Glossary of Search Engine Ranking Term
Here is a glossary of commonly used terms in the world of search engine ranking.
Alt Tag: The alternative text that the browser displays when the surfer does not want
to or cannot see the pictures present in a web page. Using alt tags containing
keywords can improve the search engine ranking of the page for those keywords.
Bridge Page: See Doorway Page.
Click Popularity: A measure of the relevance of sites obtained by noting which sites
are clicked on most and how much time users spend in each site.
Cloaking: The process by which your site can display different pages under different
circumstances. It is primarily used to show an optimized page to the search engines
and a different page to humans. Most search engines will penalize a site if they
discover that it is using cloaking.
Comment Tag: The text present within the tags in a web page. While most search
engines will ignore the text within the Comment Tags, some, like Excite, will index
the text present within them.
Directory: A site containing links to other sites which are organized into various
categories. Examples of directories are Yahoo!, Open Directory, LookSmart, NBCi
etc.
Doorway Page : A page which has been specially created in order to get a high ranking
in the search engines. Also called gateway page, bridge page, entry page etc.
Dynamic Content : Information in web pages which changes automatically, based on
database or user information. Search engines will index dynamic content in the same
way as static content unless the URL includes a ? mark. However, if the URL does
include a ? mark, many search engines will ignore the URL.
Entry Page : See Doorway Page.
Frames : An HTML technique allowing web site designers to display two or more
pages in the same browser window. Many search engines do not index framed web
pages properly - they only index the text present in the NOFRAMES tag. Unless a
web page which uses frames contains relevant content in the NOFRAMES tag, it is
unlikely to get a high ranking in those search engines.
Gateway Page : See Doorway Page.
Hallway Page : A page containing links to various doorway pages.
