What are the most important SEO terms? An overview

The topic of search engine optimization is complicated because as well as a long list of individual disciplines and measures, you will also encounter many different SEO terms. If you’re new to the field, you probably won’t know what certain terms mean such as link juice, SERPs and backlinks. All will be revealed in our detailed SEO glossary.

Anchor text

The anchor text (also known as link text) is the clickable text of a hyperlink that is embedded in a website. An anchor text is usually highlighted and if you click on it, you will be forwarded to the target URL. The target URL and the anchor text are shown separately. The reader only sees the selected anchor text on the page, and not the URL.

The URL and anchor text are integrated into the source code like this:

<a href="http://www.anexamplewebsite.com">anchor text</a>

In this example, the visitor would only see the term “anchor text”.

In SEO, a distinction is made between:

• branded anchor text (brand or target domain in the name)
• money anchor text (contains a money keyword)
• compound anchor text (combination of money keyword and brand)
• non-money-non-branded anchor text (doesn’t contain a brand, a company name, or money keywords. Many of these word combinations come across as more natural than money or compound anchor texts, which can seem more like advertisements. Examples include “read more information here” or “click here”)

Backlink

The word backlink describes an inbound link, which leads from website A to website B. These inbound links are important for a website since they have a positive influence on the search engine ranking. A backlink from a topic-relevant and trustworthy site (Google determines the quality factor) is counted as a recommendation by the search engine and increases the site’s trust value. The higher the trust value (also known as TrustRank), the more reliable Google rates the links that come from this website. A site’s backlink profile (amount and quality of links) is among the most important ranking factors for Google and other search engines and is a central point of search engine optimization.

Black hat SEO

Black hat SEO describes the unethical use of search engine optimization strategies. The term comes from the Western film genre where the villain wore a black hat and the hero, a white hat (see white hat SEO). This method of SEO involves ignoring the proper guidelines of search engines, such as Google or Bing. Spam practices, as well as links generally bought from foreign websites, are used for link building. If you get caught doing this, your site will most likely be excluded from the search engine index.

Cloaking

Cloaking is a method of search engine optimization that is not so popular with search engines. It deceives the crawler by displaying different versions of a website. While the search engine crawler gets to “see” one version of a website, normal visitors are shown a completely different version. Cloaking is a form of black hat SEO and is punished by search engines.

Find out more about cloaking in our article, such as how it works and the various cloaking techniques.

Crawler

A web crawler (also known as a search bot or spider) automatically browses internet sites in order to analyze them for certain criteria. The crawler operates independently and automatically carries out its assigned tasks. Search engines, such as Google, use search bots to maintain their index by listing new sites, deleting non-existing sites, and updating the ones in the index.

Deep link

Deep links are a special form of backlink that link to a subpage on a website. They lead website visitors directly to a certain topic. Deep links are a component of off-page SEO and are part of a complete and good link profile.

Duplicate content

Duplicate content is the name given to content that is very similar or identical to that found on other websites. Duplicate content has a negative influence on the search engine ranking so it’s best to avoid it. Google prefers high-quality and unique content. If the crawler finds identical content on different sites, the site with the most recently uploaded content will be ranked lower. SEO measures often involve searching for duplicate content and replacing it.

hreflang attribute

The hreflang attribute is an HTML attribute that provides information about the relationship between different language versions of a website. The attribute is primarily used so that the correct language version of a website is displayed to a user.

Internal links

Internal links take visitors to different subpages of the same website. Internal linking is one of the most important instruments of search engine optimization. Useful links offer value to the reader since they help them find additional information faster. It also means that the website structure is better optimized thanks to the useful links. Google has relevant quality criteria when it comes to evaluating a site. The Google bot reads the internal link structure and factors this into the ranking. Since link juice is also passed on via internal links, it’s possible to improve the ranking of subpages and category pages using it.

Keyword

Keywords are certain words or phrases that describe a page’s content. In the context of search engine optimization they refer to the typical search terms that users enter into the search engine in order to find information relating to a particular topic. Websites should be optimized for certain keywords so that the search engine sees how relevant the sites are for search queries. Your site will then appear higher up in the search results.

Landing page

Landing pages are pages created exclusively for marketing or advertising purposes. The landing page is SEO-optimized so that it is displayed in the search results for relevant keywords. These types of pages can be considered as digital advertising leaflets that are used to sell a specific product or service. Essential content, information and a direct call to action should be included.

Link building

Link building refers to the targeted construction of a backlink profile. The aim is to increase the number and quality of backlinks. Since backlinks are external links, the optimization takes place on third party sites, rather than on yours. Collecting these links for your own site is one of the most important tasks of off page search engine optimization. Google and other search engines classify backlinks as recommendations, meaning that they are a very important ranking factor.

Link juice

Link juice is determined by the distribution of backlinks throughout a website. The quality (strength, reputation) of the links plays a role as well as the quantity. Link juice can be passed on from website A to website B via links. If the source of a backlink is rated well by Google, more link juice will be brought onto the site through the inbound link.

