Signature Website Developers Glossary of Website Terms

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A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

 

Accessibility
The physical and technological barriers to people with disabilities interacting with a web site.

AD management and Tracking
Banner advert management and tracking software for high traffic websites. 100% Browser-Based application, allows your customers and monitor their ads effortlessly and at their own convenience.

adsense
Google AdSense™ matches ads to your site's content, and you earn money whenever your visitors click on them. Google AdSense™ automatically delivers text and image ads that are precisely targeted to your site and your site content—ads so well-matched. With AdSense you earn more ad revenue with minimal effort—and no additional cost.

adwords
See Pay-Per-Click Advertising

Affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is a method of promoting web businesses (merchants/advertisers) in which an affiliate (publisher) is rewarded for every visitor, subscriber, customer, and/or sale provided through his/her efforts.

analytics
Web analytics is the study of the behavior of website visitors. In a commercial context, web analytics especially refers to the use of data collected from a web site to determine which aspects of the website work towards the business objectives; for example, which landing pages encourage people to make a purchase.

Data collected almost always includes web traffic reports. It may also include e-mail response rates, direct mail campaign data, sales and lead information, user performance data such as click heat mapping, or other custom metrics as needed. This data is typically compared against key performance indicators for performance, and used to improve a web site or marketing campaign's audience response.

auto responder marketing
Auto responders are those canned messages that you receive when you email someone. They are commonly used to automatically reply to people who email you that you have received their message and will get back to them in person. Some people use auto responders for vacation notices, telling their correspondents that they are currently on holiday and will not be responding to the email anytime soon.

Applet
A small program designed to run over the internet. It's held on a serer but works inside a web browser.

asp
Active Server Page. Server side program scripting to create dynamic web pages integrated with the HTML of a page.

bandwidth
The allocated amount of data that can be transferred over our network during a fixed amount of time expressed in bits per second (bps).

Banner advertising
A web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking them to the web site of the advertiser. The advertisement is constructed from an image (GIF, JPEG, PNG, SWF), JavaScript program or multimedia object employing technologies such as Java, Shockwave or Flash, often employing animation or sound to maximize presence. Images are usually in a high-aspect ratio shape (i.e. either wide and short, or tall and narrow) hence the reference to banners. These images are usually placed on web pages that have interesting content, such as a newspaper article or an opinion piece.

black hat seo
Black Hat search engine optimisation are unethical techniques that are used to get higher search rankings. Black hat SEO techniques usually break search engine rules and regulations and generally create poor user experience.

blogging
Short for weblog, a blog is similar to diary online, that can be edited using a simple content management system (CMS).

Bookmark
A link to particular website, stored by a user for future use.

Browser
Software that is used to interpret HTML commands and display web page content. The two most widely used browsers are Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Exporer (IE).

Cache
A web browser feature, which stores copies of regularly accessed files on a computers hard disk to speed access.

Calendar
Event calendar scripts integrates into your website. User-friendly admin area that lets you customise your calendar, set recurring events, editing event details.

Case sensitive
Used to indicate that characters typed in will only be recognised if entered in the correct case.

CGI
The Common Gateway Interface (CGI) is a standard protocol for interfacing external application software with a web server. This allows the server to pass requests from a client web browser to the external application. The web server can then return the output from the application to the web browser.

Churn rate
Churn rate is a measure of the number of customers your losing to competitors over a specific period of time.

Click through rate
The number of times visitors click on a link, or advert on a page, as a percentage of the number of times the page has been displayed (click-thru).

Content Manamgement System
Content Management System (CMS). A program that automates the management of the content you add to your site.

Content
The words, graphics, photos, audio, video and downloadable docs that make up your web site.

Cookie
Web cookies are parcels of text sent by a server to a web browser and then sent back unchanged by the browser each time it accesses that server. web cookies are used for authenticating, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users, such as site preferences and the contents of their electronic shopping carts.

Cookies are subject to a number of misconceptions, mostly based on the erroneous notion that they are computer programs. In fact, cookies are simple pieces of data unable to perform any operation by themselves. In particular, they are neither spyware nor viruses, despite the detection of cookies from certain sites by many anti-spyware products.

Most modern browsers allow users to decide whether to accept cookies, but rejection makes some websites unusable. For example, shopping baskets implemented using cookies do not work if cookies are rejected.

Copy writing
Short, punchy, relevant and engaging website content that include keyword words or phrases related to your business to improve keyword density without stuffing!

