Digital Marketing Terms

A

A/B Testing

A/B testing, also known as split testing, is a means of testing two versions of something based on user experience data. The factor being tested could be audiences, visuals or pieces of copy.

Above The Fold

Above the fold is a term that is used to refer to everything that a visitor to your site will see before they have to scroll down.

Ad Manager Account

An Ad Manger Account allows users to manage and monitor several ad accounts at once.

Ad Set

Ad sets are groups in Facebook Ad Manager that indicate how, when and where your ads will run. It will mostly be used to set your budget and duration of the ad, target specific audiences, and choose the desired placement(s)

Ad Servers

Ad servers are the technological systems responsible for hosting and distributing advertising content. They will also report on ad campaign performance.

Algorithm

Put simply, an algorithm is a set of instructions that are designed to produce a certain outcome. Algorithms sit behind most online functions, including search engines and social media, and dictate what you see based on your individual data amongst other types of data. This data can also be used within marketing.

API (Application Program Interface)

An Application Program Interface is a set of routines that dicates how software components will interact.

Awareness

Awareness indicates how many people in your target audience know of your brand. Tracking brand awareness means tracking how widely recognized a brand is by an audience.

b

Backlink

A backlink is a link from one website to another. Websites with more backlinks will most likely rank higher in search engines.

Banner Ad

A banner ad is an image-based ad that is displayed on a website. Banner ads are mostly used to drive traffic to one website from another one.

Behavioral Targeting

Behavioral targeting is a marketing method that uses your website visitor’s data in order to target them and influence them to buy. Behavioral targeting means collecting data on a potential customer’s online habits and then creating ads that are relevant to them that will then be displayed to them.

Bid Management

Bid management ensures that you get the most value from your advertising budget.

Blog

A blog is an online page consisting of multiple entries of informational or opinion-based text.

Bottom of the Funnel (BOFU)

The bottom of a sales funnel is where you will focus on closing and making sales. Customers have already been through the stages before this- from awareness of your product to consideration and so on- and therefore, at bottom of funnel, they are close to purchase.

Bounce Rate

Bounce rate indicates the number of people who arrive at your website and then exit it without navigating to other pages of the site or taking any other action.

Business Manager

Business Manager is a function on Facebook that allows users to run ad accounts and pages as well as integrating with external marketing/advertising partners.

c

Call To Action/ CTA

A Call To Action is something that is designed to prompt immediate action from its viewer. For example, many web pages will end with a call to action that prompts users to fill out a contact form. Most call to actions will use urgency to command the viewer’s attention and cause them to act.

Campaign

A marketing campaign is a structured effort towards achieving a certain goal that often takes into account a number of mediums.

Campaign Optimization

Campaign optimization refers to the methods used to ensure best performance from your campaign. This includes tracking and adjusting ads.

Churn Rate

Churn rate indicates the amount of customers who have stopped doing business with you. In subscription-based businesses, it tells you the amount of customers who cancel or don’t renew their subscriptions with you after a period of time.

Closed- Loop Marketing

Close-loop marketing is a system of marketing in which sales and marketing are linked in a loop and analytics are tracked from every stage of the buyer’s journey.

Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is the hosting and delivery of computing services over the internet

Cloud Management Platform (CMP)

A cloud management platform incorporates software that allows a cloud space to be managed and optimized.

Click Through Rate/ CTR

Click Through Rate is a metric that compares the number of people who have seen your ad (impressions) with the number that ended up clicking on it.

Conversion

Conversion refers to the process in which an individual completes your desired action. You might, for example, calculate the number of leads who filled out a form and this would be classed as the number of conversions. You might also calculate how many people add to cart or purchase and so on.

Conversion Path

A conversion path is the route that any website visitor will take in order to complete a desired action- e.g. to register their information or to make a purchase.

Conversion Rate

Conversion rate is a metric that shows the percentage of people who completed a desired action on your site, normally one that drives sales. For example, you could use conversion rate to track how many people fill out your contact request form.

