is the visible text of a link. Google et al use anchor text to indicate the relevancy of the referring site and link to the content on the landing page. It’s best practice to use your keywords in your Link (Anchor) Text.

List

A list is a database and can refer to any list you care to name. In testing terms, it usually refers to an email list, either a bought list or your own customer list (opt-in).

LiveChat

One of many solutions that allow a visitor to use Instant Chat to talk to the business.

Long Tail

These are the more obscure Key Word Terms visitors will use when searching. A good Web site will have plenty of copy (words) that will capture this ‘free’ traffic and should have a programme of putting fresh content (words and images) on the site at regular intervals.

Lumen5

A simple video maker for social video marketing powered by A.I. and enables anyone without training or experience to easily create engaging video content within minutes.

M

Top^

Marketing Funnel

The Marketing Funnel is a way of looking at the process of your sale. In testing terms, you are going to be making the biggest difference at the top and the bottom. But now at least you know you have a funnel.

 

Marketing Optimisation

Audit your marketing on a regular basis. What are you getting for your money? It’s really common sense ‘how can I make things better?’

 

Mashup

In the SEO sense this is collecting different bits of content (words, images, video, audio and small applications like widgets) in a page. The content may exist separately on your site but you can combine it into a ‘Mashup’ and therefore create something new for little effort.

 

Meta Tags

Meta is data about other data. It tells the search engines about the page.

 

Meta Description

This is usually the long text you see on a Search Engine Results page. It’s good practice to repeat your keywords but the main purpose of the description it to act as a Call to Action.

 

Message Matching

Do the words and intent of your adverts or social posts match the message on your landing page?

 

Meta Title

This is where you want to put your keywords and the nearer the beginning the better.

 

Microsite

Microsites sit outside your main site. They can be two pages or hundreds. A microsite has a defined purpose. It’s either for a particular marketing campaign or other purposes such ad creating SEO benefit (an external blog for example).

 

Multivariate Page Testing

Testing multiple pages and different elements from Headlines to buttons. Only usable for very large Websites with a dedicated team.

 

N

Top^

Natural Search

Natural Search means not paid for and therefore a ‘free’ source of traffic for your site. Also known as Organic Search.

No Follow

This tells a Search Engine to ignore a link.

No Index

This tells the Search Engine not to place this page in the search engine index.

Non-Conclusive Results

It’s a fact of testing that sometimes you won’t have a conclusion. Experience will tell you which elements on a page will be worth testing. Toying with how to write a tagline or the shade of azure blue for your call to action button is best avoided.

Non-Reciprocal Link

Google and all the search engines give more value to a one-way link. This means a site links to yours but you don’t link to theirs. Google etc see that as ‘a vote of confidence.’

 

O

Top^

 

Offer

What are you offering your visitor? Why should they purchase from your site? Why should they fill in their contact details? Is the product or service strong enough? Can you give something useful for free? What are the features and benefits? Are these compelling offers?

Optimisation

The process of testing different versions of a web page, emails or banner advertisement in order to discover which gains the best response. The optimisation can be trailed on smaller, significant groups before rolling out a larger campaign.

Organic Links

Links that come about naturally. You have not paid for them.

Original

In CRO the original is your control page. The page that exists and which you wish to optimise. You’ll have statistics related to this page and it will act as the benchmark for your changes. What you are looking for is a new original page, a winner.

 

P

Top^

PageRank (PR)

Google came up with this idea of rating a site on many factors and then ranking it on a scale of 0 to 10. It is a rough idea of a site’s strength and should be seen as a broad measure of the site’s success. Google say they no longer use this algorithm to any degree but some SEO consultants think it still has a value.

Page Analysis

This is the path your visitors take through your site. It’s the visitor’s journey from the landing page to purchase. Viewing journeys can be daunting.

What do their journeys have in common? What, if anything, helped them buy? These pages can be a good place to start your optimisation programme. They work. Can you make them work even better?

Performance Marketing

Performance-based advertising, also known as pay for performance advertising, is a form of advertising in which the purchaser pays only when there are measurable results. Also known as affiliate marketing.

Persona Marketing

Persona marketing means creating fictional customers from your known marketing segments. You give them a name and as much detail as possible. For example, Jane is 32, she works as a graphical designer, she only buys when a promotion is right for her.

It’s a way of writing and designing for Websites. It is worth doing as it can give an insight into how to focus on a particular page or path through the site. The downside is you can generalise about customers but they are all different and then you fall into the trap of trying to please all customers.

Personalisation

There’s an old saying in marketing about the most important sound in the world being the sound of your own name. We all respond to our name. Campaigns and sites can gain from this approach. But you can put up a barrier, a customer will go elsewhere if forced to register. Personalised email can look tawdry if the name has been misspelt and the only way to clean your data is by someone reading every customer record.

PPA (Pay Per Action)

Like Pay Per Click except publishers only get paid when click-through results in conversions.

