Suzi Smart Bear
If you’ve ever been blinded by the technical jargon coming from your web developer, hosting provider, SEO consultant or just THE INTERNET, use our technical jargon glossary as a reference to understand what everything means.
| Abbreviation | Full Term | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| AJAX | Asynchronous JavaScript And XML | a way to making content load using javascript and XML |
| AMP | Accelerated Mobile Pages | Pages built to perform and render faster on mobiles |
| API | Application Program Interface | A protocol allowing for access to features, facilities or data of another system using a 'key' to secure the connection and authenticate. Example - Using Paypal on your website or having a 'Twitter feed' |
| Cache | a 'copy' of the website page which is loaded faster than asking for the original webpage information from the server. | |
| CDN | Content Delivery Network | A group of servers, world wide, that keep a copy of your website and distribute it to the visitors to the website that are nearest to them which makes the loading time faster and can handle high traffic better. |
| Child theme | a theme which inherits the functionality and style from a parent theme, but can be customised without changes being lost when the parent theme is updated | |
| CMS | Content Management System | A platform to manage a website without needing to code and using a user friendly interface. Example: WordPress |
| CRM | Customer Relationship Management | A platform for managing customer relations - interactions, notes, leads, contact details etc |
| CSS | Cascading Style Sheets | Used in conjunction with HTML, CSS is the where the styling instructions (in code) for the website are held. |
| CTR | Click-Through Rate | What percentage of overall people are clicking on an ad or a link on marketing material/content. |
| GA | Google Analytics | A way to measure traffic to and from your website //analytics.google.com/ |
| # | Hashtag | Using the # Symbol in front of a word to link similar words, highlight the word and categorise posts on social media |
| .htaccess | H T Access file | a (often hidden) file held on your server that controls some access information. Be careful when editing. |
| HTML | Hypertext Markup Language | A standardised structure for creating the building blocks of a website. |
| HTTPS | Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure | A security measure on web browsers encrypting data between the visitor and the server - indicated by HTTPs in the url (rather than HTTP) and a green padlock. |
| iframe | Inline Frame | An HTML document embedded inside another HTML document/page |
| IMAP | Internet Message Access Protocol | Used in email, this means that all your emails and related folders and files are saved on the server who is providing your email service. |
| Keyword | A word that has meaning for your business or relates to the content - i.e. what someone would use to search on Google. Long tailed keywords are short group of keywords that often form a sentence. |
|
| Metadata | Essentially, data that describes other data. For example, a Meta Description would be a synopsis of the page | |
| PHP | PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (a recursive acronym) | PHP is a type of coding used in the building of websites like WordPress |
| Plugins | Plugins are like apps for WordPress. They are 'add-ons' to increase your websites' functionality and can be accessed via Plugins on the dashboard menu. | |
| POP3 | Post Office Protocol 3 | Used in email, this is a protocol for holding and then delivering your email to you but unlike IMAP it doesn't store them for you on the server. |
| PPC | Pay Per Click | Buying of visits to your website through advertising |
| ROI | Return On Investment | The cost you've invested including time of labour, divided by the resulted sales. |
| RSS | Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication | A feed of a page (usually the blog page). Not generally depreciated. |
| SEO | Search Engine Optimisation | Improving your website and content to rank higher on search engines |
| SSL (certificate) | Secure Sockets Layer (certificate) | A protocol which creates a secure connection between the browser and the server. (A certificate ensures authenticity of the secure connection.) |
| SQL (database) | Structured Query Language (database) | A language used to communicate with a database (SQL is used to store information of a website in a structured database and accessed via interfaces like PHPMyAdmin |
| URL | Uniform Resource Locator | The address of the website |
| UTM (codes) | Urchin Tracking Module (codes) | A tracking code placed on the end of links so that they can be tracked in Google Analytics |
| UX | User Experience | Making the website work better for the people who are using it |
| Widgets | Widgets are small blocks that can be controlled to perform specific tasks. They can be placed in 'Sidebars' and 'Footers' within WordPress by going to Appearance->Widgets on the dashboard. | |
| Webmail | A way to access your emails via an interface on a webpage - can be accessed from any location with an internet connection and a browser. | |
| XML | eXtensible Markup Language | A markup language similar to html |