Crawler
A web crawler (also known as a Web crawlers, ants, automatic indexers, bots, Web spider Web robot) is a program or automated script which browses the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner to gather entries for a search engine
Most modern browsers allow users to decide whether to accept cookies, but rejection makes some websites unusable. For example, shopping baskets implemented using cookies do not work if cookies are rejected.

CSS
CAScading Style Sheets. A feature of HTML that enables designers to specify style information, such as fonts, size, colour, background as well as define the placement of elements on a web page.

CSV
The comma-separated values (or CSV; also known as a comma-separated list or Comma-Separated Variable) file format is a file type that stores tabular data.

Data forwarding
Data-forwarding is an extremely popular choice for many businesses who want to export financial information from web sites into third party applications in a simple and reliable way.

DHTML
Dynamic Hypertext Markup language. An extension of HTML that enables web pages to react to user's input, such as displaying a web page based on the type of browser or computer that end users are viewing a page with.

DNS Records
The Domain Name System (DNS) serves as the "phone book" for the Internet; it translates human-readable computer hostnames, e.g. signature.gb.com , into the IP addresses that networking equipment needs for delivering information. In providing a worldwide keyword-based redirection service, DNS is an essential component of contemporary Internet use.

Domain name
Domain name (web addresses, URL) is main apart of a web address that is it's unique identification, for example 'letsrentit.co.uk'.

DoORWAY PAGE
See Landing page

Download
Transferring files or data from another computer to the one you are using (such as a webserver, FTP server). A download is any file that is offered for downloading or that has been downloaded.

Dropzone
A place to host and share all your pictures, videos, or any other files on our servers.

ebay
ebay.com is an online auction and shopping website where people and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide.

E-commerce
E-commerce consists primarily of the distributing, buying, selling, marketing and servicing of products or services over the Internet.

e-FLYER
e-FLYER (electronic flyer) is a custom HTML flyer that will convey your message via broadcast email to make an impact on your audience. HTML flyers are a cost effective email marketing and fulfilment system.

Encryption
Conversion of data from it's original form to one that cannot be understood by others. Only the sender and recipient have the key to convert the data back to its original form. The purpose is to prevent unauthorised people from viewing data as it travels across the internet.

Error 404
404 is an HTTP status code. Error 404 indicates a client error. The server is saying that you've done something wrong, such as misspell the URL or request a page which is no longer there.

Export
To save a file in a format associated with another program, such as relational databases.

Ezine
An online magazine that is delivered in an electronic form. An online magazine may be online-only, or may be the online version of an otherwise print-published magazine. Today, most online magazines are Internet websites.

File sharing
File sharing is the practice of making files available for other users to download over the Internet.

Firefox
Firefox is an award-winning free graphical web browser developed by the Mozilla Corporation and a large community of external contributors.

Flash
Vector graphic software from Adobe that allows a single animation or video file to play on all browsers, with the Flash plug-in installed.

flickr
Flickr - almost arguably the best known online photo management and sharing application. Flickr is a photo sharing website and web services suite, and an online community platform. The service is widely used by bloggers as a photo repository.

Form DESIGN
HTML tags that define and label text-entry boxes, check boxes, radio buttons and drop-down menus to create on-screen forms for collecting information from the site visitor

FrontPage Server Extensions
Software technology that allows Microsoft FrontPage clients to communicate with web servers, and provide additional functionality intended for websites. It relies on HTTP protocol for communication, and CGI/POST for server side processing.

FTP
File Transfer Protocol. Enables you to copy or send files from one computer to another via the internet. Anonymous FTP is a method for downloading files from an FTP server without using a login account

functional specification
A functional specification (functional spec) is a formal document used to describe in detail for web developers a website's intended capabilities, appearance, and interactions with users. A functional specification is a blueprint and continuing reference point as the developers write the programming code.

Guerilla Marketing
Guerilla marketing strategies are relative low-cost campaigns to drive users/ return users to your site and spend longer on it. See push marketing.

Google
Google Enables users to search the Web, Usenet, and images. Features include PageRank, caching and translation of results, and an option to find similar pages.

GEOMAPPING (Googlemapping)
The Google Maps API was created by Google to facilitate developers integrating Google Maps into their web sites, with their own data points. It is a free service, that currently does not contain ads, but Google states in their terms of use[11] that they reserve the right to display ads in the future.

helpdesk
Customer Helpdesk is 100% browser based application. Your customers can create support tickets which will then be responded to in time.