Cookies

Cookies are downloaded onto your computer when you first visit a site so that a site can tell when you have visited it before. They are also able to track your activity on a site.

Cost Per Acquisition/CPA

CPM/CPT indicates the price of 1000 impressions from an ad publisher. If a website publisher charges $2.00 CPM, for example, you would pay $2.00 per 1000 impressions.

CPM (Cost per Mille) or CPT (Cost Per Thousand)

Cost Per Acquisition is a metric that measures the total cost of gaining a lead through a marketing effort- e.g. a campaign/ad/etc. The calculation is total campaign cost/ conversions.

Customer Acquisition Cost/ CAC

Customer Acquisition Cost is a metric that calculates the total cost of gaining a paying customer. To work this out, you divide your total business costs by the number of paying customers.

Customer Lifecycle

Customer lifecycle is a term used to reflect the journey a person makes as they move through the marketing funnel and purchase your product.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

Customer relationship management refers to a business’ strategy towards managing its relationships. It is also a form of technology that manages interactions between a company and its customers/ potential customers.

Customer Relationship Optimization

Customer Relationship Optimization refers to the process of optimizing the relationships existing between a business and its customers/ prospective customers.

d

Data Visualization

Data visualization is the process of putting data into a more consumable, easier to understand, visual format.

Digital Asset Management (DAM)

Digital asset management is a system that sorts and organizes digital assets (data that comes with a right to use) in a single location.

DoubleClick

DoubleClick is an integrated ad-technology platform run by Google. It enables advertisers to effectively create, manage, and grow high-impact digital marketing campaigns.

Dynamic Content

Dynamic content is content that changes based on data. When running dynamic content, you set up several pieces and the algorithm will pick which piece is most relevant to the specific audience viewing it.

e

Engagement Rate

Engagement rate is a metric that shows how many people engaged with your content- for example, how many liked it or shared it.

Event Tracking

Events are actions that users take online- for example, viewing your page- and event tracking monitors these actions.

Check more on: Advertisement Tracking

Evergreen Content

Evergreen content is content which will always be relevant online and won’t therefore go out of date. Often evergreen content will be content that answers a question an audience is always likely to ask.

f

FTP (File Transfer Protocol)

File Transfer Protocol is a method of transferring files between computers.

g

Geo-targeting

Geo-targeting is the practice of delivering specific content/ ads to users based on their location.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a service offered by Google that allows you to track your website traffic.

h

Hard Bounce

After you attempt to send an email, often a mass email, a bounce indicates a reason that your email could not be delivered. In the case of a hard bounce, this reason is permanent and might be something like the email address you have selected doesn’t exist.

i

Interactive Content

Interactive content refers to content that encourages or requires engagement from your audience. An example of interactive content might be a quiz.

Impressions

Impressions are the number of times your content appears in someone’s feed.

Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a marketing method that works to attract customers to a brand rather than targeting advertising out towards them. Inbound marketing involves creating valuable content that builds trust and develops relationships with your target audience. The types of content created can be varied- from blogs to events- but most of the content that is put out is focused towards earning audience attention and setting the business apart from its competition.

k

Keyword

Keywords are commonly searched for words. Including them strategically in your content means that you will rank more highly for these searches.

Keyword Density

Keyword density indicates the number of times a particular keyword appears in a piece of content. If content has a high keyword density for a keyword, it is more likely to rank higher in related searches.

Key Performance Indicator (KPI)

A KPI is a metric that you set to track the progress of your business goals. Marketing KPI’s, for instance, will indicate your progress towards a marketing goal.

l

Lead Generation

To generate leads is to generate potential buyers of your product/service. Lead generation involves attracting and engaging with people who were once unaware of a brand and converting them into warm leads- people who are interested in it.

