Internet Marketing & Web-Related Glossary

The technology and criteria that search engines use to deliver results to a query. Search engines utilize multiple algorithms in determining search results or keyword-targeted search ads.

Most often involves hosting links, banners, and product information on a website or blog and then getting paid a flat fee or percentage of a sale whenever visitors click through on these links and make a purchase. In essence, affiliate marketing is selling products or services offered by others and then getting paid for each sale.

Please see "Web Analytics"

The clickable text part of a hyperlink. The text usually gives visitors or search engines important information on what the page being linked to is about.

A file attached to an email message as an enclosure. Attachments are sent as a duplicate of the original file and are a superior alternative to faxing. Attachments can be of any type of software file and can be opened by the receiver if that person has the appropriate software to view it.

Please see "Inbound Link"

Bandwith has a number of technical meanings, but since the popularization of the Internet, it has generally referred to the volume of information per unit of time that a transmission medium (such as an Internet connection) can handle. Data is to available bandwidth as water is to the size of the pipe. In other words, as the bandwidth increases, so does the amount of data that can flow through in a given amount of time, just like as the size of the pipe increases, so does the amount of water that can flow through during a period of time. An Internet connection with a larger bandwidth can move a set amount of data (e.g., a video file) much faster than an Internet connection with a lower bandwidth. You can test your bandwidth availability for free using tools available at Internet speed test sites.

The promotion of a particular product, service, or company by means of distinctive advertising and design. A brand is the identity of a specific product, service, or business.

High-speed Internet service allows users to access the Internet at significantly higher speeds than those available through “dial-up” Internet access services. Broadband allows users to access the Internet using one of several high-speed transmission technologies, such as DSL, cable modem, satellite, WiMax, or BPL (broadband over powerlines). Transmission is digital, meaning that text, images, and sound are all transmitted as “bits” of data. Once a broadband connection is established, devices such as computers can be attached to this broadband connection by existing electrical or telephone wiring, coaxial cable, or wireless devices.

Microsoft’s re-launch of their search engine, originally named “Microsoft Live Search.”

Shortened version of “web log.” blogs are essentially sites on the Web that may cover news and events; the interests, hobbies, or business of the person writing the blog; or virtually any subject — akin to an online journal. Most blogs allow readers to comment on information posted in the blog, thus making this online tool interactive. A blog can also be an effective way to market a business. Marketing a business with a blog may mean not only posting new, fresh content on the business’ own blog, but also posting comments on other blogs where the business’ customers may frequent and linking back to the website or blog for the business. In this way, a blog can not only bring increased traffic to a company’s blog or site, it also can help improve search engine rankings.

A collection of direct links to web pages, stored in a user’s web browser (e.g., Firefox, Internet Explorer, or Safari). Bookmarks can be created and managed by users.

A bounced email is one that never arrives in the recipient’s inbox and is sent back, or bounced back, to the sender with an error message that indicates to the sender that the email was never successfully transmitted. There are two categories of email bounces including “hard bounce” and “soft bounce.” Hard bounce describes an email that has bounced back to the sender undelivered without having been accepted by the recipient’s mail server. Soft bounce describes an email that has bounced back to the sender undelivered after it has already been accepted by the recipient’s mail server. Typically, a bounced email returns to the sender with an explanation of why the message bounced.

A single-page visit in which the visitor left a site from the entrance (landing) page.

A website navigation technique. Breadcrumbs typically appear horizontally near the top of a web page, providing links back to each previous page that the user navigates through in order to get to the current page. Basically, they provide a trail for the user to follow back to the starting/entry point of a website and may look something like this: home page --> section page --> sub section page. This technique also is referred to as a breadcrumb trail.

Short for web browser, a software program that gives you the ability to view websites simply and easily on your computer. Examples of browsers are Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari.

