SEO Glossary

Algorithms which attempt to understand the true intent of a search query rather than just matching results to keywords.

A web site’s navigation icons, usually arranged in a row down the left hand side or along the top that plays crucial roles in directing spiders to the site’s most important content and in getting site visitors to go deeper in the site.

Negative Keyword is a term referenced by Google AdWords and is a form of keyword matching. This means that an advertiser can specify search terms that they do not want their ad to be associated with.

For example, if you add the negative keyword “-nike” to the keyword “running shoes”, the ad will not be displayed if a person searches upon the term “nike running shoes”.

Negative keyword matching ensures that only qualified traffic is clicking upon advertising.

The act of demoting a page or site from the SERPS. Most often used against a competitor that is above your site in the SERPS but can be used purely for fun.

Originally a company that created a popular web browser by the same name, Netscape is now a social news site similar to Digg.com.

A topic or subject which a website is focused on.

Alternative non-framed HTML on a frameset page for very old, non-frames capable web browsers and search engine spiders. Placing good keyword-rich text in noframes tags is a good idea if your site is framed, but a much better idea is to ditch frames altogether and rebuild the site properly. A framed web site is not search engine friendly as long as it uses noframes tags.

Attribute used to prevent a link from passing link authority. Commonly used on sites with user generated content, like in blog comments.

The code to use nofollow on a link appears like

{code type=html}anchor text {code type=html}

Nofollow can also be used in a robots meta tag to prevent a search engine from counting any outbound links on a page. This code would look like this

Google’s Matt Cutts also pushes webmasters to use nofollow on any paid links, but since Google is the world’s largest link broker, their advice on how other people should buy or sell links should be taken with a grain of salt. Please note that it is generally not advised to practice link hoarding as that may look quite unnatural. Outbound links may also boost your relevancy scores in some search engines.