The SEO & AI search glossary

127 terms every marketer should know, from crawl budget to generative engine optimization, defined in plain English.

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301 redirectTechnical
A 301 redirect is a permanent server-side redirect that sends users and search engines from one URL to another. It tells Google the old address has moved for good, so ranking signals consolidate on the new URL over time. Use 301s for site migrations, URL changes and merged pages, pointing each old URL to its closest equivalent.
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A

AI ModeAI Search
AI Mode is a conversational search experience in Google Search that answers complex questions with an AI-generated response, supporting links and follow-up questions. It is powered by a Gemini model and uses a query fan-out technique to run many related searches at once. Pages still need to be indexed and eligible for a snippet to be cited.
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AI OverviewsAI Search
AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries that Google shows at the top of some search results, with links to the web pages used as sources. They launched in the US in 2024 and now appear in many countries and languages. There is no special markup to opt in; Google selects supporting pages from its regular search index.
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AI referral trafficAnalytics
AI referral traffic is the visits your website receives from AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Copilot when users click a cited link. In GA4 it can be segmented by referrer domain, and ChatGPT adds a utm_source=chatgpt.com parameter to many links. Some AI visits arrive without a referrer, so reported numbers usually undercount.
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AI share of voiceAI Search
AI share of voice is the percentage of AI-generated answers, across a defined set of prompts, that mention or cite your brand compared with competitors. It is the AI-search equivalent of organic share of voice. Because AI answers vary between runs, it should be measured by repeating each prompt over time and across several platforms.
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AI shopping visibilityE-commerce
AI shopping visibility is how often your products appear in AI-driven shopping experiences, such as product results in ChatGPT, Google AI Mode and Perplexity. These systems draw on product feeds, structured data, merchant information and reviews. Accurate, complete product data is the main lever, alongside the same authority signals that support classic SEO.
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Alt textOn-page
Alt text is the written description of an image placed in the HTML alt attribute. Screen readers read it aloud for visually impaired users, and search engines use it to understand what an image shows. Good alt text is short, specific and descriptive; purely decorative images can use an empty alt attribute instead.
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Anchor textOff-page
Anchor text is the visible, clickable text of a hyperlink. Search engines use it as a clue to what the linked page is about, for both internal and external links. A natural backlink profile mixes branded, descriptive and generic anchors, while a high share of exact-match keyword anchors can look manipulative.
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Answer accuracyAI Search
Answer accuracy measures whether AI assistants describe your brand correctly, including your services, prices, locations, features and leadership. It is tracked by reviewing AI responses to a fixed set of prompts. Inaccurate answers usually trace back to outdated pages, conflicting third-party listings or thin entity signals, which can be corrected at the source.
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Answer engine optimization (AEO)AI Search
Answer engine optimization (AEO) is the practice of structuring content so search engines and assistants can lift it as a direct answer. It targets featured snippets, People Also Ask boxes, voice assistants and AI responses. Typical tactics include question-led headings, concise answer paragraphs, clear definitions, tables and supporting schema markup.
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Apple Business ConnectLocal
Apple Business Connect is Apple's free tool for claiming and managing how a business appears in Apple Maps and other Apple apps. Businesses can update hours, photos, categories and actions such as calls or bookings. Because Apple Maps is the default map app on iPhone, an accurate listing matters for local visibility.
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ArabiziInternational
Arabizi is Arabic written in Latin letters, often with numerals standing in for Arabic sounds, such as 3 for ع or 7 for ح. Many users in the Middle East type searches this way, or mix Arabic and English in one query. Keyword research for Arabic-speaking markets should capture these variants alongside standard Arabic.
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AttributionAnalytics
Attribution is the method of assigning credit for a conversion to the marketing touchpoints that led to it. GA4 uses data-driven attribution by default, sharing credit across channels based on observed user paths. Organic search often assists conversions that another channel closes, so last-click reports can understate the contribution of SEO.