Specialized form of computer memory. In the case of the Internet, “cache” is commonly used in the context of “browser cache.” Cache is designed to speed up the computer by prioritizing its contents for quick access. How it works: Cache holds copies of recently accessed data such as a web page and pictures on web pages. It keeps this data ready to “swap” onto your screen within fractions of a second. So, instead of requiring your computer to go to the original web page and photos, the cache simply offers you the latest copy from your own hard drive. This caching-and-swapping speeds up page viewing because the next time you request that page, it is accessed from the cache on your computer instead of from the distant web server. The browser cache should be emptied periodically.

“Mentions” or “web references” of your business name and address on other websites (such as an online directory or a local business association where your business information can be found). A factor in the ranking algorithms of major search engines, businesses with many citations can rank higher than businesses with fewer citations.

The rate (expressed in a percentage) at which users click on an ad. This is calculated by dividing the total number of clicks by the total number of ad impressions. CTR is an important metric for Internet marketers to measure the performance of an ad campaign.

The practice of distributing content — including articles, videos, podcasts, white papers, eBooks, etc. — that provides information of value to your targeted audience in order to encourage them to build trust in you, your company, and/or your products and services. Unlike traditional marketing, content marketing makes no attempt to ask for a sale. Its primary purpose is to build trust so that your targeted customers will want to contact you in order to do business. Important elements of content marketing include clearly defining and understanding your ideal prospect, creating trustworthy and valuable content that is not directly biased toward you or your company, distributing that content in places where your prospects frequent, and then making it easy for your prospects to find the content, share it, and eventually contact you to take the next step.

The percentage of website visitors who complete a desired action (conversion rate), such as sign up for a newsletter subscription, complete a form, make a purchase.

A message passed from a web server to a web browser that is stored on the user’s local hard drive in a small text file. A cookie can have many uses, the main one allowing a web server to identify a user and serve up customized web pages and/or login information to the user’s web browser when revisiting a web page.

The use of the Internet for the tasks you perform on your computer, delivered over the Internet or via wireless technology. The “cloud” represents the Internet. The individual user’s device (i.e., computer, cell phone, etc.) only provides an interface to interact with the computer programs and data. The programs are run on the service provider’s computers. Applications and associated data are available wherever you have a connection to the Internet or wireless network.

Data transfer refers to the amount of digital information that moves from one computer to a device or another computer within a given period of time.

An online directory organizes websites by subject. The user views these sites organized in a series of searchable categories and menus.

An addressable digital marketing method. With direct digital marketing, addressability comes in one of three forms: an email address, a web browser cookie, or a mobile phone number. DDM is the electronic delivery of relevant communications to specific recipients. DDM uses email, websites, and mobile services in the same way that direct marketing in the physical world uses the postal service.

Used to identify one or more IP addresses. Domain names are used in URLs to identify particular web pages. For example, in the URL http://www.beyondindigo.com/index.html, the domain name is beyondindigo.com. Every domain name has a suffix that indicates which top-level domain (TLD) it belongs to. There are only a limited number of such domains. For example: .gov (government agencies), .edu (educational institutions), .org (organizations, nonprofit), and .com (commercial business). Because the Internet is based on IP addresses, not domain names, every web server requires a domain name system (DNS) server to translate domain names into IP addresses.

To copy data (usually an entire file) from a main source to a peripheral device. The term is often used to describe the process of copying a file from an online service or bulletin board service (BBS) to one’s own computer. The opposite of download is upload, which means to copy a file from your own computer to another computer.

Short for domain name system (or service or server), an Internet service that translates domain names into IP addresses. Because domain names are alphabetic, they’re easier to remember. The Internet, however, is really based on IP addresses. Every time you use a domain name, therefore, a DNS service must translate the name into the corresponding IP address.

Short for electronic commerce, also known as e-comm; refers to the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. However, the term may refer to more than just buying and selling products online, and also includes the entire online process of developing, marketing, selling, delivering, servicing, and paying for products and services.