Meta description

The meta description is a short text (up to 156 characters) that describes the website’s content to the user. The meta description appears in the list of search results (SERPs) as part of the snippet beneath the title. If the webmaster doesn’t include their own description, Google will generate its own from the first few lines of the website or from the sentences that include the keywords. During optimization meta tags (consisting of meta descriptions, title tags, meta keywords) that are user-friendly as well as most frequently searched for are placed in the header of an HTML document.

Money keyword

Key terms with high search volumes, and thus highly sought over, are known as money keywords (e.g. “buy shoes” or “cheap smartphones”). Obviously most shops want to rank well for these keywords. If you appear high up in the search results list for relevant search queries, potential customers will find you more easily. Many of these keywords can give the user ideas as to what they’re looking for. The reason behind it is that if someone enters “buy shoes” into the search engine, it usually means there is a transaction-orientated buying motive. The searcher knows that they want to buy shoes, but just aren’t sure where to buy them from. When it comes to search engine advertising (SEA) money keywords generally achieve a high cost per click (CPC). You should exercise caution when using money keywords when optimizing your website. If these are overused, you could be penalized by Google.

“nofollow”

The nofollow attribute enables website owners to label links that they don’t want Google to index. The way to achieve this is to add the attribute rel="nofollow" next to the relevant link in the HTML code. This tells the Google bot not to track the link. The attribute was first introduced in 2005 and prompted website owners to mark all links that weren’t of an editorial nature with a "nofollow" tag. This also stops backlink profile from being manipulated (e.g. people leaving their website URLs in guest book comments), and curbs link spam. Nofollow links are now part of a natural backlink profile and are taken into consideration during an SEO analysis.

On page SEO

On page SEO (also known as on page optimization) describes all SEO measures that are directly linked to your own website. The optimization lies in the hands of the website owner and has nothing to do with any third parties. It primarily involves content alignment (keyword research) and content optimization. Structural and technical aspects are also taken into account when it comes to on page SEO.

Off page SEO

Off page SEO (also known as off page optimization) deals with all SEO measures outside of your own website. It relates to all external factors (especially backlinks) that influence the ranking of your website. Since backlink profiles are an important central ranking factor, the focus of off page efforts is on link building. Different strategies are used in the process in order to achieve the best result.

Read more on the topic of on page and off page SEO in our article on the basics of search engine optimization.

Panda update

Google’s Panda update was executed in 2011. With it came a permanent change to Google’s ranking algorithm as well as the work of search engine optimization. Due to the update, many poor-quality websites ended up with decreased rankings. Since its implementation, evaluating content quality has played a central role on top of factors such as backlink profile, bounce rate, and retention time. Whereas valuable and unique content provides more value for the reader, duplicate content and unnatural keyword stuffing is punishable. Since the update, the saying “content is king” has definitely become more applicable as content quality now has an even stronger influence on the SERPs.

Penguin update

The penguin update consists of a series of Google algorithm updates, which took place between April 2012 and October 2014 and had a big influence on SEO analysis, just like the panda update did. Google’s aim with this update was to curb link spam and to prevent search engine manipulation. An algorithm was developed that could detect unnatural site optimization (e.g. unusually quick link building, keyword stuffing, irrelevant links). Google web master guidelines prohibit these spam techniques. If you don’t conform to the guidelines, you could receive penalties and be penalized by Google.

Penalties

Google penalties refer to actions taken by Google to penalize a website. These can be either manual or algorithm-based penalties. Breaching Google web master guidelines leads to penalties, which can include a decline in the visibility index and a lower placement in the SERPs.

robots.txt

The robots.txt file is a file that is used to tell search engines which subdirectories should be indexed. It should be noted that it only provides the search engine with a reference point for indexing. The robots.txt is located in the root directory of the domain.

SERPs

SERP is the acronym for “search engine result page”. The user will be shown results relating to their search query on the SERPs. These results are known as snippets and contain the title, link, and meta description. The order depends on the relevance, which the search engine decides according to the different ranking factors such as user ratings, backlinks, and how long visitors stay on the site. The aim of all SEO measures is to obtain a higher position in the SERPs.

Title tag

The title tag specifies the title of a website and is shown in the browser as well as in Google’s search results. The user can reach the site by clicking on the title. Short, precise, and explanatory wording is very important for a good click rate. The title tag belongs to the Google ranking factors and is taken into consideration when it comes to search engine optimization. For every single URL a unique title should be used and it is best to include the keyword at the beginning of it.

White hat SEO

White hat SEO, as you’ve probably guessed from the name, is the opposite of black hat SEO. On the contrary to black hat concepts, guidelines are strictly adhered to and spam tactics are avoided. If a mix of both is used, it’s referred to as grey hat SEO and is the most often used concept when it comes to search engine optimization. Web masters principally stick to the search engine guidelines and interpret them freely, but may occasionally bend the rules a little.

The dos and don’ts of search engine optimization

Various Google ranking factors are taken into account in search engine optimization and there are a few things to bear in mind. In this video, you can find out which SEO mistakes should be avoided and which SEO tools are helpful: