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SEO Glossary
30 SEO terms, defined clearly
Technical SEO, content strategy, AI search, and analytics. Definitions written for practitioners, not beginners. Expanding to 50 terms by next quarter.
A-Z index
SEO Fundamentals
SEO
Search Engine Optimization — improving a site's visibility in organic search results.
SERP
Search Engine Results Page — what Google shows for a query.
Keyword
Query or phrase a user searches for.
Long-tail Keyword
3+ word queries with specific intent and lower search volume.
Search Intent
The underlying goal behind a user's query.
Keyword Difficulty
How hard it is to rank for a keyword on page one.
Backlink
An inbound link from another domain.
Referring Domain
A unique domain linking to your site.
Anchor Text
The visible clickable text of a link.
Domain Rating (DR)
Ahrefs' metric for backlink profile strength, 0–100.
Internal Link
A link between two pages on the same domain.
Featured Snippet
Position zero — answer box above organic results.
People Also Ask (PAA)
Expandable question box on Google SERPs.
Rich Result
Enhanced SERP listing with stars, images, or carousels.
Technical SEO
Canonical Tag
Tells search engines which URL is the preferred version.
Duplicate Content
Substantially similar content on multiple URLs.
Hreflang
HTML attribute signaling page language and region.
Schema Markup
Structured data (JSON-LD) that helps search engines understand content.
Core Web Vitals
Google's LCP, INP, CLS page-experience metrics.
Crawl Budget
How often/many pages Googlebot crawls on your site.
Indexability
Whether a page can be stored in Google's index.
robots.txt
File telling crawlers which URLs they can access.
AI Search
AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)
Optimization for AI answer engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews.
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization)
Content structured for LLM retrieval and citation.
LLM Visibility
How often a brand is cited in LLM outputs.
Entity SEO
Optimization around Google's Knowledge Graph entities.
Knowledge Graph
Google's database of real-world entities and relationships.
Put the knowledge to work
Understanding SEO is step one. Executing it is step two.
Our team handles execution across all 30+ dimensions covered in this glossary. Get a free audit to see where your site currently stands.