A type of direct digital marketing that uses electronic mail (email) as the marketing communication delivery method. Email marketing is used in a number of ways by organizations, businesses, and marketers for brand and customer loyalty building, acquiring or converting customers, company advertisements, or for communicating promotional offers and more.

Short for electronic magazine, the name for an email newsletter or website that is modeled after a print magazine. Some e-zines are simply electronic versions of existing print magazines, whereas others exist only in their digital format.

Pronounced as separate letters, or as "fak," and short for frequently asked questions, a FAQ is an online document that poses a series of common questions and answers on a specific topic. FAQs originated in Usenet groups as a way to answer questions about the rules of the service. Today, there are FAQs on the Web for many topics.

A favicon or “favorites icon” is a small graphic that is associated with a page or website. The favicon allows the web developer to customize the site in the web browser, both in the tab bar that is displayed in many browsers as well as in the bookmarks when a site is saved. Many site favicons are designed as a small rendition of a logo or other branding image.

The name of a social networking site that connects people with friends and others who work, study, and live around them. People use Facebook to keep in touch with friends, post photos, share links, and exchange other information. Facebook users can see only the profiles of confirmed friends and the people in their networks.

The new layout of a Facebook profile, which allows users to document moments in their lives in a digital scrapbook.

A bandwidth-friendly and browser-independent vector-graphic animation technology. As long as different browsers are equipped with the necessary plug-ins, Flash animations will look the same. With Flash, users can draw their own animations or import other vector-based images.

In Internet marketing, the method of determining the geo-location of a website visitor and delivering different content to that visitor based on his or her location, such as country, region/state, city, metro code/zip code, organization, IP address, ISP, or other criteria.

The world’s most popular search engine. It began as a search project in 1996 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who were two Ph.D. students at Stanford University. They developed a search engine algorithm that ranked web pages not just by content and keywords, but by how many other web pages linked to each page. This strategy produced more useful results than other search engines and led to a rapid increase in Google’s web search marketshare. According to Google’s website, the company’s mission is to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” While the web search remains Google’s primary tool for helping users access information, the company offers several other services as well. Google has become such a popular search engine that the term “google” is now often used as a verb, synonymous with “search.” For example, if you are looking for information about someone, you can google that person using Google’s search engine.

Google’s social networking site launched as a competitor to Facebook. This site allows users to organize their friends and acquaintances into groups called “circles,” which they can then easily share information, pictures, and updates with.

A hash tag, or hashtag, is a way of organizing your Tweets for Twitter search engines. Users simply prefix a message with a community-driven hash tag to enable others to discover relevant posts. One commonly used hash tag on Twitter is #followfriday, where users network by providing the names of their favorite people to follow on Twitter.

Also called a page hit. The retrieval of any item, such as a page or a graphic, from a web server. For example, when a visitor calls up a web page with four graphics, that’s five hits: one for the page and four for the graphics. For this reason, hits often aren’t a good indication of web traffic. Compare with “Page view.”

The main page of a website. Typically, the home page serves as an index or table of contents to other documents stored at the site.

Short for HyperText Transfer Protocol, the underlying protocol used by the World Wide Web. HTTP defines how messages are formatted and transmitted and what actions web servers and browsers should take in response to various commands. For example, when you enter a URL in your browser, this actually sends an HTTP command to the web server directing it to fetch and transmit the requested web page.

Short for HyperText Markup Language, the authoring language used to create documents on the World Wide Web. HTML defines the structure and layout of a web document by using a variety of tags and attributes.

An element in an electronic document that links to another place in the same document or to an entirely different document and is usually highlighted in some way (often underlined on the Web). Typically, you click on the hyperlink to follow the link.

Short for Internet Message Access Protocol, a protocol for retrieving email messages. The latest version, IMAP4, is similar to POP3 but supports some additional features. For example, with IMAP4, you can search through your email messages for keywords while the messages are still on a mail server. You can then choose which messages to download to your device.

A display of a referral link or advertisement on a web page (such as ranking results).

