SEO glossary.

A 301 redirect is a permanent HTTP redirect to another URL. It tells browsers and search engines that a resource has moved and points them to the new destination.

A 302 redirect is a temporary HTTP redirect. It sends visitors to another URL while indicating that the original address is intended to remain relevant after the temporary change.

A 404 error is an HTTP response indicating that the requested resource could not be found. A useful error page can help visitors, but the server should still return the error status.

A/B testing is a controlled experiment comparing variants with a defined audience, allocation rule, and outcome. Random assignment and a planned analysis help assess a proposed change while preserving uncertainty and implementation limits.

An AI crawler is software used by an AI provider to fetch web resources. Documented provider rules distinguish purposes such as training and search, so controls should be assessed per named crawler.

AI Overviews are Google's generated summaries shown for some searches. Documented Google guidance says ordinary SEO foundations apply; additional special markup is not required for eligibility.

AI visibility is an industry term for a brand's observed presence in generated answers. Experimental measurements depend on the engines, prompts, locations, and dates included in the sample.

Alt text is a text alternative for an image. It communicates an image's relevant meaning when someone cannot see it, and helps search engines understand image context.

Alternate page with proper canonical tag is a Search Console indexing status for a duplicate that points to its preferred version. Exclusion of the alternate URL can be expected behavior.

Anchor text is the visible, clickable text of a link. Descriptive wording helps people and search engines understand the destination before following it. Use labels that accurately describe the target.

Apple Business Connect is the former name of Apple’s business information service. Apple now combines those capabilities with other business tools in Apple Business, so owners should use the current product guidance rather than an outdated setup path.

Attribution is assigning credit for an outcome to marketing interactions under a defined model. Different models and data limits can produce different answers from the same customer journey.

Average position in Search Console is the average position of a property's topmost result across measured impressions. It is an aggregate metric, not a fixed ranking every searcher sees.

A backlink is a link from another website to your website. Its value depends on the linking context and legitimacy, not just the number of links in a report.

A backlink audit is a structured review of incoming website links, their source context, destinations, and acquisition history. It identifies useful references, broken customer paths, and evidence requiring policy review. The audit should produce justified actions with source records, rather than automatic removal instructions based on vendor scores.

Black hat SEO is an industry term for tactics that violate search engine policies to manipulate visibility. Examples include cloaking and paid links created to influence rankings.

Bounce rate in GA4 is the share of sessions that were not engaged sessions. It is the complement of engagement rate and differs from the older Universal Analytics definition.

Brand mentions are recognizable references to a business or brand in published content, with or without a website link. Monitoring them helps verify identity, understand public coverage, and correct factual errors. A mention count alone does not establish independent endorsement, a ranking effect, or qualified customer inquiries.

Breadcrumbs are navigation links showing a page's place in a site's hierarchy. Breadcrumb structured data can describe that hierarchy to Google without replacing the visible navigation.

Broken link building is finding a publisher's broken resource link and suggesting a relevant replacement. The publisher should decide whether the replacement serves readers, without a promised ranking outcome.

A call to action, or CTA, is a prompt telling a visitor what step to take next. Clear wording should describe the action and help the reader understand what follows.

Canonicalization is the process of choosing a representative URL from duplicate or very similar pages. Site owners suggest a preference, and search engines decide which URL to use.

A ccTLD is a country-code top-level domain such as .us or .de. Search engines generally treat country-code domains as geographic signals, with exceptions for some domains used generically.

Citation building is creating or correcting business information on relevant third-party platforms. Accuracy, eligibility, and usefulness to customers should guide the work rather than a target directory count.

Cloaking is presenting different content to search engines and people with the intent to manipulate search results. Google identifies cloaking as a spam practice. Cloaking can hide a misleading experience from a business owner while exposing customers to different content or destinations.

Content decay is a sustained decline in a page's usefulness or search performance as information, competition, or audience needs change. Check seasonality, reporting changes, and technical access before attributing a decline to the content.

A content gap is a missing or inadequate answer in a website's coverage of its audience's needs. Competitor coverage can suggest gaps but cannot prove that every topic deserves a page.

Content pruning is reviewing pages and deciding whether to retain, improve, merge, remove, or exclude them from search based on their usefulness and performance. Low traffic alone is not enough to justify deleting a page.

Conversion rate is the share of a defined audience or set of visits that completes a defined action. Its meaning depends on the numerator, denominator, and reporting period.

Conversion rate optimization, or CRO, is improving a website's ability to help visitors complete useful business actions. The work should evaluate lead quality alongside the proportion of visitors who act.

