SEO Glossary: Every Term Explained Simply

SEO is everything you do to help a website rank higher in Google's results without paying for ads. It covers content, technical setup, and the site's reputation over time.

The SERP is the results page Google shows after a search. It holds the classic blue links, but also maps, images, and AI-generated answers.

A keyword is the word or phrase someone types into Google to find something. Picking the right keywords means writing for what people actually search for.

Indexing is when Google adds a page to its database. A page that isn't indexed can never show up in search results, no matter how good the content is.

Crawling is when Google sends a bot to read a site's pages and understand what's on them. It happens before a page can be indexed.

Google's algorithm is the formula that decides the order of search results. It changes often, but it's always looking for the same thing: the most useful page for the question asked.

Ranking is a page's place in Google's results for a given keyword. Being #1 brings far more clicks than being on page 2.

Organic traffic is visitors who land on a site from Google's natural results, not from ads. This is the traffic that SEO grows over time.

Core Web Vitals are three measurements Google uses for a site's speed and comfort: loading time, click responsiveness, and visual stability while the page loads.

Page speed measures how long a page takes to load. A slow site loses visitors and loses points with Google. We aim for a 100/100 PageSpeed score on every page we ship.

The title tag is a page's clickable headline in Google's results. It needs to stay short enough to avoid being cut off, and it should give a real sense of what the page is about.

The meta description is the short text shown under the title in Google's results. It doesn't directly boost ranking, but a clear one makes people more likely to click.

An XML sitemap is a list of every page on a site, handed straight to Google to help it find and crawl them faster.

A canonical tag tells Google which version of a page is the real one, when several URLs show almost the same content. It stops Google from splitting attention across copies.

Structured data is hidden code on a page that tells Google what each piece of information actually is: a price, a review, a question, an address. It can unlock richer results in search.

A 301 redirect automatically sends visitors and Google from an old URL to a new one, carrying over the original page's SEO value. We use this on every website redesign.

Search intent is what someone actually wants when they type a query: to compare, buy, learn, or find an address. Good content SEO answers that intent first.

A long-tail keyword is a longer, more specific search, like "website design price Algiers" instead of "website." These searches happen less often, but they're easier to rank for and often closer to a real purchase.

Evergreen content stays useful and true long after it's published, unlike news that goes stale fast. A guide on "how to choose a web agency" is evergreen; a post about a three-day sale is not.

Internal linking is the network of links between pages on the same site. Done well, it helps visitors find other useful pages and helps Google understand which pages matter most.

Heading tags structure a page into a main title (H1) and subheadings (H2, H3...). A page should have only one H1, and the heading levels should follow a real hierarchy, not just a font-size choice.

Duplicate content is text that's nearly identical across several pages or sites. Google struggles to decide which one to show, which can hold both back.

A featured snippet is the answer box Google shows at the very top of some searches, above the first classic result. A clear, short answer at the start of a paragraph has a better chance of landing there.

Keyword density is how often a keyword shows up in a text. Google doesn't need a set density anymore: repeating a word too often reads as forced and can hurt more than it helps.

A backlink is a link from another site to yours. Google treats it a bit like a vote of confidence: the more trustworthy the linking site, the more that vote counts.

Anchor text is the clickable words of a link. A specific anchor, like "website maintenance service" instead of "click here," gives both Google and readers a real sense of where the link leads.

Domain Authority is a score, built by SEO tools like Moz, that estimates a site's overall strength against its competitors. It's not an official Google number, but it's a useful trend indicator.

A dofollow link passes some of its SEO value to the linked site. A nofollow link carries a tag telling Google not to pass that value, often used for comments or paid links.

Link building covers all the work done to earn quality backlinks to a site, often by creating content that other sites genuinely want to cite.

A guest post is an article written to be published on someone else's site, in exchange for a link back. It's only worth doing if the host site is real and genuinely relevant to the topic.

Page Authority is the same idea as Domain Authority, but measured for a single page instead of the whole site.

A Google Business Profile is the free listing that shows a business on Google Maps and in local search results, with its hours, reviews, and phone number.

The Local 3-Pack is the block of three businesses with a map that Google shows at the top of local searches, like "plumber in Algiers." Landing there brings a lot of clicks and calls.

NAP is a business's name, address, and phone number. This information needs to match everywhere online (website, Google profile, directories), or Google trusts the business less.

Google reviews influence both local ranking and how much visitors trust a business. A real number of reviews and honest replies, including to negative ones, matter more than a perfect star rating.

Local SEO covers the work done so a business shows up in searches made near its location, like "restaurant near me."

A local citation is a mention of a business's name, address, and phone number on another site, like a directory. The more consistent these citations are, the more they strengthen local SEO.

A service-area business works at its customers' locations rather than a storefront open to the public, so it can hide its exact address on its Google profile while still listing the cities it serves.

GEO means writing and structuring content so it can be understood and cited by AI tools like Google's AI Overviews or ChatGPT, on top of classic search results.

An AI Overview is the summary Google generates with AI at the top of some searches, above the classic links. Clear, well-sourced content has a better chance of being cited there.

Agentic browsing is when an AI assistant navigates a site on its own to answer a question, without a person clicking through each page. A site with clean code and structured data is easier for these agents to read.

The llms.txt file is a simple list of a site's pages, written to help AI models quickly understand what the site offers, a bit like a sitemap made for AI instead of Google.

Conversational search is a question typed or spoken the way you'd ask a real person, instead of a short string of keywords. Content that answers a full, real question performs better here.

An answer engine is a tool that gives a direct answer, like ChatGPT or Perplexity, instead of a list of links to explore yourself.

Conversion rate is the percentage of visitors who take the action you want: buying, filling out a form, calling. A fast, clear site always converts better than a slow, confusing one.

An abandoned cart is when a customer adds products but leaves before paying, often because of surprise fees or a checkout that's too complicated.

A product page presents a single item on an online store: photos, price, description, and reviews. A good product page answers questions before the shopper even asks them.

User experience is what someone feels while using a site: easy to understand, pleasant to move through, nothing getting in the way. Bad UX drives visitors off, even with good SEO behind it.

A CMS is the tool that lets someone edit a site's text and images without knowing how to code, like WordPress. Some sites, like the ones we build with Next.js, choose speed over a classic CMS.

A site built with a framework like Next.js generates its pages ahead of time, which makes them much faster than a site that rebuilds each page on every visit.

Mobile-first means designing a site for a phone screen first, then adapting it to desktop. Google also indexes sites based on their mobile version first.

Load time is how long it takes between clicking a link and seeing the full page. Every extra second drives visitors away, especially on mobile.

Google Search Console is Google's free tool showing how a site shows up in search: which pages are indexed, which keywords bring clicks, and which technical errors need fixing.

Google Analytics (GA4) measures what visitors do once they're on the site: pages viewed, time spent, actions taken. It complements Search Console, which only shows what happens before the click.

A KPI is a number chosen in advance to judge whether something is working, like the number of calls a website brings in. A good KPI ties back to a real business outcome, not just a number that goes up.

Bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who leave a page without taking any other action. A high rate isn't always bad: someone who finds a phone number and calls right away also counts as a bounce.

Click-through rate is the percentage of people who click a link after seeing it, for example in Google's results. A clear title tag and meta description push this number up.

Search volume is the average number of times a keyword is searched each month. It helps decide which keywords to focus on first, weighed against how much competition sits behind them.

An impression is each time a page shows up in Google's results, even if nobody clicks it. Lots of impressions with few clicks often means a decent ranking but a title that needs work.