Incoming hyperlink to a particular web page from an outside site, bringing traffic to that web page. Inbound links are an important element that most search engine algorithms use to measure the popularity of a web page.

The process of marketing goods or services through the Internet — both for those whose income is derived solely from the Internet and for those who have a brick-and-mortar location but choose to advertise on the Web. Internet marketing can be used to communicate a company’s message about itself, its products, or its services; conduct research as to the nature (demographics, preferences, and needs) of existing and potential customers; and sell goods, services, or advertising space over the Internet.

A list of data, such as group of files or database entries. It is typically saved in a plain text format that can be quickly scanned by a search algorithm. This significantly speeds up searching and sorting operations on data referenced by the index. Indexes often include information about each item in the list, such as metadata or keywords, which allows the data to be searched via the index instead of reading through each file individually. The term “index” can also be used as a verb, which not surprisingly means to create an index. An example is Google’s “Googlebot,” which crawls the Web on a regular basis, adding new web pages to the Google index. While most database and hard disk indexes are updated on the fly, search engine indexes are only updated every few hours, days, or even weeks. This is why newly published web pages may take time to show up in search engine results.

Also referred to as the deep Web, the term refers to either web pages that cannot be indexed by a typical search engine or web pages that a search engine purposely does not index, rendering the data “invisible” to the general user. One of the most common reasons that a website’s content is not indexed is because of the site’s use of dynamic databases, which opens the door for a potential spider trap. Web pages can also fall into the invisible Web if there are no links leading to them, since search engine spiders typically crawl through links that lead them from one destination to another. Data on the invisible Web is not inaccessible; the information is out there — it is stored on a web server somewhere and can be accessed using a browser — but the data must be found using means other than the general-purpose search engines, such as Google and Yahoo!

An IP address, short for Internet Protocol address, is an identifying number for a piece of network hardware. Having an IP address allows a device to communicate with other devices over an IP-based network. Public IP addresses are all unique and private IP addresses must be unique within the local network that the device belongs to. Think of an IP address much like your home address. You must have an address so others know how to reach (communicate) with you. Your home address, say 123 Main Street, is unique within your town (your local network), but there are likely others with the address of 123 Main Street in other towns (other local networks).

Short for Internet Service Provider, this refers to a company that provides access to the Internet. Equipped with a modem, you can then log on to the Internet, browse the World Wide Web, and send and receive email.

Word or phrase entered into a search engine in an effort to get the search engine to return matching and relevant results. Websites can be optimized with keywords that are used frequently in searches.

An element in an electronic document that links to another place in the same document or to an entirely different document. Typically, you click on the hyperlink to follow/connect to the linked page.

A searchable online directory listing information about geographically based businesses. Many offer users the option to post reviews, as well as connect and share information with other consumers (e.g., Yelp, Citysearch, Insiderpages).

A search that references a product or service that is typically consumed locally, such as “restaurant” or “nail salon,” is an implicit local search. Typical local search queries include not only information about “what” the site visitor is searching for (such as keywords, a business category, or the name of a consumer product), but also “where” information, such city name.

A special HTML tag that provides information about a web page. Unlike normal HTML tags, meta tags do not affect how the page is displayed. Instead, they provide information such as who created the page, how often it is updated, what the page is about, and which keywords represent the page’s content. Many search engines use this information when building their indices. Common meta tags used in search engine marketing are title, description, and keyword tags.

Short for Mail Exchange Record, an entry in a domain name database that identifies the mail server that is responsible for handling emails for that domain name.

Marketing on or with a mobile device, such as a cell phone using SMS (Short Message Service) Marketing. This is an example of horizontal telecommunication convergence. An older, more traditional definition: marketing in a moving fashion — for example — technology road shows or moving billboards.

A program that translates names from one form into another. For example, the Internet relies on domain name servers (DNSs) that translate domain names into IP addresses.

A form of an index of links to web pages that is akin to a table of contents in a book; how users move from one page to another as they view a web page or website.