Crawl budget is the amount of crawling a search engine is willing and able to do for a website. Google's guidance emphasizes large or rapidly changing sites, rather than ordinary small business websites.

Cumulative Layout Shift, or CLS, is a Core Web Vital measuring unexpected visual movement. It captures layout instability rather than the time needed to load a page.

Disavow is a Google Search Console feature for asking Google to disregard specified inbound links when assessing a site. Google cautions that most sites do not need it and incorrect use can harm performance. Review the link evidence, documented use conditions, property scope, and existing list before preparing a submission.

Dofollow link is an informal name for an ordinary link without a nofollow, sponsored, or ugc qualification. There is no standard dofollow HTML attribute that makes a link more powerful.

Domain Authority is Moz's proprietary comparative score for predicting a domain's ability to appear in search results. It is not a Google ranking factor or a measure of customer demand. Use it to organize relevant competitor research, then inspect actual pages, source links, and observed search performance before making decisions.

Doorway pages are pages created to rank for similar searches while directing users to substantially the same destination. Google's spam policy covers location pages that serve this manipulative purpose.

Duplicate content is content available in substantially the same form at more than one URL. Search engines may choose one representative URL rather than show every version separately.

Duplicate without user-selected canonical is a Search Console indexing status for a duplicate URL with no declared preferred version. Google selected another URL to represent the content.

An entity is a distinguishable thing, such as an organization, person, place, or product. Search systems can connect entity information from names, context, and other identifiers.

Entity SEO is an industry term for helping search systems understand the organizations, people, and subjects described on a website. It does not identify a Google certification or a promise of search placement.

Evergreen content is content whose core subject stays useful beyond a short news cycle. Keeping the subject relevant does not remove the need to check examples, policies, or product details.

FAQ schema is structured data describing visible questions and answers with the Schema.org FAQPage type. Google has retired FAQ rich results, so the vocabulary and Google search feature should not be treated as the same thing.

A featured snippet is an excerpt Google selects from a web page to answer a search query. Site owners cannot mark a page as a featured snippet themselves.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is Google's event-based analytics platform for websites and apps. Its reports depend on the events, privacy choices, and data collection settings implemented on the property.

Google Business Profile is Google's service for managing eligible businesses' information on Search and Maps. Eligibility and representation rules differ for storefronts and businesses serving customers at their locations.

Google Guaranteed is the former Local Services Ads badge and guarantee program. Google replaced that badging with Google Verified and discontinued the associated Money Back Guarantee; old articles may describe a program that is no longer offered.

The Google sandbox is an industry hypothesis that new websites face a fixed ranking waiting period. Google does not document a universal sandbox timer, so the label should not substitute for diagnosis.

Google Search Console is Google's tool for inspecting a site's search performance and technical search status. Its reports describe Google's observations and do not replace lead tracking or customer records.

Googlebot is Google's web crawler for Google Search. It requests pages so Google can discover and process content; a request does not mean a page will be indexed.

GPTBot is OpenAI's crawler for content that may be used to improve its models. Documented OpenAI guidance separates it from its search crawler and from user-initiated fetches.

Grey hat SEO is an informal label for tactics described as lying between policy-compliant optimization and manipulation. The label does not exempt a tactic from Google's spam policies.

Guest posting is contributing content to another publisher's website. Editorial contributions can be legitimate, while paid or scaled placements intended to manipulate ranking signals can violate Google's link spam policies.

An H1 tag is a top-level HTML heading that identifies a page's main subject. It serves the visible document structure and is different from the HTML title element.

A headless CMS is a content management system that supplies content separately from the website presentation layer. Developers use APIs and frontend code to turn that content into pages.

Helpful content is content created to meet a reader's needs rather than primarily to attract search engine traffic. Google emphasizes usefulness, reliability, and people-first intent.

Hreflang is an annotation describing language or regional alternatives for a page. It helps search engines select a suitable version and does not automatically translate content or replace canonicalization.

The hub-and-spoke model is a website organization pattern with a central resource linked to focused supporting pages. The links express relationships between subjects rather than a ranking formula.

Image SEO is making images accessible, discoverable, and suitable for their page context. Relevant text, crawlable image files, and appropriate delivery matter more than repeating keywords in filenames.

Index bloat is an informal term for search indexes containing many low-value URLs from a site. The concern is unnecessary coverage and maintenance, not a Google metric with a fixed threshold.

IndexNow is a protocol for notifying participating search engines when URLs change. A successful notification does not establish crawling or indexing, and Google is not a participating engine.

Interaction to Next Paint, or INP, is a Core Web Vital describing page responsiveness to user interactions. It includes interaction processing and the wait before the browser displays the next frame.

