| Term |
Definition |
| A/B Testing |
A method of split testing in which one variable is compared to a baseline control sample. For example, a 12-point font on a web page can be tested against an 11-point font to determine which is best at generating the desired call to action. |
| Abandonment |
The process of a web site user leaving a site prior to completing a specific task, such as making a purchase. |
| Above the fold |
On a web page, the first screen viewed on a computer monitor when a document is opened; the content visible on a computer monitor without scrolling. |
| Absolute boosting |
Enabling a document to be consistently displayed at a given position in the results when a user searches with a specific query. |
| Accent normalization |
The process of normalizing data to minimize redundancy. |
| Access control |
Mechanisms and policies that restrict access to computer resources. |
| Access control list (ACL) |
A set of data that informs a computer’s operating system which permissions, or access rights, that each user or group has to a specific system, such as a directory or file. |
| Accuracy |
The quality of a measurement being near to the true value. |
| ACH (Automated Clearing House) |
A nationwide wholesale electronic payment and collection system for transferring funds between banks via the Federal Reserve System |
| Acknowledgement page |
A page that informs visitors their input has been successfully recorded. |
| Acquirer |
A financial institution that supports merchants by providing services for processing payment card transactions. |
| Acquisition |
The process of attracting visitors to a web site or the number of visitors arrived. |
| Actionable data |
Data a business can use to improve operations |
| ActiveX |
A loosely defined set of technologies developed by Microsoft Corp. for sharing information among different applicants. |
| Ad copy |
The words that form an advertisement that is displayed to searchers on the results page of a search engine. |
| Ad hoc query |
Any query that cannot be determined prior to the moment the query is issued. A query that consists of dynamically constructed query language, which is usually used by desktop-resident query tools. |
| Ad title |
The first text prospective visitors see when the link comes up in a search engine query, whether it is a web page that has paid for inclusion or appears in a regular search engine results. |
| Address verification service/system (AVS) |
A process used by a credit card processor or other party to verify that a customer’s billing address matches that of their credit card statement. |
| Adjacent searching (proximity searching) |
An extension to Boolean searching, this technique checks the position of terms and only matches those within a specified distance. |
| Administrator |
The person in charge of managing a system or network. |
| ADN (advanced digital network) |
A leased-line phone connection |
| Advanced search |
An option for searching that enables more complex combination of choices of subject, author and format; a search using more than one search term. |
| Affiliate |
A webmaster or site owner who earns revenue, usually commission-based, for conversion of leads, slicks or sales on an advertiser’s site. |
| Affiliate merchant |
The advertiser in an affiliate marketing relationship |
| Affiliate network |
A clearinghouse where online merchants with a product or service to sell can locate marketing professionals who will promote their products or services for a fee or commission. |
| Affirmative consent |
An active request by a user to receive newsletters or promotions via- e-mail. The permission to collect and use details or information for lead generation. |
| Aggregation |
The process by which data values are collected with the intent to manage the collection as a single unit. |
| Ajax (asynchronous JavaScript and XML) |
A web development technique used for creating interactive web applications. |
| Alert engine |
An application that performs matching of incoming documents against stored queries—a match generates an alert. |
| Alert query |
A set of filtering conditions an end-user or external applications sends to the alert engine. Each alert query is composed of several matching conditions and Boolean operators in a similar way as a search query. |
| Algorithm |
A formula or set of steps solving a particular problem; a formula used for calculating values, such as paid search fees. |
| Alias |
An alternative name for an object, such as a variable, file or device. |
| Allocation |
The process of assigning activities, costs or resources to certain organizational units. |
| Analog |
An analog signal represents a variable signal that is continuous in time and amplitude. |
| Anonymous FTP |
A method for downloading public web files using the File Transfer Protocol without the need to identify the user. |
| Anti-phrasing |
Identifying word sequences in queries that do not contribute essentially to the query’s meaning. |
| Apache |
A free, open-source web service software system used on UNIX, Linux and similar operating systems. It also is available for Windows and other operating systems. |
| Applet |
A program designed to be executed from within another application. |
| Application Program Interface (API) |
A source code interface that a computer application, operating system or library provides to support requests for services made of it by a computer program. |
| Application server |
Software that handles all application operations between users and an organization’s backend business applications or databases. |