PPC (Pay Per Click)

A prospective visitor clicks on an advert on the search page or on partner sites or within a video and arrives at your site.

PPP (Pay Per Performance)

A form of performance marketing that means you only pay for responses to your advert (banner).

Predictive Analysis

Using your current data to predict future results. It really is a finger in the air approach. Better to test and test often than make assumptions on how well a test is going to perform.

Primary Sensitivity

Visitors will be sensitive to different elements of the page. When deciding on what to test evaluate the page for the most sensitive elements. It’s a way of seeing the priority to test. Most visitors are going to be sensitive to prices, features and benefits.

 

Q

Top^

Qualitative

Statistics tell a great part of the story but there are something’s that statistics cannot tell. That is the human factor. A focus group talking about your product or service can give valuable insight for a copywriter or a product manager and this can be fed into your testing programme.

Quantitative

Quantitative simply means the data that you build your insights on (the numbers). If you don’t understand the data then ask or learn exactly what it means. It’s very easy to make assumptions that can lead you down a blind alley.

 

R

Top^

Reciprocal link

Two sites which link to each other.

Redirect

Used when a page moves or no longer exists, the search engine is ‘Redirected’ to another relevant page. This can be permanent or temporary depending if the page is just to be hidden while being updated.

Regression Analysis

Instead of starting at the top or your Marketing Funnel you start at the end with your successful conversions. Did all these successful conversions come from the same source? What do these conversions have in common? What parts of the site helped them convert. You will need advanced statistical help and a large sample to draw any conclusions.

Relevance

How relevant is your landing page to your visitor? If a page is relevant then a visitor is more likely to be converted. Not only does a page have to be relevant to the visitor it must be obvious. Visitors won’t hang around if they decide the page is not what they are looking for and therefore abandonment increases.

Robots.txt

A text file created at the root of your site that can restrict the Search Engines from certain pages like your Content Management System.

Return on Investment (ROI)

Is your investment returning enough revenue to make it worthwhile? Sometimes confused with ROAS or Return on Advertisement Spend.

Roll-Out

Once you have the best version of your page you may roll-out your findings to other pages.

digital marketing jargon buster

S

Top^

Sample Size

The total number of people who visited the page or the total number of recipients of your email.

Sandbox, The

Google is said to place ‘untried’ Web sites in the Sandbox for a period of time as a trail. No one believes this anymore.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

SEM includes search engine optimisation, paid listings and other search-engine related services.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

SEO is all about best practice and is aimed at getting your Web site the most amount of traffic by making it appeal as a quality site to the Search Engines. SEO includes making sure your pages conform to a certain standard, your images have ‘Alt Text’ and your site is being linked to. The biggest factors these days are site speed and security.

Search Engine Results Page (SERPs)

What you see after typing in your search words on Google for example.

Segmentation

The act of grouping the different types of visitor so as to address their needs and market to them accordingly. The more targeted you are with your groups of segments the higher the conversion rate is likely to be. For example, common segments could be a prospective customer, new customers, loyal customer. You can use one page as a template or guide to address the different needs and relevancy of your segments. Google Analytics offers segmentation for example based on traffic types, Organic, Paid Search, Referral, Social and Other.

Session

A particular visit from a single visitor is referred to as a ‘session.’

Skyscraper content (Technique)

Finding other websites content that is performing well for keyword terms valuable to your business. Once found you create content that improves on the original and surpasses it. It’s not copying it’ using another angle that engages for your business.

Site Map

A map of what’s on your site and used by Search Engines as an XML (Extended Mark Up) file, sitemap.xml.

Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Using social media from Facebook to LinkedIn to promote your site. Which means content of the highest quality.

Spider

An automated programme used by search engines to find and add web pages to their indexes.

Splash Page

A page created to appeal to humans, usually created for a specific campaign.

Split Testing

Another way of saying A/B page testing.

Static Page

A web page without dynamic content or variables such as session IDs in the URL.

Stickiness

Quite an old-fashioned term meaning how long the visitor stays on your site.

Storytelling

Storytelling is essentially translating your marketing message into narrative form. Everyone responds to a good story. ‘Digital’ storytelling refers to a variety of emergent new forms of digital narratives, web-based stories, interactive stories, podcasts etc.

T

Top^

Taguchi Test

Originally created by Mr Genichi Taguchi, a Japanese engineer in the 1950s to help improve the quality of manufactured goods. Most CRO exponents rely on other methods as these tests need expert analysts.

Test Cell

Also known as a Test Panel. This is the particular version of a test for a specific list or traffic source.

Text link

A plain HTML link that does not involve graphics or special code and more trusted than a banner or graphic link.

Thank You Page

The page your customer will see immediately after they have converted. If your visitor has bought then they are highly likely to perform another action especially if you give them an offer for purchasing. An offer code for a complementary Website, filling in a survey or sending an offer to a friend is worth testing.

Time on Page

How long a visitor stays on a page.

