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Every photographer needs to be proactive about Search Engine Optimization to some degree. The first step is learning about the SEO terminology that Google and SEO experts use.
To make this topic more approachable to photographers, we’ve compiled a glossary of SEO terms. We’ll do our best to explain each one briefly, clearly, and in plain English, so you have the knowledge you need to make decisions about your digital strategy.
Alt text: A brief description added to images in HTML. It helps search engines understand what an image is about, and it is beneficial for visually impaired users who use screen readers. It’s a good practice to include relevant keywords in your alt text.
Anchor text: Clickable text in a hyperlink. SEO best practices dictate that anchor text be relevant to the page you’re linking to, rather than generic text like “click here”.
Average engagement time: The amount of time a user spends on a particular page or website, divided by the total number of users. A higher average engagement time indicates that visitors find the content interesting and relevant.
Back-end: The part of a website that users don’t see. It involves server-side development and database management. A well-developed back-end can help improve site performance and user experience.
Backlink: An incoming link from another website to a page on your website. Pages with a high number of backlinks tend to have high organic search engine rankings.
Bounce rate: The percentage of visitors who navigate away from the site after viewing only one page. A high bounce rate can indicate that users aren’t finding what they’re looking for or the page isn’t user-friendly.
Caching: A process where web pages store static files (like HTML, images, etc.) to help reduce server lag. It can improve load speed, offering a better user experience.
Crawler: Also known as a spider, a crawler is software search engines use to index web content by crawling and scanning websites.
CSS: Stands for Cascading Style Sheets. It’s a style sheet language used for describing the look and formatting of a document written in HTML. Good CSS implementation can help websites look good and load faster, improving user experience.
DA: Stands for Domain Authority. It’s a score (from 1-100) developed by Moz that predicts how well a website will rank on search engine result pages (SERPs).
Direct traffic: Website traffic that occurs when a visitor arrives directly to a website by typing the URL into their browser or clicking on a bookmark.
Do-follow links: Hyperlinks that do allow search engines to follow them and reach another website. These links can pass on ranking power to other websites.
Domain Name Registrar: A company that manages the reservation of internet domain names. A domain name is your website name and address where Internet users can access your website.
DNS: Stands for Domain Name System. It’s like the phone book of the internet, translating domain names into IP addresses so browsers can load Internet resources.
Duplicate content: Refers to substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely match or are appreciably similar. It’s a practice that is generally not recommended because it can result in a lower search ranking.
Engagement: A measure of user interaction with your website and its content. It can include actions like clicks, shares, comments, and time spent on the website.
Event: In the context of Google Analytics, an event is a user’s interaction/activity on a webpage that can be tracked like downloads, button clicks, or video views.
External links: Hyperlinks that point to any domain other than the domain the link exists on. They can improve a website’s SEO ranking because search engines use them as a recommendation system.
Front-end: The interactive part of a website that users see and engage with, encompassing elements like visuals, menus, and sliders. The front-end of a website is controlled by the user’s browser, and it’s shaped by HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Google Analytics: An analytics service offered by Google, designed to aggregate and evaluate data related to your website’s visitors.
Google Search Console: A tool from Google designed to assist in tracking your website’s performance in Google Search results and resolving any potential issues.
Header tags: HTML tags, from H1 to H6, used to identify headings and subheadings within your content. H1 is the most important and H6 is the least. They can help both readers and search engines understand your content better.
HTML: Stands for HyperText Markup Language. It’s the standard language for creating websites and web applications. It helps tell the browser how to structure the web content.
Https protocol: A protocol for secure communication over a computer network. Websites that utilize https offer security measures that can safeguard user data from unwanted intrusions.
Image compression: This refers to reducing an image file’s size without notably impacting its quality. It’s crucial as it helps speed up your website’s load time.
Indexing: The process of integrating web pages into the results of Google’s search engine.
Internal links: Hyperlinks that navigate from one page on a website to another page within the same website. They are useful for helping visitors navigate a website and for spreading link equity (ranking power) around websites.