B

Bing Places for BusinessLocal
Bing Places for Business is Microsoft's free tool for creating and managing business listings in Bing Search and Bing Maps. Listings can be imported from an existing Google Business Profile. Bing data also feeds Microsoft products such as Copilot, so an accurate profile supports both local search and AI assistant answers.
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Bing Webmaster ToolsAnalytics
Bing Webmaster Tools is Microsoft's free service for monitoring how Bing crawls, indexes and ranks your site. It offers search performance data, sitemap submission, URL inspection and IndexNow integration. Bing's index powers Microsoft Copilot and is widely reported to support ChatGPT search, so healthy Bing indexation matters for AI visibility.
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Black-hat SEOOff-page
Black-hat SEO is the use of tactics that break search engine spam policies to manipulate rankings. Examples include buying links, private blog networks, cloaking, hidden text, keyword stuffing and mass-produced low-value pages. These tactics can bring short-lived gains but risk manual actions, algorithmic demotion and lasting damage to a domain's trust.
Branded keywordAnalytics
A branded keyword is a search query that includes your company, product or trademark name, such as your brand name followed by pricing or reviews. Branded and non-branded traffic should be reported separately, because branded demand reflects existing awareness, while non-branded growth shows SEO winning customers who did not know you yet.

C

Canonical tagTechnical
A canonical tag is an HTML link element (rel=canonical) that tells search engines which URL is the preferred version of a page when similar or duplicate versions exist. It consolidates ranking signals onto one address. Google treats it as a strong hint rather than a directive, so it should agree with redirects, internal links and sitemaps.
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Category pageE-commerce
A category page is an e-commerce page that lists a group of related products, such as women's running shoes. Category pages usually target the most valuable commercial keywords in a store, so they need a unique title, a short helpful introduction, clean filters, crawlable pagination and internal links to subcategories and top products.
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ccTLDInternational
A ccTLD (country-code top-level domain) is a domain extension tied to a specific country, such as .de, .ae, .ca or .au. It is the strongest geotargeting signal a site can send, but each ccTLD builds authority separately and needs its own content and links. Many brands choose subfolders on one domain instead.
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Citation rateAI Search
Citation rate is the share of tracked AI answers that cite or link to your website as a source. For example, if your domain is cited in 30 of 200 prompt runs, your citation rate is 15 percent. It differs from mention rate, since an AI assistant can name your brand without linking to your site.
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ClaudeBotAI Search
ClaudeBot is the web crawler Anthropic uses to collect publicly available content that may be used to train its Claude AI models. Anthropic documents separate user agents for search indexing and for pages fetched at a user's request. Site owners can allow or block each one in robots.txt, depending on whether they want training use, AI search visibility or both.
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Content decayContent
Content decay is the gradual loss of rankings and traffic a page suffers as its information ages or competitors publish better answers. It is spotted by comparing year-over-year clicks in Search Console. Fixes include refreshing facts and examples, improving depth, merging overlapping pages, or retiring pages that no longer serve users.
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Core Web VitalsTechnical
Core Web Vitals are three Google metrics that measure real-user page experience: Largest Contentful Paint for loading, Interaction to Next Paint for responsiveness and Cumulative Layout Shift for visual stability. Google assesses them from Chrome field data at the 75th percentile of visits. They are a ranking signal, but relevance still matters more.
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Crawl budgetTechnical
Crawl budget is the number of URLs a search engine is able and willing to crawl on a site in a given period. It depends on server capacity and on how much demand Google sees for your content. It mainly matters for large or fast-changing sites, where duplicate, parameter and low-value URLs can crowd out important pages.
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Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)Technical
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) is a Core Web Vitals metric that measures how much visible content unexpectedly moves while a page is in use. A good score is 0.1 or less. Common causes are images and ads without reserved dimensions, late-loading web fonts, and banners injected above content that has already loaded.
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D

Digital PROff-page
Digital PR is the practice of earning coverage, links and brand mentions from online publications by giving journalists something worth reporting. Typical assets include original data studies, expert commentary and newsworthy tools. It builds authority for classic SEO and also increases the brand mentions that AI models draw on when forming answers.
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Disavow fileOff-page
A disavow file is a text file submitted through Google Search Console that asks Google to ignore specific backlinks or linking domains. Google recommends it only when a site has a manual action for unnatural links, or many spammy paid links it cannot remove. Most sites never need one, and careless use can discard helpful links.
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Domain AuthorityOff-page
Domain Authority is a third-party score from the SEO tool Moz that estimates, on a 1 to 100 scale, how likely a domain is to rank, based mainly on its backlink profile. Google does not use it. Similar metrics include Ahrefs' Domain Rating and Semrush's Authority Score; they are useful for comparison, not as goals.
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Duplicate contentTechnical
Duplicate content is substantially identical or very similar content available at more than one URL, on your site or across sites. It rarely triggers a penalty, but it splits ranking signals and forces Google to choose which version to show. Common causes are URL parameters, HTTP and HTTPS versions, printer pages and copied manufacturer descriptions.
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E