| Application service provider (ASP) |
A business that provides computer based services to customers over a network. Software offered using an ASP model is sometimes called on –demand software or software-as-a-service (SaaS). |
| Approximate matching |
Matching a query term and a term within a document based on approximations. Such approximations can be used on spell check or linguistic normalization. |
| Archive |
To copy files to a long-term storage medium for backup. |
| ASN (advanced shipment notification) |
Notice that a product is being shipped |
| ASP (Active Server Pages) |
A specification for a dynamically created web page with a .ASP extension that uses ActiveX scripting. |
| Attachment |
A file attached to an e-mail message. |
| Attrition |
A gradual reduction in numbers |
| Auction |
The process of buying and selling goods by offering them for bid, taking bids and then selling the item to the winning bidder. |
| Auction model bidding |
Giving merchants the ability to bid on the cost per click they are willing to pay on any product. |
| Authentication |
Entering a user name and password to access Internet or intranet resources. |
| Authority |
In cryptography, an entity that issues digital certificates for use by other parties. Also known as a certificate authority. |
| Authorization |
The process of checking the validity and available balance of a customer’s credit card before the transaction can be accepted. |
| Autoresponder |
An e-mail that is automatically sent in reply to any e-mail received in a specific mailbox. |
| Average lifetime value |
An estimate of how much a customer is worth in monetary terms. |
| Average page views |
The average number of pages each visitor looks at during a specific period of time. |
| Average query response time |
The average time it takes for a search engine to respond to a given query. |
| Average time spent on site |
Average session length per visit during a specific time frame. |
| B |
|
| Backorder |
A customer order for goods that are not currently in stock but are to be sold or delivered when they become available. |
| Bandwidth |
The amount of data that can be transmitted through a communications channel in a fixed amount of time. For digital devices, it is typically expressed in bits per second (pbs) or bytes per second (1 byte is equal to 8 bites). |
| Bank identification number (BIN) |
The first six digits of a Visa or MasterCard account number, which is used to identify the card-issuing institution. |
| Banner advertising |
Advertisements that display as banners at the top or bottom of a web page; an image file placed in content sites where the advertiser’s target market can be reached. |
| Baseline metric |
The average of some measure, such as time spent on site over a specific period of time. |
| Batch processing |
A type of data processing where related transactions are transmitted as a group for processing. |
| Begins-with partial word matching |
Matching indexed words that contain a search term at the beginning, such as guns and gunsmith. |
| Behavior tracking |
Logging the behavior of a visitor to a web site. |
| Bid |
A formal proposal to buy at a specified price. |
| Bid management software |
An application that analyzed which search terms are bringing in the best return on investment. |
| Bigram |
A pair of letters considered as a single unit; a two-word phrase. |
| Bill of lading (BL, BOL, B/L) |
A shipment of document that gives instructions to the company transporting the goods. |
| Biometric |
Using a unique and measurable human physical characteristic to identify an individual |
| Bitmap Image (BMP) |
A graphic image stored as a specific arrangement of screen dots or pixels. |
| Blacklists |
Message blocking lists; All messages from addresses on such lists are automatically blocked. |
| Blog |
A web site where entries are written in chronological order and commonly displayed in reverse chronological order. Blog also can be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. |
| Blue tooth |
A short-range radio technology aimed at simplifying communications among Internet devices and between devices, such as smart phones, and the Internet. It also aims to simplify data synchronization between Internet devices and other computers. |
| BOM (bill of material) |
A list of all parts, sub-assemblies and raw materials that constitute a particular assembly for a product or set of products, showing the quantity of each required item. |
| Bookmark |
A feature supported by web browsers to access frequently viewed web pages when saved to a file. |
| Boolean search |
Narrowing down a search of the Internet by using the words, “and,” “or” or “not” before keywords. Most online databases and search engines support Boolean searches. |
| Boosting |
Altering the relevancy value of a document compared to other documents in a search |
| Byte |
A unit of information transferred over a network or stored in a hard drive or in memory One byte Is equal to 8 bits where each bit is wither a one or zero. |
| C |
|
| Caching |
Temporarily storing common pages and graphics that have been recently opened through a browser. Caches enable browsers to quickly reload pages and images that were recently viewed. |
| Call-backs |
Repeated attempts to contact a respondent who could not be interviewed on earlier attempts. |
| Call center |
A facility that answers inbound or places outbound telephone calls. Also, a customer contact function that fields incoming service and help requests and may conduct outgoing marketing and telemarketing activities. |
| Campaign |