JavaScript: This is a scripting language that allows you to implement complex features on web pages, such as interactive content and dynamic web pages.
Keyword: A word or phrase that describes the content on your page or post best. It’s the search term that you want to rank for with a certain page.
Link attribute: This is a feature in the HTML anchor tag that establishes the connection between the present document and the document it’s linked to. It can take forms like “nofollow” and “dofollow.”
Link building: The process of getting other websites to link back to your website. It’s a key SEO strategy, as these inbound links signal to search engines that your content is valuable.
Link equity: Also known as “link juice,” it refers to the value passed from one page or site to another through links. It’s a key factor in how search engines rank web pages.
Link profile: The overall composition of all the inbound links pointing to a website, including their quantity, quality, diversity, and relevance.
Loading speed: The time it takes for a webpage to load. Faster load speeds offer a better user experience and can improve your website’s SEO.
Metadata: This refers to data that gives information about other data. For a webpage, it could involve details about the page’s content, author, significant keywords, and copyright specifics.
Meta descriptions: These are concise summaries of a webpage that show up in search engine results, aiding users in understanding the page’s content and potentially affecting the rate at which users click on the page.
Meta titles: Also recognized as title tags, they represent a webpage’s title and are shown on search engine results pages as the clickable title for a particular result.
New user: A user who has not been to your site before or who has cleared their cookies recently. Google Analytics uses cookies to track this.
No-follow links: Links that do not pass on SEO benefits to other pages. They’re used when a website doesn’t want to associate itself with or endorse the webpage it’s linking to.
Organic traffic: Website traffic that comes from unpaid search engine results. Users find your website after using a search engine like Google.
PageSpeed Score: This is a rating given by Google that evaluates the speed at which your page loads. A higher score, out of 100, signifies that the page is well-optimized and loads rapidly.
Query: In SEO terms, a query refers to the word or phrase a user inputs into a search engine.
Redirection: A method used to guide users and search engines from one URL to a different one, usually employed when a webpage has relocated to a new address.
Referral traffic: Traffic that lands on your website from sources other than a search engine, such as when someone follows a link from a social media post or blog article that directs them to your website.
Responsive design: Web design approach that makes web pages render well on a variety of devices and window or screen sizes. It’s important for user experience and SEO.
Robots.txt: A file that tells search engine spiders not to crawl certain pages or sections of a website.
Search engine: A software application engineered to perform web searches, producing a roster of web pages in accordance with the user’s search term.
Search engine optimization: Frequently abbreviated as SEO, it represents the systematic process of enhancing a website’s or web page’s prominence in the non-paid outcomes of a search engine’s results. This can involve improving on-page content, meta tags, and backlink profile.
SEO audit: A process of analyzing how well a web presence relates to best practices. It’s the first step to creating an implementation plan with measurable results.
SERP: An acronym for Search Engine Results Page. This is the dedicated page that presents the outcomes of a query performed on a search engine.
Session duration: Refers to the cumulative duration a visitor spends on your website within a single engagement session.
Sitemap: A systematically arranged document that enumerates all the web pages present on your website, offering Google and other search engines a structured understanding of your site’s content.
Spam score: A measure created by Moz to forecast the probability of a particular URL facing penalties from Google. A score of 1%-30% is considered a Low Spam Score. A score of 31%-60% is considered a Medium Spam Score. A score of 61%-100% is considered a High Spam Score.
SSL certificate: A digital certificate that provides authentication for a website and enables an encrypted connection. Websites with SSL have “https://” in their URL.
Structured data: A standardized format for providing information about a page and classifying the page content. It helps search engines understand your website’s content.
Traffic acquisition: In Google Analytics, the Traffic Acquisition report is crafted to give insights into the origins of your website and app visitors.
URL: Short for Uniform Resource Locator, this is effectively the web page’s address, marking the precise spot of a web page on the Internet.
User: Refers to an individual who has begun at least one session within a specific period on Google Analytics. A single user can hold several sessions.
Further Reading
Wonderful Machine: SEO Audit case studies
Wonderful Machine: SEO Implementation case studies
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