E-E-A-TContent
E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness, the qualities Google's search quality rater guidelines use to judge content. It is not a single ranking factor, but it describes what Google's systems aim to reward. Trust is the most important element, and first-hand experience, clear authorship and accurate sourcing all support it.
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EntityAI Search
An entity is a distinct, well-defined thing, such as a person, company, place, product or concept, that search engines and AI models can recognize and connect to facts. Building your brand as a clear entity means consistent names, descriptions and profiles across the web, plus Organization schema with sameAs links to official profiles.
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F

Faceted navigationTechnical
Faceted navigation is a filtering system, common on e-commerce and listing sites, that lets users narrow results by attributes such as size, color, brand or price. Each filter combination can create a new URL, producing thousands of near-duplicate pages. Good setups keep valuable facets indexable and block or canonicalize the rest.
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Free listingsE-commerce
Free listings are unpaid product results that Google shows across surfaces such as the Shopping tab, Search results and Google Images, using data from Google Merchant Center. Eligible merchants can appear without any ad spend. Visibility depends on product data quality, price, availability, reviews and store signals such as shipping and return policies.
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G

Generative engine optimization (GEO)AI Search
Generative engine optimization (GEO) is the practice of increasing how often, and how accurately, AI systems such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews mention and cite your brand. The term comes from a 2023 academic paper. GEO builds on SEO foundations and adds prompt research, entity building, citable content and AI visibility tracking.
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Geo-grid rank trackingLocal
Geo-grid rank tracking measures a business's local map rankings from many points on a grid around its location. Because Google tailors local results to the searcher's position, a business can rank first near its address and drop out a few streets away. Grid reports show where visibility is strong and where it fades.
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GeotargetingInternational
Geotargeting is the practice of signaling which country or region a website or section is meant to serve. Search engines infer it from ccTLDs, hreflang annotations, local language, currency, addresses and links from the target market. Google Search Console's manual country targeting setting was retired in 2022, so on-site signals now carry the load.
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Google Analytics 4 (GA4)Analytics
Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is Google's current web and app analytics platform, built on an event-based data model. It replaced Universal Analytics, which stopped processing data in 2023. For SEO, GA4 shows what organic visitors do after they land, including engagement and key events such as leads, purchases and form submissions.
Google Business ProfileLocal
Google Business Profile is Google's free business listing that controls how a company appears in Google Search and Google Maps, including the local pack. It holds your categories, services, hours, photos, posts, reviews and contact details. Formerly called Google My Business, it is one of the most influential assets in local SEO.
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Google Merchant CenterE-commerce
Google Merchant Center is Google's platform for uploading and managing product data, such as titles, prices, availability, images and identifiers, for display across Google. It powers both free listings and Shopping ads. A clean, approved feed with matching on-site product schema helps products appear in Shopping results and AI shopping experiences.
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Google Search ConsoleAnalytics
Google Search Console is Google's free tool for monitoring how a site performs in Google Search. It reports clicks, impressions, click-through rate and average position by query and page, plus indexing status, Core Web Vitals, structured data errors and manual actions. It is the most reliable source of Google organic search data.
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Google-ExtendedAI Search
Google-Extended is a robots.txt token that lets site owners control whether content Google crawls may be used to train and ground its Gemini models. It is not a separate crawler, and blocking it does not affect Google Search rankings. It also does not control AI Overviews, which follow standard Googlebot and snippet rules.
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GooglebotTechnical
Googlebot is the web crawler Google uses to discover and fetch pages for Google Search. It comes in smartphone and desktop versions, and under mobile-first indexing the smartphone crawler does most of the work. Googlebot renders JavaScript with an up-to-date Chromium engine, and genuine Googlebot visits can be verified through reverse DNS lookups.
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GPTBotAI Search
GPTBot is OpenAI's web crawler for collecting publicly available content that may be used to train its generative AI models. It is separate from OAI-SearchBot, which powers ChatGPT search, and ChatGPT-User, which fetches pages on a user's request. Blocking GPTBot in robots.txt opts content out of training without removing it from ChatGPT search.
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GroundingAI Search
Grounding is the process of anchoring an AI model's answer in specific, verifiable sources retrieved at the time of the question, such as search results or documents. It reduces made-up answers and makes citations possible. For brands, being retrievable and quotable at grounding time is what turns a web page into a cited source.
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H