The process of planning, creating, buying and tracking an advertising project from start to finish. |
| Campaign analysis |
A measurement of response to campaigns by households and individual customers. It enables measuring the effectiveness of individual campaigns and different media, and offers an opportunity to conduct cost-benefit analysis of campaigns. |
| Campaign integration |
Incorporating the same message in all types of marketing, such as in-store ads, e-mail campaigns and print ads. |
| Canonicalization |
The process of converting data with more than one possible representation into a canonical, or simplified, representation. |
| Card Identification number (CID) |
An American Express and Discover verification process that uses a non-embossed three- or four-digit number when authorizing credit card transactions where the physical card is not present. |
| Card Not Present (CNP) |
A type of card transaction in which the card is not resent at the point of sale for the magnetic stripe to be read. These are considered to be higher risk transactions. |
| Card Validation Code (CVC2) |
MasterCard’s term for the three-digit code printed next to the card number in the signature panel and used as part of the authorization process. |
| Card Verification Value (CVV2) |
Visa’s term for the three-digit code printed next to the card number in the signature panel and used as part of the authorization process. |
| Cardholder |
The authorized user of a credit or debit card who is financially responsible for transactions made against the card. |
| Cardholder Information Security Program (CISP) |
Visa’s cardholder data security standard. |
| Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) |
Groups of rules or properties called style sheets, which may be used to define the fonts, colors and layouts of a web site. |
| Case insensitive searching |
Search function that does not distinguish between capitalized or non-capitalized letters or words. |
| Case sensitive searching |
Search function that distinguishes between capitalized and non-capitalized letters of words. |
| Catalog |
A compilation of records describing the product content of a particular collection or group of collections. |
| Categorization |
Organizing documents, web pages and other content into logical groupings based on their content. |
| Certificate authority |
A third-party organization that creates digital certificates for a public key data security infrastructure. The authority guarantees a user’s identify and issues public and private keys for message encryption and decryption. |
| CGI (common Gateway Interface) |
A standard for the exchange of information between a web server and external computer programs. |
| CGI script |
A program written in one of several popular languages that can take input from a web page, manipulate the data and produce a customized result. |
| Challenge-Response Authentication |
A family of transaction security protocols in which one party presents a question (challenge) and another party must provide a valid answer (response) to be authenticated. |
| Chargeback |
The reversal of a credit card or other payment transaction as viewed from the perspective of the merchant. It usually occurs when a customer files a complaint. |
| Classification |
The act of forming data into a class or classes according to some common relations or attributes. |
| Click bot |
Software programmed to click on banner ads and pay-per-click text ad links to perform click fraud. |
| Click fraud |
An illegal practice that occurs when individuals click on web site click-through advertisements to increase their own personal banner ad revenues or to deplete a competitor’s advertising budget. |
| Click tracking |
Tracking clicks made by visitors coming in and going out of a site through scripts, giving details about site traffic and whether a site links is being used by visitors as a back link to another site. |
| Click-through |
Clicking on an online ad and reaching the advertiser’s destination page. |
| Click-through rate (CTR) |
The ratio of the number of times a user clicks on an online advertisement per the number of visitors who view the web site that carries the advertisement. |
| Click-to-open rate (CTOR) |
The ratio of e-mails that are actually opened by recipients compared to the total e-mails sent in a particular company. |
| Client |
A computer that can request information such as a web page, from a server, but can also perform tasks independently by using its own applications and programs. |
| Client/server |
An application in which one computer program (the client) requests information from another computer program (the server). |
| Client-side tracking |
Analyzing web users’ activity on a particular we site. |
| Cloaking |
A technique used by some web sites to deliver one page to a search engine for indexing while serving an entirely different page to everyone else. |
| COA (Certificate of authenticity) |
A document intended to validate the origin of an application or object, such as a collectible item. |
| Co-branding |
A system whereby affiliates include their own logo and branding on the pages to which they send visitors through affiliate links. |
| Collaboration |
Cooperation, networking and information sharing activities through computer networks |
| Collection |
Two or more electronic document containing related information that has been grouped together to facilitate retrieval. |
| Collection-level security |
Different authorization levels for various collections within the search index. |
| Competitive analysis |
The assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of current and potential competitors. |
| Completeness |
The degree to which all the parts of software system or components are present and each of its parts is fully specified and developed. |
| Concept extraction |
The ability to mine concepts from data using linguistic analysis. |
| Confirmed opt-in (double opt-in) |
The process by which each new subscriber is sent an authentication e-mail requesting that he or she confirm the intention to receive e-mail communications from a company or organization. |
| Consignment inventory |
Merchandise owned by one party that is places with another party for sale, usually on a commission basis. |
| Consumer generated media (CGM) |
Posts made by consumers within online venues on products they have purchased. It includes video, audio and multimedia posts crated by consumers in support of products, brands and corporate institutions. |
| Content connector |
Technology that extracts content from an external content repository and inputs it into a search system for indexing. |
| Content delivery network |
A system that copies the pages of a web site to geographically dispersed servers. When a page is requested, content is dynamically identified and served from the closest server to the users, enabling faster delivery. |
| Content management (CM) |
A technology that addresses the content creation, review, approval and publishing processes of web-based content. |
| Content provider |
A service provider that specializes in providing content, rather than infrastructure. |
| Content routing |
Distributing content to different areas of a web site. |
| Context relevancy |
The importance of a term/phrase/entity match depending on the matching context. |
| Contextual advertising |
Advertising that targets a web page based on the page’s content, keywords or category. |
| Contextual entity extraction |
Normalized matching of entities as well as contextual navigation into detected entities from search results. |
| Conversion rate |
The percentage of people converted into buyers out of the total number of visitors to a retail web site in a given period of time. |
| Cookies |
A small file that is given to a browser by a web server when a person visits a web site. The purpose of cookies is to identify web site visitors and possibly prepare customized web pages for them. |
| Copyright |
A legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time. |
| Cost of goods sold (COGS) |
Direct expenses incurred in producing goods for sale, including the cost of materials that comprise the gods and direct labor expense used to produce the goods and make them ready to sell. |
| Coupons/rebates |
Discounts given to consumers when purchasing goods or services. |
| CPA (cost per action) |
A form of advertising where payment is dependent on an action that a user performs as a result of the ad. |
| CPC (cost per click) |
A performance-based advertising model where the advertiser pays a set fee for every click on an ad. |
| CPG |
Consumer product goods |
| CPM (cost per mile, or thousand) |
An ad model that charges an advertiser every time an ad is displayed to a user, whether the users click on the ad or not. The fee is based on every 1,000 ad impressions. |
| CPO (cost per order) |
A measure used in direct marketing to determine the number of orders generated relative to the cost of running and advertisement. |
| Crawler |
Software used by a search engine to find and retrieve web pages to include in its index. |
| Cron job |
A Unix operating system command for scheduling jobs to be executed in the future. Also a Deamon process that runs continuously, waiting for specific events to occur. |
| Cryptography |
The art of protecting information by transforming it into an unreadable format, called cipher text. |
| Customer relationship management (CRM) |
All aspects of interaction a company has with its customers, whether they are sales or service-related. |
| Customer reviews |
Customer ratings of products posted on a retailer’s or manufacturer’s web site. |
| Cycle count/time |
A measurement of how quickly two back-to-back accesses of a memory chip can be made. |
| D |
|
| Daemon |
Any program running on a UNIX-type operating system that runs at all times, such as Apache or an FTP server. |
| Dashboard |
Software used to host smaller applications, known as widgets. When active, it allows users to create, delete, rearrange and recreate the widgets on their desktop. Also a user interface that organizes and presents information in a way that is easy to read. |
| Data model |
A description of data that consists of all entities represented in a data structure or database and the relationships among them. |
| Data segment |
A database segment containing rows from a table or from a clustered set of tables. |
| Data warehouse |
A database used for storing historical data, which is used for data analysis. |
| Database |
A collection of digital information organized in such a way that a computer program can quickly select desired pieces of data. |
| Database publishing |
The production of catalogs and price lists, using data from a database. |
| Date range |
A feature that allows file selection based on the date and time they were last modified |
| Dayparting |
The practice of displaying ads based on the time of day. |
| Deep linking |
To link to a page on a web site other than its home page. |
| Deep navigators |
A type of dynamic drill-down navigator that applies on-the-fly aggregation of values across the entire result for a query. |
| Demographics |