Lead Nurturing

Lead nurturing involves paying attention to buyers at every stage of the buyer journey and building relationships that drive numbers of warmer leads and eventually sales.

Lifetime value (LTV)

The lifetime value of one customer is how much revenue you anticipate making from them throughout their lifetime.

Lookalike Audience

A lookalike audience is an audience that resembles another audience. For example, you could create a lookalike audience based on your email list. This lookalike audience would have many similar attributes so would also be likely to buy from you.

m

Marketing Automation

Marketing automation is the term used to describe software that automates marketing activity so that it does not need to be completed manually. A common example of marketing automation is software that automatically sends out targeted emails.

Marketing Plan

A marketing plan outlines a company or individual’s overall plan to achieve specific goals through their marketing.

Martech/ Marketing Technology

Martech is a term used to illustrate the merging of marketing and technology. An example of martech is mail automation software.

Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

An MVP (Minimum Viable Product) is the most basic version of a product containing the most vital features that a company wants to launch.

Monetization

Monetization refers to the process of taking something that ordinarily does not generate revenue and making money from it. For example, you can monetize the traffic on your website by allowing third parties to advertise on it.

Multi-channel Marketing

Multi-channel marketing is the process of interacting with customers and potential customers via a number of platforms. For example, a shop might incorporate multi-channel marketing by marketing to customers in-store, through their email campaign and through social media and their website.

n

Native Advertising

Native advertising is a term used to describe paid adverts that fit the platform that they are being promoted on. Unlike banner ads, for instance, a Facebook ad will appear “native” to the platform.

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

Net Promoter Score is a metric that indicates how likely your customers are to recommend you.

o

Omnichannel Marketing

The term omnichannel marketing refers to a marketing approach that uses multiple channels to create an integrated, seamless buying experience. An example of this would be when a customer receives an email or text about their order whilst they are shopping on a website.

Open Rate

Open rate tells you the percentage of people that opened your email.

Organic Search

Organic search is a term used to indicate the results of a natural search. As opposed to PPC advertising, which will advertise your site at the top of a search engine’s results, how your site ranks in terms of organic search will depend on your SEO strategy.

Outbound Marketing

Outbound marketing is considered to be a more traditional style of marketing. With outbound marketing, the focus is placed on a business sending out a message and obstructing the lives of potential customers in order to sell to them. Some examples include TV ads, magazine ads and cold calls. Social media advertising, however, is not considered to be outbound marketing because it is only targeted towards people who, in theory, are looking for that type of product/service.

p

Page Views

The number of page views will tell you the amount of times a specific page on your site has been viewed. This includes refreshes by the same users.

Paid Ads

Paid ads are ads that you have to spend money to put out. Paid advertising is bought as opposed to earned media which is gained organically.

Pay Per Click (PPC)

Pay-Per-Click is a type of advertising in which users only pay for each click that is placed on one of their ads.

Payment Threshold

Payment threshold is the number of dollars necessary to reach in order to complete an action. In affiliate marketing, this number will indicate the amount of commission earned before receiving a payment. In paid media, this number could indicate the amount you have to spend in order to keep using the platform.

Position Zero

Position zero refers to the featured snippet at the top of a list of Google search results.

Pillar Pages

Pillar pages are pages designed to answer longer, more detailed web searches in order to rank higher in search engines. Pillar pages address topics, or topic clusters, in great detail, covering multiple questions that could be asked.

q

Qualified Lead

A qualified lead is someone who you know, based on your verification system, could become a paying customer of yours.

QR Code

A QR (or quick response) code is a code that can be read by a mobile device in order to deliver information.

r

Reach

Reach indicates the number of people that saw your content. Unlike impressions, which just indicate how many times your content appeared on the feed, reach tells you the number of unique people that saw your content.

Reactions

Facebook reactions allow your audience to express different feelings towards your content through the use of emojis.

Referral Marketing

Referral marketing is a marketing method which promotes an offer to new customers based on referrals from existing ones. This is usually word of mouth.