HallucinationAI Search
A hallucination is a confident but false or unsupported statement produced by an AI model. For brands, hallucinations can mean wrong prices, invented features, outdated locations or confusion with a similarly named company. They are reduced, not eliminated, by publishing clear, consistent facts on your site and correcting errors in trusted third-party sources.
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Heading tagsOn-page
Heading tags are the HTML elements H1 through H6 that structure a page's content into a clear hierarchy. The H1 states the page's main topic, while H2s and H3s break it into sections. Descriptive headings help readers scan, help search engines understand topics and give AI systems clean passages to quote.
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HreflangInternational
Hreflang is an HTML attribute that tells search engines which language or regional version of a page to show a given user, such as en-us, en-gb or ar-ae. It can be set in the page head, HTTP headers or XML sitemaps. Every version must list all alternates, including itself, with matching return links.
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I

ImpressionsAnalytics
Impressions count how often a link to your site appeared in search results that a user loaded, whether or not they clicked. In Google Search Console, impressions paired with clicks give click-through rate. Rising impressions with flat clicks often point to new rankings in low positions, or to SERP features and AI Overviews absorbing attention.
IndexingTechnical
Indexing is the process by which a search engine analyzes a crawled page and stores it in its database so it can appear in results. Crawling does not guarantee indexing: Google may skip pages it sees as duplicate, low value or marked noindex. Search Console's page indexing report shows which URLs are excluded and why.
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IndexNowTechnical
IndexNow is an open protocol that lets websites instantly notify participating search engines when URLs are added, updated or deleted. It was launched by Microsoft Bing and Yandex in 2021 and is supported by several other engines. Google does not currently use it, but faster Bing indexing can help visibility in Copilot and ChatGPT search.
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Interaction to Next Paint (INP)Technical
Interaction to Next Paint (INP) is a Core Web Vitals metric that measures how quickly a page responds visually to clicks, taps and key presses throughout a visit. A good score is 200 milliseconds or less. INP replaced First Input Delay in March 2024, and heavy JavaScript and third-party scripts are the usual culprits.
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Internal linkingOn-page
Internal linking is the practice of linking from one page on your site to another. Internal links help search engines discover pages, understand how topics relate and decide which pages matter most. A strong structure links hub pages to their subpages and back, using descriptive anchor text rather than generic phrases like click here.
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JavaScript SEOTechnical
JavaScript SEO is the work of making sure pages built with JavaScript frameworks can be crawled, rendered and indexed. Google renders JavaScript, but rendering can be delayed or fail on errors and blocked resources. Many AI crawlers do not run JavaScript at all, so critical content and links should be present in the initial HTML.
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JSON-LDTechnical
JSON-LD (JavaScript Object Notation for Linked Data) is a format for adding structured data to a page inside a script tag, separate from the visible HTML. It is Google's recommended format for schema markup because it is easy to generate, maintain and validate. Its values must still match what users see on the page.
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K

Keyword cannibalizationContent
Keyword cannibalization happens when two or more pages on the same site target the same query and intent, so they compete with each other in search results. Symptoms include rankings that flip between URLs and neither page performing well. Fixes include merging pages, differentiating their intent, or adjusting internal links and canonicals.
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Keyword difficultyContent
Keyword difficulty is a third-party score, usually from 0 to 100, estimating how hard it would be to rank on the first page for a keyword. Most tools base it on the backlink strength of pages already ranking. Scores differ between tools and are not a Google metric, so use them to compare keywords rather than predict outcomes.
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Keyword researchContent
Keyword research is the process of finding and prioritizing the search terms your potential customers use. It weighs search volume, intent, difficulty and business value, then groups related terms into topics that map to specific pages. For AI search, the same research extends to the longer, conversational prompts people type into assistants.
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Knowledge GraphAI Search
The Knowledge Graph is Google's database of entities and the relationships between them, used to understand queries and power features such as knowledge panels. Google introduced it in 2012. Brands strengthen their Knowledge Graph presence through consistent information across the web, authoritative profiles, Organization schema and coverage in trusted sources.
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L

