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Optimization

Optimization involves making web page improvement changes that conform to the criteria search engines use for ranking. Each search engine has its own criteria or algorithm and correct page optimization can greatly improve the positioning of that page. Optimization may involve design/layout changes, content rich text in the title, description and body text and a host of other factors. Since most search engines change their algorithms often, optimization strategies must be adjusted accordingly.

Page Popularity

Search engines liken page popularity to the number and quality of links to a particular page, including both inbound and reciprocal links. Greater page (or link) popularity can factor greatly in where your pages are ranked. You can find a free service to measure your page's popularity at http://www.linkpopularity.com.

Page View

Page View measures the number of pages viewed rather than server hits. Sometimes when a searcher views a single page it is recorded as many "hits" because of the frames or images within that page. These multiple hits can be grouped together to provide a more useful method of counting visitors.

Placement

See Positioning added info on search engine placement.

Portal Site

Search engines, directories and service provider homepages are examples of this generic term. Basically, any site which provides an entry point to the internet for a significant number of users can be called a portal site.

Positioning

Search engines and directories use a variety of methods to order or rank web sites or web pages and position them in terms of relevancy to a particular query.

Positioning Technique

Search engine optimization (SEO) utilizes a variety of methods or positioning techniques to modify a web page and make it more relevant to a particular query for any given search engine.

Promotion

See Search Engine Promotion as well as web site promotion.

Qualified Traffic

By targeting the keywords searchers are most likely to use to find your products or services, you effectively target your traffic audience. This is considered qualified traffic because they are specifically looking for what it is you have to offer.

Query

Any search term, word, phrase or group of words that searchers use to ask a search engine or directory for a list of results is referred to as a query.

Ranking

See Positioning for more page search engine ranking info.

Referrer

A referrer is the internet address or URL of the web page from which a visitor initiated and is indicated on the server's referrer log file.

Registration

There are two distinct registrations on the internet. The first is the registration of a domain name. The second is the registration of domain pages with a search engine or directory in order to obtain listings.

Re-submission

Any page or site can be re-submitted to a search engine or directory. Re-submission of critical pages at given accepted intervals is necessary for some search engines; however, with most directories, once the domain has a listing, it should not be re-submitted.

Robot

A search engine spider is one example of a robot. Spider robots follow hypertext links and access web pages without human control. When a page is spidered the robot scans the page for its content, places information into its database and at a later date the pages are ranked and added to the database that supplies search results.

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