A group of two or more computer systems linked together. There are many types of computer networks, including (1) local-area networks (LANs): these computers are geographically close together (that is, in the same building); (2) wide-area networks (WANs): these computers are farther apart and are connected by telephone lines or radio waves; (3) campus-area networks (CANs): these computers are within a limited geographic area, such as a campus or military base; (4) metropolitan-area networks (MANs): a data network designed for a town or city; (5) home-area networks (HANs): a network contained within a user’s home that connects a person’s digital devices. Computers on a network are sometimes called nodes. Computers and devices that allocate resources for a network are called servers. (v.) to connect two or more computers together with the ability to communicate with each other.

Listings on search engine results pages that appear because of their relevance to the search terms, as opposed to being advertisements. In contrast, non-organic search results may include pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.

An external link, or hyperlink, that points to another website on the Internet, typically on another domain from the current website. External links on your site become incoming links, or backlinks, for the sites you link to.

An instance of a page being loaded by a browser. Page views are often used in online advertising, where advertisers use the number of page views a site receives to determine where and how to advertise.

An Internet marketing formula used to price online advertisements. In PPC programs, the online advertisers will pay Internet publishers the agreed-upon PPC rate when an ad is clicked on, regardless if a sale is made or not. With pay-per-click in search engine advertising, the advertiser would typically bid on a keyword so the PPC rate changes. On single websites — or a network of content websites — the site publisher would usually set a fixed pay-per-click rate. Also called cost-per-click (CPC).

Short for Post Office Protocol, a protocol used to retrieve email from a mail server. Most email applications (sometimes called an email client) use the POP protocol, although some can use the newer IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol). There are two versions of POP. The first, called POP2, became a standard in the mid 80s and requires SMTP to send messages. The newer version, POP3, can be used with or without SMTP.

Short for quick response code, a QR code is a type of two-dimensional (2D) barcode that can be read using a QR barcode reader or camera-enabled smart phone with QR reader software. A QR code is able to carry information in both the vertical and the horizontal direction, which is why it is called a 2D barcode. QR codes are popular with mobile phone users as the barcode can be used to store addresses and URLs. With a camera-enabled smart phone, users can scan the QR code that has been coded to do things such as display text, provide contact data, or even open a web page in the browser on the smart phone.

In SEO terms, rank (or ranking) refers to where a website or web page is ranked within search engine results to a particular query. A web page rank within a search engine is also commonly called a position.

An agreement between two parties to provide a hyperlink within their own website to each other’s website. Generally, this is done to provide readers with quick access to related sites, to show a partnership between two sites, and to help with search engine ranking.

A web server function where an old URL can be redirected to a new one. 301 Redirect is a “permanent” redirect status indicating that the resource has moved permanently.

An approach to public relations that involves monitoring and managing online presence so as to develop positive public sentiment and credibility, as well as protect the reputation of a product, service, or company. This may involve complaint resolution and responding to negative or defamatory reviews.

The acronym used to describe the de facto standard for the syndication of web content. RSS is an XML-based format and, while it can be used in different ways for content distribution, its most widespread usage is in distributing news headlines on the Web. A website that wants to allow other sites to publish some of its content creates an RSS document and registers the document with an RSS publisher. A user that can read RSS-distributed content can use the content on a different site. Syndicated content can include data such as news feeds, blog posts, events listings, news stories, headlines, project updates, excerpts from discussion forums, or even corporate information.

A search engine is a program that searches documents for specified keywords and returns a list of the documents in which those keywords were found, often ranked according to relevance. Although a search engine is really a general class of programs, the term is often used to specifically describe systems such as Google, which enable users to search for documents on the World Wide Web.

Short for search engine optimization; the process of making a site and its content highly relevant for search engines (e.g., Google, Bing) and searchers. SEO includes technical tasks to make it easier for search engines to find and index a site for the appropriate keywords and can also encompass other marketing-focused tasks, as well as usability. Successful search marketing helps a site gain top ranking positioning for relevant words and phrases.