Hits
The number of times a web object ( a page a picture within a page) has been viewed or downloaded.

Homepage
The main or first page of a website.

Hosting
The act of storing and providing information over the internet. Hosting Companies offer hosting space for lease, enabling companies or individuals to set up their own websites or other internet content.

html
Hypertext Markup language is the predominant markup language for the creation of web pages. It provides a means to describe the structure of text-based information in a document — by denoting certain text as headings, paragraphs, lists, and so on — and to supplement that text with interactive forms, embedded images, and other objects. HTML is written in the form of labels (known as tags), surrounded by less-than (<) and greater-than signs (>). HTML can also describe, to some degree, the appearance and semantics of a document, and can include embedded scripting language code which can affect the behavior of web browsers and other HTML processors.

Hyperlink
A pointer to another document, most often a pointer to another web page.

Image slicing
Breaking an image into smaller pieces to make it load into a web browser faster.

iNFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
Information architecture as utilised in web development refers to user interactions, database development, programming, and technical writing that require expressions of complex systems.

Itunes
iTunes is a digital media player application, from Apple Computers for playing and organising digital music and video files. The program is also an interface to manage the contents on Apple's popular iPod digital media players. Additionally, iTunes can connect to the iTunes Store (provided an internet connection is present) in order to download purchased digital music, music videos, television shows, iPod games, audio books, various podcasts, and feature length films.

javascript
JavaScript is a scripting language most often used for client-side web development, but is also used to enable scripting access to objects embedded in other applications.

Keyword Phrase
The words and symbols used as an input for a database search.

keyword density
Keyword density is expressed as a ratio of "keyword phrase" as a percentage of text within the <body></body> tags on a web page. A density of around 4 - 7 % is good, bu there is no guaranteed rule for that.

keyword stuffing
Keyword stuffing web pages with many repetitions of the keyphrase to try and manipulate your SER is a practice best avoided if your aiming for organic listings. Whilst it might get you off to a good start, search engines like Google are switched onto this and your site will be eventually penalised or even banned!

keyword saturation
See Copy Writing

landing page
Landing page is a specific page on your Web site. Landing pages are usefull as hotlinks to specific product pages, featured articles or services.

Link
A pointer to another document, most often a pointer to another web page.

Link building
Link building is an essential part of internet marketing. The internet and sites like signature.gb.com need links to other sites in order to receive traffic and to give resources to visitors. Strategic link building is about establishing your competitive position in the online marketplace that already exists.

log files
A file that lists every request made to a web server. With log file analysis tools, it's possible to get a good idea of where visitors are coming from, how often they return, and how they navigate through a site. See Analytics

MB
Abbreviation for megabyte - a million bytes (actually 1024 kilobytes). Most often used by hosting companies to define allocated webspace.

Mashups
Content used in mashups is typically sourced from a third party via a public interface or API, Web feeds ( RSS or Atom) and web services.

Many people are experimenting with mashups using Google, eBay, Amazon, AOL, Windows Live, and Yahoos APIs.

Masthead
A graphic image positioned at the top of a web page to tell the visitor what page they're on

Mailing list
An electronic mailing list is similar to a traditional mailing list — a list of names and addresses — as might be kept by an organisation for sending publications to its members or customers, but typically refers to four things: a list of e-mail addresses, the people ("subscribers") receiving mail at those addresses, the publications (e-mail messages) sent to those addresses, and a reflector, which is a single e-mail address that, when designated as the recipient of a message, will send a copy of that message to all of the subscribers.

merchant account
A merchant account allows a business to accept credit cards, debit cards, gift cards and other forms of payment cards. This is also widely known as payment processing or credit card processing.

Meta tag
A specific HTMl tag that contains information about the page itself. Typical use of meta tags are to include information for search engines to help them index your site better.

Mx record
An MX record or Mail exchanger record is a type of resource record in the Domain Name System (DNS) specifying how Internet e-mail should be routed. MX records point to the servers that should receive an e-mail, and their priority relative to each other.

name server
A name server is a computer server that implements a name service protocol. It will normally map a computer-usable identifier of a host to a human-usable identifier for that host. For example, a Domain Name System (DNS) server might translate the domain name en.wikipedia.org to the Internet Protocol (IP) address 145.97.39.155. See DNS

Navigation structure
The hierarchical relationship between pages in a website, mapped out in a site diagram, which is then used to determine the links that will appear in each page's navigation bar.