The study of, or information about, people’s lifestyles, habits, population movements, spending, age, social grade and employment. |
| Description tag |
A meta tag which describes the purpose of the web site or web page. |
| Dictionary |
A dictionary supports linguistic processing of content and queries against a lot of words/terms/phrases in order to improve recall an/or precision for a query. |
| Digital asset |
Any form of content or media that has been formatted into a binary source, which includes the right to use it. |
| Digital asset management (DAM) |
A system that creates a centralized repository for digital files that allows the content to be archived, searched and retrieved. |
| Digital certificate |
An attachment to an electronic message used for security purposes. For example, to verify that a user sending a message is who he or she claims to be. |
| Digital content |
Digital media such as audio, video, an image or a combination of the three. |
| Digital rights Management (DRM) |
A system for protecting the copyrights of data circulated via the Internet or other digital media by enabling secure distribution or disabling of illegal distribution of the data. |
| Directed search |
A narrow data search within a specified area of the index content. |
| Directories |
Virtual containers for holding computer files; a key building block of a computer’s storage architecture that contains files or other directories. |
| Discount rate |
A percentage rate charged by the bank for processing a merchant’s transaction. |
| Distribution center |
A warehouse that receives merchandise from multiples vendors and distributes it to multiple stores. |
| DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) |
An act of Congress signed into law on Oct. 28, 1998, to update U.S. copyright laws for the digital age. |
| DMS |
A family of switching systems that provides digital circuit-switched service for voice and data transmission, and packet-switched service for data transmission |
| DNA (Domain Name System) |
A system that translates text addresses, such as companyname.com, into a numeric Internet address. |
| DNS lookup |
The process of converting a numeric Internet provider address into a text name. |
| Document element |
The part of a document within the document processing framework. |
| Document management (DM) |
The storage, indexing and control digital documents. |
| Document summary |
The subset, indexing and control of digital documents. |
| Document-level security |
Within a search engine, document-level security implies that the search index provides the same document access control granularity as the source context repositories. |
| Domain |
A specific virtual are within the Internet, defined by the letters immediately following the period, dot or end mark in the URL (uniform resource locator) |
| Domain name |
The text name corresponding to the numeric IP address of a computer on the Internet. |
| Domain name system (DNS) |
An Internet addressing system that used a group of names that are listed with dots (periods) between them, working from the most specific to the most general group. |
| Doorway page |
A web page designed specifically for the purpose of gaining high placement in a search engine’s rankings. |
| Download |
Copying a file from an online service or network file server to a computer on a network. |
| DPI (dots per inch) |
A basic measurement for the sharpness and clarity of images. The more dots per inch, the higher the resolution. |
| Drop-ship |
The process by which a customer places an order with a retailer only to have the purchased goods sent directly from another location. |
| DSL (digital subscriber line) |
A technology using sophisticated modulation schemes to pack data onto copper wires used for connections from a telephone switching station to a home, office or another switching station. |
| Duplicate detection |
An output feature of some search engines and meta-search tools that automatically filter out of search results any URLs that are duplicated elsewhere in the results. |
| Dynamic concept extraction |
The ability to mine concepts from data present in the result set of a query through statistical and linguistic analysis. |
| Dynamic landing pages |
An extension of the original ad or link that is clicked on and optimized for a particular set of keywords to draw the most traffic. |
| Dynamic publishing |
The ability to create content and re purpose it for the appropriate audience in the fight medium. |
| Dynamic rank |
The process by which rank components are computed during matching related to the level of match between document and query. |
| Dynamic teaser |
A short summary of a document, generated based on the actual query, showing the regions of the document matching the query, with the query terms highlighted. |
| E |
|
| ECPM ( effective cost per mile measures) |
A calculation that reveals how much each thousand units of inventory costs an advertiser. |
| Electronic check (eCheck) |
An electronic version of the traditional paper check. It includes all the components of a paper check and can be used as a method of payment on the Internet. |
| Electronic commerce (EC) |
Business that is conducted over the Internet using any of the application that rely on the Internet, such as e-mail, instant messaging, shopping carts, web services, and others. |
| Electronic funds transfer (EFT) |
The paperless act of transmitting money through a computer network. |
| Electronic signature |
A paperless way to sign a document using an electronic symbol or process attached to or associated with the document. |
| E-mail append |