Large language model (LLM)AI Search
A large language model (LLM) is an AI system trained on very large amounts of text to understand and generate human language. LLMs power assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Copilot. On their own they answer from training data; connected to search, they retrieve current web pages and cite them, which is where SEO and GEO meet.
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Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)Technical
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) is a Core Web Vitals metric that measures how long it takes for the largest image or text block in the viewport to render. A good score is 2.5 seconds or less. Common fixes include faster server response, optimized and preloaded hero images, and removing render-blocking CSS and JavaScript.
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llms.txtAI Search
llms.txt is a proposed standard for a Markdown file at a site's root that gives large language models a curated summary of the site and links to its most useful content. It was proposed in 2024 and has not been officially adopted by major search engines or AI platforms. It is cheap to add but not a proven ranking factor.
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Local citationLocal
A local citation is any online mention of a business's name, address and phone number, such as a listing on Yelp, Apple Maps, Bing Places, an industry directory or a chamber of commerce site. Consistent citations help search engines trust your location data. Accurate listings on major platforms matter most; volume beyond them brings diminishing returns.
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Local landing pageLocal
A local landing page is a page dedicated to one location or service area, such as a branch or a city a business serves. Strong local pages include unique content, the exact address and hours, local reviews, an embedded map and LocalBusiness schema. Thin pages that only swap the city name can be treated as doorway pages.
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Local packLocal
The local pack is the block of business listings, usually three, that Google shows with a map for searches with local intent, such as dentist near me. Selecting more places opens the Local Finder with a longer list. Listings are drawn from Google Business Profile data and ranked on relevance, distance and prominence.
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LocalBusiness schemaLocal
LocalBusiness schema is structured data from the Schema.org vocabulary that describes a physical business, including its name, address, phone, opening hours, geo-coordinates and accepted payments. More specific subtypes exist, such as Dentist or Plumber. Adding it to location pages helps search engines confirm details that should match your Google Business Profile.
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LocalizationInternational
Localization is adapting content for a specific market's language, culture, currency, units, regulations and search habits, rather than translating it word for word. In SEO it starts with separate keyword research for each language, because people in different markets describe the same need differently. Native-speaker review catches errors that machine translation misses.
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Log file analysisTechnical
Log file analysis is the review of a web server's access logs to see exactly how search engine and AI crawlers request your pages. It reveals which URLs bots visit, how often, which status codes they receive and where crawl budget is wasted. It is a direct record of crawler behavior rather than an estimate.
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Long-tail keywordContent
A long-tail keyword is a longer, more specific search query with lower individual volume, such as emergency plumber open Sunday Toronto. Long-tail queries usually signal clearer intent, face less competition and convert well. Together they make up a large share of all searches, and they resemble the conversational prompts people type into AI assistants.
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Manual actionOff-page
A manual action is a penalty applied by a human reviewer at Google when a site violates Google's spam policies, for example through unnatural links, cloaking or scaled spam content. Affected pages can be demoted or removed from results. Manual actions appear in Search Console, and lifting one requires fixing the issue and filing a reconsideration request.
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Map packLocal
Map pack is the industry's everyday name for Google's local pack, the map and top business listings shown for local searches. Map pack SEO focuses on the three factors Google names for local ranking, relevance, distance and prominence, through a complete Business Profile, steady reviews, consistent citations and strong local landing pages.
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Meta descriptionOn-page
A meta description is an HTML tag that summarizes a page's content for search results. It is not a direct ranking factor, and Google often rewrites it using text from the page, but a clear, specific description can improve click-through rate. Keep it roughly under 160 characters so it is less likely to be truncated.
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Meta robots tagTechnical
A meta robots tag is an HTML tag that gives search engines page-level instructions, such as noindex, nofollow, nosnippet or max-snippet. The X-Robots-Tag HTTP header does the same for PDFs and other non-HTML files. Google's snippet controls also apply to its AI features, so they affect how pages can appear in AI Overviews.
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Mobile-first indexingTechnical
Mobile-first indexing means Google primarily uses the mobile version of a page's content for indexing and ranking. Google now applies it to essentially all sites. Content, structured data, internal links and metadata that exist only on the desktop version may be ignored, so mobile and desktop versions should be equivalent.
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N