Internal linking is connecting pages within the same website using links. Useful internal links help visitors reach related information and help crawlers discover the site's pages.

JavaScript SEO is making script-dependent content and links accessible to search engines. The rendered page, response status, and link structure matter alongside the original HTML response.

JSON-LD is a format for representing linked data in JSON. On websites, it commonly appears in a script element to describe content without changing the visible page layout.

Key events in GA4 are events marked as important to a business. Marking an event does not prove it represents a qualified customer, and Google Ads conversions have a distinct role.

Keyword cannibalization is a situation where several pages compete for the same search intent without a clear reason for each page to exist. Keyword cannibalization can make it unclear which page should handle a customer's request.

A keyword gap is a difference between the queries covered by your website and those covered by competing sites. Each gap still needs a business and intent check.

Keyword mapping is assigning related search queries and their intent to specific website pages. The purpose is to give each page a clear role in the search journey.

Keyword stuffing is the excessive or unnatural use of search terms to manipulate rankings. Google's spam policies cover repetition that makes content less useful. Keyword stuffing can turn a service page into something customers struggle to trust.

A knowledge panel is a Google Search information box about an entity such as a person or organization. It is different from a Google Business Profile listing.

A landing page is the page a visitor first reaches during a visit. Marketers also use the term for pages designed around a campaign and a specific next action.

Largest Contentful Paint, or LCP, is a Core Web Vital that measures when the largest eligible content element becomes visible in the viewport during loading.

Link equity is an informal term for the ranking value associated with links. Google does not expose a public amount of equity that you can read from an individual link.

A link farm is a group of websites or pages organized primarily to manufacture links for search ranking manipulation. The term describes the arrangement and its purpose, not a public Google score. Evaluate the source pages, editorial independence, and placement agreements before deciding whether a network is legitimate or risky.

Link reclamation is recovering useful links lost through a move, changed URL, or mistaken destination. The appropriate repair depends on whether the destination still has relevant content.

LLM SEO is an industry term for work intended to help language-model systems find and represent useful website content. Experimental optimization claims need testing rather than being presented as a universal ranking formula.

Llms.txt is an experimental proposal for a Markdown file summarizing resources for language-model systems. Publishing the file does not guarantee adoption, training exclusion, citations, or improved search visibility.

Local citations are references to a business's identifying information on other websites or directories. Useful citations support accurate discovery, but directory quantity alone does not establish local search visibility.

Log file analysis is examining recorded server requests to understand crawling and response behavior. The usefulness of the conclusions depends on what the server recorded and whether bot identities were verified.

Machine translation SEO is managing automatically translated website content for search and reader usefulness. Translation quality and intent matter; automation does not remove the need for accurate language and technical implementation.

The map pack is a group of local business results displayed for some Google searches. Visibility depends on factors including relevance, distance, and prominence rather than an agency's promise.

A meta description is an HTML summary of a page. Google may use it for a search snippet or choose text from the page that better matches a query.

NAP consistency is agreement in a business's name, address, and phone information across relevant listings. Accurate representation matters; a remote business should not invent a location to make listings match.

Negative SEO is an attempt to harm another website's search visibility. A suspicious link or a traffic decline alone does not establish that an attack occurred.

Nofollow is a link relationship value that signals a limited association with a linked page. Google treats nofollow as a hint; it is not an indexing block for the destination.

Noindex is a robots instruction that tells supported search engines not to include a page in search results. A crawler must be able to fetch the instruction to process it.

Organic traffic is website traffic attributed to unpaid search results. A visit is a channel observation, not proof that the visitor became a qualified lead.

Orphan pages are pages without discoverable internal links from the website's linked structure. A sitemap can list an orphan, but it does not replace a useful navigation path for visitors.

Page experience is Google's way of describing aspects of how people experience a web page. Useful content remains essential; a good experience score alone does not secure search visibility.

The Page indexing report is a Search Console report grouping discovered URLs by indexing status. An excluded URL can reflect either an intentional choice or a problem requiring investigation.

PageSpeed Insights is Google's public tool for examining page performance. It combines available real-user data with a Lighthouse laboratory test; those measurements describe different conditions.

Pagination is splitting a collection across separately addressable pages. Search engines need discoverable links between the pages to find content beyond the first portion of the collection.

Parasite SEO is an informal label for publishing content on another site's established platform to benefit from its visibility. Arrangements can violate Google's site reputation abuse policy depending on their purpose.

People Also Ask is a Google results feature that presents related questions with expandable answers. Its presence and questions depend on the search and can change.

A pillar page is a broad resource that introduces a topic and links to more focused supporting pages. Its scope should serve readers rather than duplicate every supporting article.

