Need To Know SEM Terminology
1. Ad Group – A set of keywords, ads, and bids that is a key part of how your account is organized. Each campaign is made up of one or more ad groups, while each ad group typically includes about 5-10 keywords.
2. Average Cost-Per-Click (Avg. CPC) – The average amount that you’ve been charged for a click on your ad. Average CPC is calculated by dividing the total cost of your clicks by the total number of clicks.
3. Average Position – A statistic that describes how your ad is typically positioned on search results pages.
4. Bid – The maximum amount you are willing to pay for a search keyword click.
5. Bounce Rate – Percent of people who enter your site but leave without visiting any other page.
6. Broad Match – The default matching option, broad match means that your ad may show if a search term contains your keyword terms in any order, and possibly along with other terms. Your ads can also show for singular or plural forms, synonyms, related searches, and other relevant variations. Sticking with the broad match default is a great choice if you don’t want to spend a lot of time building your keyword lists and want to capture the highest possible volume of ad traffic.
7. Broad Match Modifier (BMM) – You can add a modifier, a plus sign (+), to your broad match keywords if you’d like your ads to show when someone searches for close variants of your keywords in any order. Close variants include misspellings, singular/plural forms, abbreviations and acronyms. Unlike broad match, using a modifier excludes synonyms or related searches. For this reason, it adds an additional level of control. Using broad match modifier is a good choice if you want to increase relevancy even if it means you might get less ad traffic than broad match.
8. Daily Budget – An amount set for each ad campaign to specify how much, on average, you’d like to spend each day. However, it is important to know that on any single day, you can receive up to 20% more in costs than your daily budget.
9. Campaign – A set of ad groups (ads, keywords, and bids) that share a budget, location targeting, and other settings. Your AdWords account can have one or many ad campaignsrunning.
10. Clicks – In PPC, a click is registered when someone clicks on one of your Search or Display Network ads.
11. Click-Through Rate (CTR) – A way of measuring the success of an online advertising campaign. CTR is determined by dividing the number of users who clicked on an ad by the number of impressions.
12. Cost-Per-Click (CPC) – The amount of money an advertiser pays search engines and other Internet publishers for a single click on its advertisement that brings one visitor to its website.
13. Day Parting – Optimization technique where you adjust your ads to run during the most profitable hours and/or days. For example, if you run a call center that operates from 8-5, you can schedule ads to run during that timespan only.
14. Default Max. CPC – Set at the ad group level, this represents the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for each ad click. If you don’t set a specific keyword bid, AdWords will apply your default max. CPC bid.
15. Destination URL – The URL address for the page you’re sending traffic to from your PPC ads. This is allowed to be different from the display URL, although it has to direct users to the same domain as what is in the display URL.
16. Devices – Electronics that are capable of displaying a PPC ad. Supported devices include desktops/laptops, mobile devices and tablets.
17. Display URL – The webpage address that is shown with your ad. This is often different from your destination URL and much shorter. Just make sure you only have one display URL per ad group and that it uses the same root domain as your destination URL. AdWords allows 35 characters for Display URLs, and if your domain is longer than that they may show a shortened version.
18. Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) – Feature that allows users to dynamically customizean ad to include keywords contained in user search queries.
19. Enhanced CPC (ECPC) – Automatic bid management feature designed to increase your ROI by raising or lowering your bids for keywords that the system predicts are more likely to convert.
20. Exact Match – The most specific of the keyword match types and triggers your ad when users type your keyword exactly as is and in the same order.
21. Geotargeting – Also known as Location Targeting, this campaign setting allows advertisers to specify the geographical countries, regions, states, etc. where their ads will be served.
22. Google AdWords – Online advertising platform that offers pay-per-click advertising and site-targeted advertising for text, banner, and rich-media ads and more.
23. Google Analytics – Free website optimization service and interface that provides detailed statistics regarding visits to your site and behavioral analysis.
24. Impressions – Number of people who see your PPC ad.
25. Keyword – A word or phrase that PPC advertisers use to target and display their ads in the sponsored search results.
26. Keyword Matching Options – Keyword-level settings that help control how closely the keyword needs to match a person’s search term in order to trigger your ad. These include broad, modified broad, phrase, exact and negative match types. You also have the ability to specify whether or not you want your phrase and exact match terms to show for plurals, misspellings or close variants.
27. Landing Page – Specified by the destination URL, this is the webpage where customers end up after they click your ad. It is important to note that landing page quality is an important factor in determining Quality Score.
28. Location Extensions – Type of extension that includes a business address and phone number into text ads. These can be a great way to help attract more customers to local businesses.