NAP consistencyLocal
NAP consistency means your business name, address and phone number appear identically across your website, Google Business Profile, directories and social profiles. Conflicting details, such as an old address or a different phone number, weaken search engines' confidence in your location data. It matters most after a move, rebrand or phone number change.
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NofollowOff-page
Nofollow is a link attribute (rel=nofollow) that tells search engines not to associate your site with, or pass ranking credit through, a link. Google treats it as a hint rather than a strict rule. Related attributes are rel=sponsored for paid or affiliate links and rel=ugc for user-generated content such as comments and forum posts.
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NoindexTechnical
Noindex is a directive, set in a meta robots tag or X-Robots-Tag header, that tells search engines not to include a page in their index. The page must stay crawlable for the directive to be seen, so do not also block it in robots.txt. It suits thank-you pages, internal search results and thin filter pages.
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OAI-SearchBotAI Search
OAI-SearchBot is the OpenAI crawler that finds and indexes web pages so they can be shown and linked in ChatGPT search results. OpenAI says it is not used to train its generative AI models. Sites that block OAI-SearchBot in robots.txt may not appear as cited sources in ChatGPT search answers, so most businesses should allow it.
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Organic CTRAnalytics
Organic click-through rate (CTR) is the percentage of search impressions that result in a click to your site. Search Console reports it by query and page. CTR depends on position, title and snippet quality, and on SERP features such as ads, AI Overviews and local packs, which can lower clicks even when rankings hold.
Orphan pageTechnical
An orphan page is a page on your site that no other internal page links to. Search engines may find it only through sitemaps or external links, crawl it rarely and treat it as unimportant. Orphans often result from redesigns, expired campaigns or CMS quirks, and comparing a site crawl with sitemap and analytics data reveals them.
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Out-of-stock handlingE-commerce
Out-of-stock handling is how an online store treats product pages when items are unavailable. Temporarily out-of-stock products should usually stay live and indexable, with availability updated in schema and feeds and alternatives shown. Permanently discontinued products should 301 redirect to the closest replacement or category, or return 404 or 410 if nothing relevant exists.
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P

People Also AskContent
People Also Ask is a Google search feature that shows a list of related questions, each expanding to reveal a short answer and a source link. It reveals how users phrase follow-up questions around a topic. Answering these questions directly under clear headings helps pages appear in the box and supports AI answer visibility.
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PerplexityBotAI Search
PerplexityBot is the crawler Perplexity uses to discover and index web pages so they can be surfaced and linked in Perplexity's answers. Perplexity states it is not used to crawl content for training AI foundation models. A separate agent, Perplexity-User, fetches pages when a user's question requires it. Blocking PerplexityBot can reduce your citations there.
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Pillar pageContent
A pillar page is a comprehensive page covering a broad topic that links to more detailed cluster pages on subtopics, which link back to it. This hub-and-spoke model helps search engines understand topical depth and site structure. For example, a local SEO guide might link to separate pages on reviews, citations and Business Profile optimization.
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Primary categoryLocal
The primary category is the main business category you choose in your Google Business Profile, such as Dentist or Family law attorney. It is one of the strongest relevance signals for local rankings and determines which category-specific features are available. Additional categories help cover secondary services, but the primary category should match your core business.
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Product feedE-commerce
A product feed is a structured file or data stream listing a store's products and their attributes, such as ID, title, description, price, availability, GTIN, brand and image links. It is submitted to Google Merchant Center and other channels. Feed quality directly shapes how products appear in Shopping results, free listings and AI shopping answers.
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Product schemaE-commerce
Product schema is structured data that describes a product for search engines, including its name, image, brand, price, availability, shipping, return policy and reviews. It can make pages eligible for product rich results with prices and star ratings. Values must match the visible page and your Merchant Center feed to avoid errors and lost eligibility.
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Product variantE-commerce
A product variant is a version of a product that differs by an attribute such as size, color or material. Variants can share one URL or have their own URLs, which risks duplicate content when descriptions are identical. Google supports ProductGroup markup with hasVariant and variesBy properties to describe variant families clearly.
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Prompt mappingAI Search
Prompt mapping is the process of identifying the questions and requests your buyers type into AI assistants and linking each one to an intent, a topic and a page on your site. It is the AI-search counterpart of keyword mapping. The resulting prompt set also becomes the basis for tracking citation rate and AI share of voice.
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Q