A computer or device on a network that manages network resources. There are many different types of servers. For example, a file server is a computer and storage device dedicated to storing file — any user on the network can store files on the server; a print server is a computer that manages one or more printers; a network server is a computer that manages network traffic; and a database server is a computer system that processes database queries. Servers are often dedicated, meaning that they perform no other tasks besides their server tasks.

A text messaging service component of phone, web, or mobile communication systems, using standardized communications protocols that allow the exchange of short text messages between fixed line or mobile phone devices. SMS text messaging is the most widely used data application in the world, with 2.4 billion active users, or 74% of all mobile phone subscribers.

A relatively new type of mobile marketing that uses SMS (short message service) text messaging as a medium of direct advertising, often to a firm’s existing customers. An SMS Marketing campaign involves collecting mobile phone numbers usually by customer opt-ins using a keyword sent to a short code, which adds their number to a messaging platform database. Once numbers are collected, the marketer can then prepare a special promotion or update and send a mass message to potential repeat customers. SMS marketing is one of the newest and fastest growing types of marketing because it offers low cost, high return on investment and places promotions and updates in the pockets of potential customers. It is similar to email in cost, but offers much higher response rates as most mobile phone users open and view text messages.

Short for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, a protocol for sending email messages between servers. Most email systems that send mail over the Internet use SMTP to send messages from one server to another; the messages can then be retrieved with an email client using either POP or IMAP. In addition, SMTP is generally used to send messages from a mail client to a mail server. This is why you need to specify both the POP or IMAP server and the SMTP server when you configure your email application.

Short for secure sockets layer, a protocol for transmitting private documents via the Internet. SSL uses a cryptographic system that uses two keys to encrypt data — a public key known to everyone and a private or secret key known only to the recipient of the message. Many websites use the protocol to obtain confidential user information, such as credit card numbers. By convention, URLs that require an SSL connection start with https: instead of http.

A category of online sites and interactive tools that are based on user participation and user-generated content. They include social networking sites such as LinkedIn,Facebook, Google+, and Twitter, social bookmarking sites like Del.icio.us, social news sites like Digg or Reddit, and other sites that are centered on user interaction.

SNS describes any website that enables users to create public profiles within that website and form relationships with other users of the same website who access their profile. Social networking sites can be used to describe community-based websites, online discussions forums, chatrooms, and other social spaces online.

Electronic junk mail or junk newsgroup postings. Some people define spam even more generally as any unsolicited email. Spam is generally email advertising for some product sent to a mailing list or newsgroup. There is some debate about the source of the term, but the generally accepted version is that it comes from the Monty Python song of the same name; like the song, spam is an endless repetition of worthless text. Another school of thought maintains that it comes from the computer group lab at the University of Southern California, which gave it the name because it has many of the same characteristics as the lunchmeat Spam.

A search engine spider is an automated software program that crawls the web (also called crawler, robot, or “bot”). A spider will visit a website, read the information on the actual site, read the site’s meta tags, and follow the links that the site connects to, performing indexing on all linked websites as well. The crawler returns all that information back to a central depository, where the data is indexed. The crawler will periodically return to the sites to check for any information that has changed. The administrators of the search engine determine the frequency that this happens.

Short for Sender Policy Framework, an extension of SMTP that stops email spammers from forging the “From” fields in an email. As SMTP itself does not carry an authenticating mechanism, the SPF extension provides the authentication scheme by specifying which computers are authorized to send email from a specific domain. In order to use SPF, the domain sending emails must establish an SPF record that is published in DNS records. When the email passes through the DNS server, it is compared to the SPF record for that domain to determine if the sender is indeed authorized to transmit emails from that sender’s address. If the email comes from a domain that is not authorized, the DNS server will not forward the email to the expected destination. SPF is one method that can be used to stop spam from being sent using unauthorized domain names. However, it should be noted that SPF only stops the spammer from forging the “From” field in the email and does not stop the spammer from sending emails from a domain in which it is a member.