29. Long-tail Keyword – A specific keyword phrase that consists of 2 or more words. Most advertisers use long-tail keywords to target the customer at or near their buying stage. These also generally have less competition since they are more specific, which leads to reduced CPCs
30. Match Type – Matching option that allows advertisers to control when their ad triggers for a particular search query.
31. Negative Keywords – Advertisers add negative keywords to their account so their ads do not display when a customer types in a search query containing that keyword. Negative keywords help you qualify the clicks to your site more effectively.
32. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) – A method of advertising where the advertiser pays for each click received through the search engines.
33. Pay-Per-Click Management – Service provided by certified agencies or individuals that help businesses achieve their PPC goals and maximize returns.
34. Phrase Match – Keyword setting that allows ads to show only when someone’s search includes the exact phrase of your keyword or close variations of the specific keyword phrase.
35. Quality Score – A complex and partially hidden formula used by search engines that takes CTR and several other factors into account in order to decide whether your keywords arerelevant to your ads and landing page. This is multiplied with your max CPC to calculate your Ad Rank to see what your ad position will be.
36. Remarketing – Allows advertisers to show ads to users who’ve previously visited your website as they browse other sites on the Display Network. This creates a network of high-intent and relevant users that have the opportunity to click on your ad and return to your site to make a purchase.
37. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) – Form of online marketing that involves the promotion of web properties by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages and through paid online advertisements like PPC.
38. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Process of increasing organic traffic from search engines results pages. All major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing have such results, where web pages and other content are analyzed and ranked based on what the search engine considers most relevant to the user.
39. Search Engine Results Page (SERP) – The listings a user sees in the search engines after typing in a search query. The results typically consist of a series of Organic listings and Paid or sponsored search ads.
40. Search Query – A basic search query is what the user enters when searching on any search engine. If their search includes the keywords that you are bidding on your ad will appear (depending on match types and all of the other targeting options, of course).
41. Search Query Report (SQR) – Also known as a “search terms report”, this allows advertisers to review the actual search queries that triggered their PPC ads. This report is great for identifying new profitable keyword ideas and blocking irrelevant queries.
42. Sitelinks Extensions – Feature that displays links to different pages of a website beneath the ad text. Sitelinks can appear in ads at the top and bottom of the SERPs and for some search partners. Sitelinks need to direct users to a different destination URL than what your main ad points to.
Text Ad – The standard type of AdWords ad, which typically includes a headline (25 characters in length), two lines of descriptive text (35 characters per line), and a display and destination URL (the display URL is limited to 35 characters)
2. Average Cost-Per-Click (Avg. CPC) – The average amount that you’ve been charged for a click on your ad. Average CPC is calculated by dividing the total cost of your clicks by the total number of clicks.
3. Average Position – A statistic that describes how your ad is typically positioned on search results pages.
4. Bid – The maximum amount you are willing to pay for a search keyword click.
5. Bounce Rate – Percent of people who enter your site but leave without visiting any other page.
6. Broad Match – The default matching option, broad match means that your ad may show if a search term contains your keyword terms in any order, and possibly along with other terms. Your ads can also show for singular or plural forms, synonyms, related searches, and other relevant variations. Sticking with the broad match default is a great choice if you don’t want to spend a lot of time building your keyword lists and want to capture the highest possible volume of ad traffic.
7. Broad Match Modifier (BMM) – You can add a modifier, a plus sign (+), to your broad match keywords if you’d like your ads to show when someone searches for close variants of your keywords in any order. Close variants include misspellings, singular/plural forms, abbreviations and acronyms. Unlike broad match, using a modifier excludes synonyms or related searches. For this reason, it adds an additional level of control. Using broad match modifier is a good choice if you want to increase relevancy even if it means you might get less ad traffic than broad match.
8. Daily Budget – An amount set for each ad campaign to specify how much, on average, you’d like to spend each day. However, it is important to know that on any single day, you can receive up to 20% more in costs than your daily budget.
9. Campaign – A set of ad groups (ads, keywords, and bids) that share a budget, location targeting, and other settings. Your AdWords account can have one or many ad campaignsrunning.
10. Clicks – In PPC, a click is registered when someone clicks on one of your Search or Display Network ads.
11. Click-Through Rate (CTR) – A way of measuring the success of an online advertising campaign. CTR is determined by dividing the number of users who clicked on an ad by the number of impressions.
12. Cost-Per-Click (CPC) – The amount of money an advertiser pays search engines and other Internet publishers for a single click on its advertisement that brings one visitor to its website.
13. Day Parting – Optimization technique where you adjust your ads to run during the most profitable hours and/or days. For example, if you run a call center that operates from 8-5, you can schedule ads to run during that timespan only.