Query fan-outAI Search
Query fan-out is a technique in which an AI search system breaks one question into several related subqueries, runs them at once and combines the results into a single answer. Google uses it in AI Mode. It means a page can be cited for a subtopic even when it does not rank for the original query.
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Rank trackingAnalytics
Rank tracking is the regular monitoring of where your pages appear in search results for a chosen set of keywords, locations and devices. Third-party tools record daily or weekly positions, including SERP features. Tracked positions are samples rather than what every user sees, so they work best alongside Search Console data.
Redirect chainTechnical
A redirect chain occurs when a URL redirects to another URL that redirects again before reaching the final page. Chains slow users down, waste crawl budget and can cause search engines to stop following them; Googlebot follows up to 10 hops. They are fixed by pointing every old URL directly to its final destination.
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Referring domainOff-page
A referring domain is a unique website that links to yours at least once, so ten links from one site count as one referring domain. Because links from new, relevant domains usually add more value than repeat links from the same site, referring domain growth is a better authority indicator than total backlink count.
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Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)AI Search
Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) is an AI architecture in which a system retrieves relevant documents from an index at query time and passes them to a language model to write a grounded answer. AI search engines work this way. To be cited, content must first be retrievable, which requires indexation, clear structure and passages that answer questions directly.
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Review gatingLocal
Review gating is the practice of screening customers first and asking only happy ones to leave public reviews, while routing unhappy ones to private feedback. Google's review policies prohibit selectively soliciting positive reviews, and consumer protection rules in several countries restrict review manipulation. Ethical review programs ask every customer in the same way.
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Review velocityLocal
Review velocity is the rate at which a business gains new reviews over time. A steady flow of recent reviews signals an active, trusted business to customers and search engines. Sudden spikes can look unnatural and may trigger review filters, so consistent requests after every job or purchase work better than one-off campaigns.
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Rich resultsTechnical
Rich results are enhanced search listings that show extra information, such as star ratings, prices, availability, event dates or recipe details, drawn from structured data. Valid schema makes a page eligible, but Google decides whether to show them. Eligibility changes over time; in 2023, for example, Google restricted FAQ rich results to authoritative government and health sites.
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Right-to-left (RTL) layoutInternational
A right-to-left (RTL) layout is a page design for languages written from right to left, such as Arabic. It requires the dir=rtl and correct lang attributes, mirrored navigation and careful handling of mixed English and Arabic text. Broken RTL rendering hurts usability and conversions for Arabic-speaking visitors.
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robots.txtTechnical
robots.txt is a text file at the root of a domain that tells crawlers which paths they may or may not crawl. It controls crawling, not indexing: a blocked URL can still appear in results if other pages link to it. It is also where sites set rules for AI crawlers such as GPTBot and ClaudeBot.
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Schema markupTechnical
Schema markup is structured data, based on the Schema.org vocabulary, that describes a page's content in a machine-readable way, such as an organization, product, article or local business. It helps search engines and AI systems interpret facts reliably and can make pages eligible for rich results. It is usually added in JSON-LD format.
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Search intentContent
Search intent is the goal behind a search query, usually grouped as informational, navigational, commercial or transactional. Google ranks pages that best satisfy the dominant intent, so a query like best CRM for startups needs a comparison, not a single product page. Matching intent is often the difference between ranking and not ranking.
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SERPOn-page
A SERP (search engine results page) is the page a search engine displays in response to a query. Modern SERPs mix organic listings with ads, AI Overviews, local packs, featured snippets, People Also Ask boxes, images, videos and shopping results. Studying the SERP for a keyword shows which format and intent Google rewards.
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Server-side rendering (SSR)Technical
Server-side rendering (SSR) is a technique in which the server builds a page's full HTML before sending it to the browser. Crawlers receive complete content and links without executing JavaScript, unlike client-side rendering, where the browser assembles the page. SSR and static generation are the safest choices for search engines and AI crawlers.
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Server-side taggingAnalytics
Server-side tagging is a setup in which tracking tags run in a server container you control, such as a Google Tag Manager server container, instead of directly in the visitor's browser. It reduces page weight and gives you control over what data reaches vendors. It does not remove the need for consent where privacy laws require it.