The page of a website that the user sees first before being given the option to continue to the main content of the site. Splash pages are used to promote a company, service, or product or may be used to inform the user of what kind of software or browser is necessary in order to view the rest of the site’s pages. Some splash pages will bring the user to the main website automatically, and some require the user to click on a link that will load the main page. A splash page is sometimes referred to as a splash screen.

Short for spam blog, splog is a slang term used to describe blogs that are established only to promote affiliate websites in order to help those sites achieve a better search engine page ranking.

A user or html sitemap, sometimes written “site map,” is an overview of the pages within a website. Sitemaps of smaller sites may include every page of the website, while sitemaps of larger sites often only include pages for major categories and subcategories of the website. While sitemaps can be organized in a variety of ways, most use an outline form, with pages arranged by topic. This gives visitors a good overall picture of how the site is organized and clearly defines all the resources the website has to offer. While a properly designed website should allow visitors to navigate the entire site without using the sitemap, incorporating a sitemap gives users another means of locating pages. For this reason, each page listed in a sitemap is typically linked to the page it represents. This allows visitors to quickly jump to any section of a website listed in the sitemap. An xml sitemap informs and directs search crawlers. Webmasters can place a sitemap-formatted file on their web server that enables crawlers to find out what pages are present and which have recently changed, so they can crawl a website accordingly.

A command inserted in a document that specifies how the document, or a portion of the document, should be formatted. Tags are used by all format specifications that store documents as text files. This includes SGML and HTML.

A keyword used to identify a piece of information. Many blog systems allow authors to add free-form tags to a post, along with (or instead of) placing the post into categories. For example, a post may display that it has been tagged with “pet nutrition” and “dog food.” Each of those tags is usually a web link leading to an index page listing all of the posts associated with that tag. The blog may have a sidebar listing all the tags in use on that blog, with each tag leading to an index page.

A small snippet of code that is inserted into the body of an HTML page. In the case of web analytics, for example, when the HTML page is loaded, the tracking code contacts the analytics server and logs a page view for that page and captures information about the visit.

The measurement of the amount of users that visit a website.

A free social messaging tool that lets people stay connected through brief text message updates up to 140 characters in length. Twitter is based on you answering the question: “What are you doing?” You then post thoughts, observations, and happenings during the day. Your update is posted on your Twitter profile page through SMS text messaging, the Twitter website, instant messaging, RSS, email, or through other social applications and sites, such as Facebook.

Slang term to describe a Twitter update to your answer to Twitter’s “What are you doing?” question. A tweet is basically whatever you type into the web box to answer that question, using 140 characters or less. People tweet personal messages, random thoughts, post links, or anything else that fits in the character requirements.

To transmit data from a computer to a bulletin board service, mainframe, or network. For example, if you use a personal computer to log on to a network and you want to send files across the network, you must upload the files from your computer to the network.

Acronym for Uniform Resource Locator (URL); it is the global address of documents and other resources on the World Wide Web and is a means of identifying an exact location on the Internet. For example, http://www.beyondindigopets.com/services/reaching-out.html is the URL that defines the use of HTTP to access the web page reaching-out.html in the /services/ directory on the Beyond Indigo website. URLs typically have four parts: protocol type (HTTP), host domain name (www.beyondindigopets.com), directory path (/services/), and file name (reaching-out.html).

A website design phrase that describes how well visitors can use a website. Good usability requires that the site be easy to navigate, have a clear layout, be consistent across all pages, and also be informative and useful to the visitor.

Marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message. Viral marketing depends on a high pass-along rate from person to person. If a large percentage of recipients forward something to a large number of friends, the overall growth snowballs very quickly. If the pass-along numbers get too low, the overall growth quickly fizzles.

Short for video blog, it is the term used to describe a blog that includes or consists of video clips. Typically updated with regular frequency, vlogs often reflect the personality or cause of the author.