Optimisation
Web page analysis to tests page size, composition, accessibility, keyword density and download speed. Recommendations and improvements are based on best practices

PayPal
PayPal is an e-commerce business allowing payments and money transfers to be made through the Internet. It serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper methods such as cheques and money orders. PayPal performs payment processing for online vendors, auction sites, and other corporate users, for which it charges a fee.

Pay per click advertising
Pay per click (PPC) is an advertising technique used on websites, advertising networks, and search engines. Advertisers bid on "keywords" that they believe their target market (people they think would be interested in their offer) would type in the search bar when they are looking for their type of product or service. For example, if an advertiser sells red widgets, he/she would bid on the keyword "red widgets", hoping a user would type those words in the search bar, see their ad, click on it and buy. These ads are called "sponsored links" or "sponsored ads" and appear next to and sometimes above the natural or organic results on the page. The advertiser pays only when the user clicks on the ad.

Pdf
Portable Document Format. PDF files can be viewed using Adobe's free Acrobat cross-browser, cross-platform compatible software

push marketing
Push/ pull marketing analagy referes to the purchasing experience (CRM) between customer and your website. A customer/ browser "pulls" things towards themselves, while a site owner "pushes" things toward customers. See guerilla marketing

photo sharing
See FLICKR

PHP
PHP Hypertext Preprocessor is a scripting language often used to create dynamic web pages. A MySQL database holds the necessary information: PHP takes the required information and sets it out as a web page on demand

Podcasting
Podcasting is a new type of online media delivery. You publish selected audio files via the internet and allow your users to subscribe via an RSS feed to automatically receive new files. Podcasting lets you create your own syndicated online talkshow or radio program, with content of your choosing.

RECIPROCAL LINK
Swapping links between two websites.

Referrers
Referrers are tracked in website log files. Showing where a site's visitors can from and the the keyword search terms they used to find it

Rich media
Media with more than text and images, using sound, video and special effects via programs such as Flash and Shockwave, and often some interactive advertising capacity

shopping cart
See Ecommerce

Skype
Skype is a peer-to-peer Internet telephony network. Fpr more info see VOIP

social networking
A social network is a map of all of the relevant ties between the social structure of organisations that are tied by one or more specific types of relations, such as ideas, financial exchange, friends, trade or web links.

Spam
Spam is e-mail that is both unsolicited by the recipient and sent in substantively identical form to many recipients. Thus, a common synonym for spam is unsolicited bulk e-mail (UBE). Some definitions of spam specifically include the aspects of email that is unsolicited and sent in bulk.

Screen grab
Screen grab or screen shot, saves a 'snapshot' web-page as an image. With it, you can save anything that you can see in a browser

Sticky marketing
Marketins stickiness is the amount of time spent at a site over a given time period. Stickiness is often measured in terms of page views. When defined as minutes per month, site stickiness is a function of number of visits (repeat usage) and time spent per visit (session stickiness).

Taxonomy
Taxonomy is the practice and science of classification. Commonly displaying parent-child relationships.

Traffic
The number of visitors to your website. I's measured with stats such as page views, hits and pages accessed

upload
The transfer of data from a computer to an online file or similar archive.

Vector graphic
A scaleable graphic image drawn in shapes and lines, called paths.

Viral marketing
Viral marketing is based on naural human behavious and refers to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness. It can be word-of-mouth. Viral promotions may take the form of funny video clips, interactive Flash games, advergames, images, or even SMS text messages.

VOIP
Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) is the routing of voice conversations over the Internet or through any other IP-based network.

Vote caster/ opinion poll
Online poll is a 100% browser based interface that lets you easily create and display simple polls to your visitors.

WC3
World Wide Web Consortium. The group responsible for defining major standards used in web design, such as HTML and CSS.

Wikis
A wiki is a website that allows visitors to add, remove, and edit content.

web design
Web design is the designing and graphical presentation of content shown on the Internet in the form of Web sites and other Web applications using many different forms of media. The basic design of most pages on the Web use HTML, CSS, and the newest form of language, XHTML. Many sites today also integrate various forms of dynamic, interactive content using E-Commerce, and server-side languages such as PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor), and ASP. Web design contrasts with Web development, which includes Web server configuration, writing Web applications, and server security.

XML
Extensible Markup language. A format for defining pieces of information and how they relate to each other within a set of documents.

 

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Many definations courtesy of Wikipedia