A private blog network, or PBN, is a set of controlled websites used for manipulative linking, a link spam risk. We do not offer these networks as an SEO service.

Product schema is structured data that describes a product and eligible details such as offers or reviews. The markup must represent the page's visible information and comply with the relevant feature rules.

Product variants SEO is organizing and describing related product versions so people and search engines understand their differences. URL structure, canonical choices, and variant markup have separate roles.

Programmatic SEO is producing pages from a structured data model and reusable layouts. Each page still needs a distinct reader purpose and sufficient useful information to justify its own URL.

A redirect chain is a sequence of redirects before a request reaches its final destination. Each extra hop adds another request and makes troubleshooting the route more difficult.

Review gating is directing only selected customers toward public review requests while diverting others elsewhere. Google's review policies prohibit selectively soliciting positive reviews or discouraging negative reviews.

Rich results are search appearances with supported features beyond a standard text link. Eligible structured data can help a page qualify, but does not guarantee a feature.

Robots.txt is a file that tells supported crawlers which paths they may request. It controls crawling and is not a reliable way to keep a URL out of search results.

Scaled content abuse is creating many pages primarily to manipulate search rankings instead of help users. Google's policy focuses on purpose and value, regardless of whether people or automation produced the pages.

Schema markup is structured data that uses the Schema.org vocabulary. Correct vocabulary describes a page's content, while Google's separate documentation determines eligibility for Google rich results.

Search volume is an estimate of how often people search a keyword during a stated period in a defined market. It is not a forecast of website visits.

SEO content is content planned around a real search need and written to help the person making that search. Optimization supports usefulness rather than substituting for a useful answer.

A SERP is a search engine results page. Its links, map listings, and other features change with the query and the searcher's context. A SERP is the environment where a customer decides which answer or business to investigate.

SERP features are result formats beyond conventional text listings, such as image results, featured snippets, and map results. Their availability depends on the query and search engine.

A service-area business is a business that visits or delivers to customers rather than serving them at a staffed storefront. Google Business Profile has specific address and service-area representation rules.

Share of voice is a comparison of a brand's visibility against a defined competitor set. In SEO, the result depends on the chosen keywords, market, and measurement method.

Site reputation abuse is publishing third-party content mainly to exploit a host site's established ranking signals. Google's policy assesses the publishing arrangement and intent, not merely the presence of a guest author.

The skyscraper technique is an outreach approach that creates a resource intended to improve on existing linked content, then asks relevant publishers to consider it. Length alone does not establish improvement.

A soft 404 is a URL that appears missing or unhelpfully empty but returns a successful HTTP response. Google can treat that URL as an error rather than index its content.

Structured data is machine-readable information describing the content and entities on a page. Search engines use supported markup to understand pages and assess eligibility for certain search features.

Thin content is content that offers insufficient original value for its intended purpose. A short page can be useful, while a long page can still be repetitive or unhelpful.

Time to First Byte, or TTFB, is the time from the start of a request until the first byte of the response arrives. It includes more than server processing alone.

A title tag is the HTML title element that names a web page. Search engines can use it when creating a result's title link, but may display different wording.

A topic cluster is a group of related pages that covers a subject through distinct reader needs. Contextual links connect the group, often with a central overview or hub.

Topical authority is an industry description of a website's perceived expertise across a subject. Google does not publish a universal topical authority score or a required number of supporting articles.

Toxic backlinks are links that an SEO tool or reviewer labels potentially risky based on observed features. The label is not a public Google penalty diagnosis. Review the source page, the placement agreement, and any relevant manual action before deciding whether to monitor, remove, qualify, or consider disavowing a link.

A trailing slash is the slash at the end of a URL path. Search engines can treat slashed and unslashed paths as different URLs unless the site consistently consolidates them.

Unlinked brand mentions are references to a brand that do not include a clickable link to its website. A mention is not a backlink, and requesting a link requires an editorial reason.

A URL slug is the readable path segment used to identify a page. A clear slug helps people understand a destination before they open it.

A web crawler is software that requests web resources to discover or update information. Different crawlers have different purposes, access rules, and ways of identifying themselves.

White hat SEO is an industry term for optimization that follows search engine policies and helps people use a website. It is not a Google certification.

The X-Robots-Tag is an HTTP response header that carries indexing and presentation instructions for search engines. It works outside the page's HTML and can apply to non-HTML resources.

An XML sitemap is a structured file listing URLs you want search engines to discover. Submitting a sitemap is a discovery signal, not a promise that its URLs will be indexed.

YMYL means Your Money or Your Life. Google uses the concept for subjects where unreliable information can significantly affect people's health, financial stability, safety, or wider well-being.