Please see "URL"

Please see "Browser".

A web host is in the business of providing server space, web services, and file maintenance for websites controlled by individuals or companies that do not have their own web servers.

Or "web metrics," is a generic term meaning the study of the impact of a website on its users. E-commerce companies and other website publishers often use web analytics software (such as Google Analytics) to measure such concrete details as how many people visited their site, how many of those visitors were unique visitors, how they came to the site (e.g., if they followed a link to get to the site or came there directly), what keywords they searched for on the site’s search engine, how long they stayed on a given page or on the entire site, what links they clicked on, and when they left the site. Web analytics software also can be used to monitor whether or not a site’s pages are working properly. With this information, website administrators can determine which areas of the site are popular and which areas of the site do not get traffic. Web analytics provides these site administrators and publishers with data that can be used to streamline a website to create a better user experience.

Computers that deliver (serve up) web pages. Every web server has an IP address and possibly a domain name. For example, if you enter the URL http://www.beyondindigo.com/index.html in your browser, this sends a request to the web server whose domain name is beyondindigo.com. The server then fetches the page named index.html and sends it to your browser. Any computer can be turned into a web server by installing server software and connecting the machine to the Internet.

Short for web-based seminar; a presentation, lecture, workshop, or seminar that is transmitted over the Web. A key feature of a webinar is its interactive elements — the ability to give, receive, and discuss information. Contrast with webcast, in which the data transmission is one way and does not allow interaction between the presenter and the audience.

(1) to use the Internet to broadcast live or delayed audio and/or video transmissions, much like traditional television and radio broadcasts. For example, a university may offer online courses in which the instructor webcasts a pre-recorded or live lecture or an enterprise may webcast a press conference in lieu of or in addition to a conference call. Users typically must have the appropriate multimedia application in order to view a webcast. (2) to use push technology, to send web-based information to an Internet user. (n.) the data transmission that results from one of the above methods.

A site (location) on the World Wide Web. Each website contains a home page, which is the first document users see when they enter the site. The site might also contain additional documents and files. Each site is owned and managed by an individual, company, or organization.

The name of a popular wireless networking technology that uses radio waves to provide wireless high-speed Internet and network connections. The Wi-Fi Alliance, the organization that owns the Wi-Fi (registered trademark) term, specifically defines Wi-Fi as any “wireless local area network (WLAN) products that are based on the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 standards.”

An open source content management system (CMS) often used as a blog publishing application powered by PHP and MySQL. It has many features, including a plugin architecture and a templating system. WordPress is the most popular CMS in use today.

A marketing method that relies on casual social interactions to promote a product or service to create a “buzz” that goes viral.

a system of Internet servers that support specially formatted documents. The documents are formatted in a markup language called HTML (HyperText Markup Language) that supports links to other documents, as well as graphics, audio, and video files. This enables the ability to jump from one document to another simply by clicking on hot spots. Not all Internet servers are part of the World Wide Web. Web browser applications make it easy to access the World Wide Web; two of the most popular being Firefox, and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Short for Extensible Markup Language‘ XML is a pared-down version of SGML, designed especially for web documents. It allows designers to create their own customized tags, enabling the definition, transmission, validation, and interpretation of data between applications and between organizations.

An Internet portal that incorporates a search engine and a directory of World Wide Web sites organized in a hierarchy of topic categories. Yahoo! began as the bookmark lists of two Stanford University graduate students, David Filo and Jerry Yang. After putting their combined bookmark lists organized by categories on a college site, the list began to grow into an Internet phenomenon. It became the first such directory with a large following. According to the Yahoo site’s official FAQ page, Yahoo stands for “Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.”

A popular free video-sharing website that lets registered users upload and share video clips online at YouTube.com and acts as a distribution platform for original content creators as well as advertisers. To view the videos, you are not required to register. Launched in 2005 by former PayPal employees, the video-sharing site was acquired by Google in October 2006.