14. Default Max. CPC – Set at the ad group level, this represents the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for each ad click. If you don’t set a specific keyword bid, AdWords will apply your default max. CPC bid.
15. Destination URL – The URL address for the page you’re sending traffic to from your PPC ads. This is allowed to be different from the display URL, although it has to direct users to the same domain as what is in the display URL.
16. Devices – Electronics that are capable of displaying a PPC ad. Supported devices include desktops/laptops, mobile devices and tablets.
17. Display URL – The webpage address that is shown with your ad. This is often different from your destination URL and much shorter. Just make sure you only have one display URL per ad group and that it uses the same root domain as your destination URL. AdWords allows 35 characters for Display URLs, and if your domain is longer than that they may show a shortened version.
18. Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) – Feature that allows users to dynamically customizean ad to include keywords contained in user search queries.
19. Enhanced CPC (ECPC) – Automatic bid management feature designed to increase your ROI by raising or lowering your bids for keywords that the system predicts are more likely to convert.
20. Exact Match – The most specific of the keyword match types and triggers your ad when users type your keyword exactly as is and in the same order.
21. Geotargeting – Also known as Location Targeting, this campaign setting allows advertisers to specify the geographical countries, regions, states, etc. where their ads will be served.
22. Google AdWords – Online advertising platform that offers pay-per-click advertising and site-targeted advertising for text, banner, and rich-media ads and more.
23. Google Analytics – Free website optimization service and interface that provides detailed statistics regarding visits to your site and behavioral analysis.
24. Impressions – Number of people who see your PPC ad.
25. Keyword – A word or phrase that PPC advertisers use to target and display their ads in the sponsored search results.
26. Keyword Matching Options – Keyword-level settings that help control how closely the keyword needs to match a person’s search term in order to trigger your ad. These include broad, modified broad, phrase, exact and negative match types. You also have the ability to specify whether or not you want your phrase and exact match terms to show for plurals, misspellings or close variants.
27. Landing Page – Specified by the destination URL, this is the webpage where customers end up after they click your ad. It is important to note that landing page quality is an important factor in determining Quality Score.
28. Location Extensions – Type of extension that includes a business address and phone number into text ads. These can be a great way to help attract more customers to local businesses.
29. Long-tail Keyword – A specific keyword phrase that consists of 2 or more words. Most advertisers use long-tail keywords to target the customer at or near their buying stage. These also generally have less competition since they are more specific, which leads to reduced CPCs
30. Match Type – Matching option that allows advertisers to control when their ad triggers for a particular search query.
31. Negative Keywords – Advertisers add negative keywords to their account so their ads do not display when a customer types in a search query containing that keyword. Negative keywords help you qualify the clicks to your site more effectively.
32. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) – A method of advertising where the advertiser pays for each click received through the search engines.
33. Pay-Per-Click Management – Service provided by certified agencies or individuals that help businesses achieve their PPC goals and maximize returns.
34. Phrase Match – Keyword setting that allows ads to show only when someone’s search includes the exact phrase of your keyword or close variations of the specific keyword phrase.
35. Quality Score – A complex and partially hidden formula used by search engines that takes CTR and several other factors into account in order to decide whether your keywords arerelevant to your ads and landing page. This is multiplied with your max CPC to calculate your Ad Rank to see what your ad position will be.
36. Remarketing – Allows advertisers to show ads to users who’ve previously visited your website as they browse other sites on the Display Network. This creates a network of high-intent and relevant users that have the opportunity to click on your ad and return to your site to make a purchase.
37. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) – Form of online marketing that involves the promotion of web properties by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages and through paid online advertisements like PPC.
38. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Process of increasing organic traffic from search engines results pages. All major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing have such results, where web pages and other content are analyzed and ranked based on what the search engine considers most relevant to the user.
39. Search Engine Results Page (SERP) – The listings a user sees in the search engines after typing in a search query. The results typically consist of a series of Organic listings and Paid or sponsored search ads.
40. Search Query – A basic search query is what the user enters when searching on any search engine. If their search includes the keywords that you are bidding on your ad will appear (depending on match types and all of the other targeting options, of course).
41. Search Query Report (SQR) – Also known as a “search terms report”, this allows advertisers to review the actual search queries that triggered their PPC ads. This report is great for identifying new profitable keyword ideas and blocking irrelevant queries.
42. Sitelinks Extensions – Feature that displays links to different pages of a website beneath the ad text. Sitelinks can appear in ads at the top and bottom of the SERPs and for some search partners. Sitelinks need to direct users to a different destination URL than what your main ad points to.
Text Ad – The standard type of AdWords ad, which typically includes a headline (25 characters in length), two lines of descriptive text (35 characters per line), and a display and destination URL (the display URL is limited to 35 characters)