Remarketing (or Retargeting)

Remarketing/retargeting refers to the process of targeting people who have already engaged with your business in some way- be that by viewing your site or by purchasing from you.

ROAS (Return On Ad Spend)

Return on ad spend is a metric that shows the value of your advertising compared to the money you have put into it. For instance, if you paid $1 for an ad and made a $2 sale from it, your ROAS would be 2.

ROI (Return On Investment)

Return On Investment compares the money made with the money spent on any marketing initiative to calculate its worth.

RPS (Revenue Per Click)

Revenue per click is a metric available in Google Analytics that calculates the average revenue generated by each click on your ads and pay-per-click keywords.

s

SaaS (Software as a Service)

SaaS is a service that allows you to access software in the cloud rather than downloading it to your device.

SAINT ( Sitecatalyst Attribute Import Naming Tool)

SAINT is an Adobe classification, within sitecatalyst, that allows users to direct more web traffic in a campaign.

Search Engine

A search engine is a service that delivers specific content based on databases of information. The most well-known example of a search engine is Google.

SEA ( Search Engine Advertising)

Search engine advertising focuses on paying for ads to appear on search engine results and partner websites.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Search engine marketing is a form of marketing that focuses on improving search engine ranking largely through paid advertising.

Check More: SEM vs SEO

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

In order to reach their ideal audience through search engines, websites must incorporate search engine optimization. SEO is comprised of a number of techniques that can be incorporated on a site and will subsequently improve quantity and quality of traffic and search ranking.

Check More: SEM vs SEO

Shoppable Posts

On Instagram, shoppable posts are posts which you can click on and then buy the featured products within the app.

Site Audit

A site audit is a complete analysis of the factors that influence a site’s ranking in search engines.

Sitecatalyst

Adobe sitecatalyst is a tool that allows you to monitor website analytics and optimize your site.

Social Media Engagement

Social media engagement measures how many people interact with your posts. It includes public shares, comments, likes, and clicks.

Soft Bounce

A soft bounce refers to an email which is temporarily undeliverable. This might be because the recipient’s inbox is full, for example.

t

Top Of The Funnel (TOFU)

Top of funnel refers to the first stages of the buyer’s journey. At top of funnel, your marketing will focus on building awareness and interest since your buyer knows nothing about your business or your offer.

Traffic

Traffic indicates the number of people who arrive at your website.

u

URL (Uniform Resource Locator)

A URL is the string of characters that makes up a web address.

UTM Parameters

UTM parameters are tags that you add to your URL which mean that, when the link is clicked, information is sent back to Google Analytics to be tracked.

UTM_id

UTM_id is a tag in Google Analytics which allows you to specifically track your campaigns.

Upsells

Upselling increases the profits derived from each customer by persuading them to buy a more expensive version/item or extra add-ons post-purchase. An example of an upsell would be an airline offering you extra legroom after you’ve booked your flight.

Unique Visitor (UV)

A unique visitor is a term used to separate out how many individual people visited your site within a given period.

v

Viral Marketing

Viral marketing involves the creation of content that spreads both extensively and quickly from person to person. Viral marketing can be used to develop wide brand awareness and interest in a product/service.

Voice Search

Voice search is a technology that allows people to use search engines with their voice. Alexa is a famous example of this. To respond to the rise in popularity of voice search, marketers must adapt their SEO approach.

w

Web Design

Web design is the structuring of the content, graphics and other components of a website in order to improve user experience.

Webinar Funnels

Webinars are pieces of video content that users sign up to receive. They contain valuable information but also work to sell a product/ service. A webinar funnel takes someone who has come across a description of a webinar through a process that aims to fulfil the webinar’s objective- usually a sale.

Word Of Mouth Marketing

Word of mouth marketing strategies are adopted by companies to get their customers talking about their product/service and generating awareness and interest in other potential buyers.

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