← SEO Fundamentals
Glossary: SEO Fundamentals
Every key term from the course, in plain English. Bookmark this page — you'll come back to it.
- SERP
- Search engine results page — what Google shows after a search. Your goal is to appear here for searches that matter.
- Keyword
- The word or phrase someone types into search. 'Best plumber austin' is a keyword; so is 'plumber.'
- Search intent
- What the searcher actually wants — to buy, to learn, to find a location. Matching intent is half of SEO.
- Title tag
- The clickable headline Google shows in results. The single most influential on-page element.
- Meta description
- The short summary under your title in results. Doesn't directly affect rankings, but good ones earn more clicks.
- Backlink
- A link from another website to yours. Google treats these as votes of confidence — quality beats quantity.
- A third-party score estimating how likely a site is to rank. Useful for comparing, not an official Google metric.
- Crawl
- When Google's bots visit and read your pages. If they can't crawl it, it can't rank.
- Index
- Google's database of pages. Getting indexed is step one; ranking well is step two.
- Long-tail keyword
- Longer, specific searches ('affordable wedding photographer austin tx'). Less traffic each, easier to rank for, higher intent.
- Featured snippet
- The answer box at the top of some results. Clear, structured content wins these.
- Google Business Profile
- Your free business listing on Google Maps and local results. Essential for any local business.
- NAP
- Name, Address, Phone — must be consistent everywhere online for local SEO to work.
- Bounce rate
- Visitors who leave after one page. High bounce can signal the page didn't match the search intent.
- Core Web Vitals
- Google's speed and usability metrics. Slow, jumpy pages rank worse than fast, stable ones.