Service-area business (SAB)Local
A service-area business (SAB) is a business that serves customers at their locations rather than at a storefront, such as plumbers, cleaners or mobile mechanics. In Google Business Profile, SABs hide their street address and list the areas they serve instead. Rankings stay anchored to the verified address, so pages for each served area help.
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Site architectureTechnical
Site architecture is the way a website's pages are organized and linked together, from the homepage down to individual pages. A logical, shallow structure lets users and crawlers reach important pages in a few clicks and signals which pages matter most. Hub pages, clear categories and breadcrumbs are its building blocks.
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Soft 404Technical
A soft 404 is a page that tells users it does not exist, or has little or no content, but returns a 200 OK status code instead of a 404 or 410. Google flags these in Search Console and usually excludes them from the index. Empty category pages and misconfigured error templates are common causes.
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SubdomainInternational
A subdomain is a prefix that creates a separate section of a domain, such as blog.example.com or de.example.com. Search engines can treat subdomains somewhat independently, so authority may not flow as easily as it does within subfolders. Subdomains suit separate platforms or apps, but subfolders are usually simpler for international SEO.
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SubfolderInternational
A subfolder, or subdirectory, is a path within a domain, such as example.com/fr/ or example.com/ar-ae/, used to host a language or country version of a site. Subfolders share the root domain's authority and are easier to manage than separate domains. Paired with hreflang, they are a common and practical international SEO structure.
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Thin contentContent
Thin content is a page with little or no original value for users, such as auto-generated text, scraped copy, doorway pages or near-empty category pages. Search engines may rank it poorly or skip indexing it, and large amounts can drag down perceptions of a whole site. Fixes include expanding, merging, noindexing or removing it.
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Title tagOn-page
A title tag is the HTML element that defines a page's title, shown in browser tabs and usually as the clickable headline in search results. It is one of the clearest relevance signals on a page. Good titles lead with the main keyword, stay roughly within 60 characters and give searchers a reason to click.
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Topical authorityContent
Topical authority is the depth and credibility a website demonstrates on a subject through comprehensive, accurate and well-linked content. It is an industry concept rather than a published Google metric. Sites build it by covering a topic's key questions thoroughly, linking related pages together and earning mentions from respected sources in the field.
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Unlinked brand mentionOff-page
An unlinked brand mention is a reference to your brand name on another website without a hyperlink. Such mentions can often be turned into links through polite outreach. They also matter in their own right for AI search, because language models learn associations from text, so frequent mentions in trusted sources shape how AI describes you.
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URL parameterTechnical
A URL parameter is a key-value pair added after a question mark in a URL, such as ?color=red or ?sort=price, used for filtering, sorting, tracking or sessions. Parameters can create many duplicate URLs for the same content and waste crawl budget. Manage them with canonical tags, consistent internal links and robots.txt rules where needed.
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UTM parametersAnalytics
UTM parameters are tags added to a URL, such as utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign, that tell analytics tools where a visit came from. They are used on links in emails, social posts, ads and partner sites. Never add UTM tags to internal links, because they overwrite the original traffic source and distort reports.

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White-hat SEOOff-page
White-hat SEO is the practice of improving search visibility using methods that follow search engine guidelines and put users first. It covers technical fixes, helpful content, sound site structure and earned links. Results take longer than shortcuts, but they compound over time and do not carry the penalty risk of black-hat tactics.
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x-defaultInternational
x-default is a special hreflang value that tells search engines which page to show users whose language or region does not match any listed version. It usually points to a global English page or a language selector. Each page in an hreflang set should include the same x-default reference alongside its other alternates.
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XML sitemapTechnical
An XML sitemap is a file that lists the URLs you want search engines to crawl and index, often with the date each was last modified. Each file can hold up to 50,000 URLs or 50 MB uncompressed. Submit it in Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, and include only canonical, indexable pages.
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YMYLContent
YMYL, short for Your Money or Your Life, describes topics that could significantly affect a person's health, finances, safety or well-being, such as medical, legal or financial advice. Google's quality rater guidelines hold YMYL content to the highest E-E-A-T standards, so expert authorship, accurate sourcing and clear trust signals matter most here.
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