Traffic

Simply the number of visitors that come to your site but not all traffic is the same. Segmenting your traffic and testing what works for that segment is the norm in Conversion Rate Optimisation (when you have the volume of traffic). Traffic from different sources can convert at radically different rates. Relevancy is often the key. Is that segment seeing what they want to see? If you have different sources of traffic then it is worth testing each independently.

Traffic Source

The place where the traffic is coming from, for example, PPC, organic, email list, banner advertising, ePartnerships, affiliate programmes. Be wary of making assumptions about your traffic sources. The source of the traffic is the last click the visitor made and the potential customer may have been influenced by other factors, for example, a newspaper article or a recommendation from an influential Twitter user.

 

U

Top^

 

Unique Visitor

Unfortunately, this term is not as precise as it sounds. A unique visitor should be one person who visits your site any number of times. But a ‘cookie tracks this uniqueness some visitors may refuse to accept a cookie or delete their cookies. A visitor may use another computer or other device to view your site and so be counted twice. It is best to view Unique Visitor (UV) as an indicator of visitors and not an absolute.

Urgency

How ‘urgent’ is your offer to a visitor? Urgency is a factor in considering your offer to a visitor. Using offers that stress time discipline ‘Offer ends midnight 12th of March’ or limited stock ‘only 10 Sproggets left’ can instigate urgency. Auction sites are the keenest example of instilling urgency in a visitor.

Usability Lab

A Usability Laboratory is a room dedicated to carrying out user tests.

Usability Tests

There are a number of sites offering to carry out usability tests and they are well worth doing. Most people who work on Websites access usability by their own standards. It is a good policy to use a hired cross-section of visitors to test how easy a page is to use. Tests can be carried out before and after a redesign.

User Experience (UX)

This term stems from programmers describing how the screen on the computer looks to the user. In CRO terms this acronym can be used to describe the look of the web page. A tester may refer to ‘tweaking the UX’ by changing the layout of the page.

UTM (code)

Stands for Urchin Tracking Module. Google bought an analytics company called ‘Urchin’ many years ago. When you have a Google Analytics code you can start adding UTM codes and track clicks to your page for campaigns. You can add labels to the code like the Source (eg Facebook), Medium (video) and give it a name. Just search on Campaign URL Builder.

Uniform Resource Locator (URL)

A Web Address.

Up-Sell

A marketing term for increasing the spend of a customer; usually by making a great offer.

Usability Testing

How an unbiased visitor uses your site. These tests can be commissioned from 3rd party sites for a reasonable amount of money. A very useful before and after test for your Web site changes.

User Generated Content (UGC)

Visitors write content for your site or leave video or pictures. Your FaceBook page is User Generated and services like BazaarVoice or reviews.co.uk enable a site to have USG in the form of product reviews.

 

V

Top^

 

Value Per Lead

To calculate your ‘Value per Lead’ start with your marketing budget (but omitting general branding advertising) and divide it by the total number of leads generated. Now you can put a value on how much each conversion is worth to you and your company.

Value Proposition

The Value Proposition is for the visitor. What particular benefit will they gain from a page? Also in this realm is the Unique Value Proposition, which means how do you differentiate your business from your competition and also the Online Value Proposition, which means why should a visitor buy from your Website?

Variables

Variables are the elements on a page that can change during testing. Everything from your headlines, calls to action, navigation, and button size and colour.

Variable Matching

This is a term used in multivariate testing where different versions of your page and many variables of the elements on the page are tested. Highly complex such methods demand complex software and trained analysts.

 

W

Top^

 

Web Analytics Audit

Web analytic software produces vast amounts of data but the key is what can you action? A skilled auditor can identify which data is worth pursuing and where you are lacking in reports. It’s easy to be blinded by numbers that have no bearing on your conversion.

Website Optimisation

Online marketing is awash with people telling you how to optimise your site. The truth of the matter is you shouldn’t be making your site. Your opinion is an opinion and is valid because you can use experience and knowledge. But it’s your visitors that build your Website and it is working with them and the mix of designers, copywriters and external experts that will optimise your site and increase your revenue.

Website Usability

Put simply how easy is it for a visitor to use your site? Can they navigate with ease? What is the journey you wish them to take? See ‘Usability Testing.’

Widget

Small applications used on web pages to provide specific functions; used a lot by CMS software like WordPress to add interest to the sidebar.

Wireframe

An outline design of a Web page showing where each element is placed.

 

X

Top^

XML

Extensible Markup Language (XML)  defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable.

XML-Sitemap

Is a text file used to detail all URLs on a website. It usually can be found at the end of your domain name i.e. domainname.com/sitemap.xml.

 

Y

Yelp

A social review platform and search engine that allows users to leave reviews for businesses.

 

Z

 

Zapier
Zapier allows you to choose automation modules (apps, known as ‘zapps’) to connect different online platforms. In effect it allows your apps to ‘talk’ to each other.

 

Conversion Detectives Ltd is a digital marketing company  in Hertfordshire