Merging a database of customer information, where the customer’s e-mail addresses are missing, with a service provider’s database of e-mail addresses in an attempt to find a match. |
| E-mail blocking |
Blocking e-mail based on the source host name, IP address, envelope sender address or content. |
| E-mail link |
An Internet e-mail address placed in content that allows the user to generate an e-mail to that address by double-clicking on the link. |
| E-mail marketing |
An electronic mail variation of the traditional method of marketing directly to consumers via bulk mail. |
| Encryption |
Encoding information so that it is secure from other Internet users. |
| End user |
The final user of a software product, after the product has been fully developed and marketed. |
| Enlarged product view |
Magnification of a product photo. |
| Enterprise content management (ECM) |
Capturing, managing, storing and controlling enterprise wide content, including documents, images, e-mail messages, instant messages and video |
| Enterprise resource planning (ERP) |
Integrating all facets of the business, including planning, manufacturing, sales and marketing. |
| Entity extraction |
In biometric security systems, the process of converting a captured biometric sample into data that can be compared to a reference template. |
| ERP System |
Software applications that help business managers implement enterprise resource planning in business activities such as inventory control, order tracking, customer service, finance and human resources. |
| Ethernet |
A local area network architecture developed by Xerox Corp., Digital Equipment Corp., and Intel. |
| Exact match |
Query terms that match document words exactly. |
| Eye tracking studies |
A testing method that yields data on how consumers visually perceive web pages and other media formats. |
| F |
|
| False drop |
A web page retrieved from a search engine or directory that is not relevant to the query used. |
| False positive |
An incorrect positive result to a test. |
| FAQ (frequently asked questions) |
An online document that poses a series of common questions and answers on a specific topic. |
| FDDI (Fiber Distributed Data Interface) |
A set of ANSI protocols for sending digital data over fiber optic cable. |
| Federated search |
The simultaneous search of multiple online databases. |
| File Transfer Protocol (FTP) |
The basic method for copying a file from one computer to another through the Internet. |
| Filters |
Text strings or regular expressions used to either exclude certain visits or only include certain visits from a web analytics tool; commonly used to omit certain content, such as |
| Firewall |
A security device, either software of hardware, placed on a local area network to protect it from Internet intruders. |
| First-party cookie |
Cookies placed by web sites, unlike third-party cookies places by commercial entities. First-party cookies are considered to be secure and reliable. |
| First time sessions |
The number of times unique visitors come to a web site during a specified period, not having visited before that period. Visitors are identified by cookies. |
| First time unique visitor |
The number of unique visitors to a site that had not visited prior to the time frame being analyzed. |
| First time visitors |
The number of visitors who come to a web site for the first time, as determined by the absence of a cookie. |
| Flash |
A multimedia-authoring program for vector graphic animation. |
| Follow-on transaction |
Transactions submitted to take further action for originating transactions, such as capturing authorized funds, voicing and original transaction or issuing a refund for a purchase. |
| Forum |
An online discussion group. |
| Frame |
A rectangular region within the browser window that displays a web page alongside other pages in other frames. |
| Frames |
In HTML, providing the ability to break w web page into multiple, separately scrollable areas. |
| Frequency |
The number of times an ad is delivered to the same browser in a single session or time period. |
| Frequent buyer program |
A rewards program for repeat customers. |
| Fulfillment |
To carry out the processing of an order including picking, packaging and shipping of the product. |
| Full text search |
A search of the text of the documents in a collection. |
| Full text sorting |
Sorting of search results based on the full textual content of a field. |
| Fuzzy matching |
Retrieving matches for partially spelled or misspelled words. |
| G |
|
| Gateway |
A web page designed to attract visitors and search engines to a particular web site. |
| Geo-enabled search |
The ability to sort, filter or rank documents based on their geographical distance from a given source position, typically the position of the end-user. |
| Geolocation |
The geographic location of a user of the Internet. |
| Geotargeting |
Serving of ads to a particular geographical area. |
| GET method |
A way of passing parameters, usually separated by special characters, such as an ampersand, of an HTTP request from the browser to the server. |
| GIF (Graphic Interchange Format) |
A compressed, bitmapped format often used on the Internet to send images because of its good quality/compression ratio when used on certain image types. |
| Gigabyte |
A unit of information equal to 1,024 megabytes. |
| Golden set |
The number of documents and queries to be used for testing; a minimum of 2,000 documents and at least 50 queries. |
| Google |
The largest public Internet search engine in terms of indexed content and number of users. |
| Google Adwords |
Google’s purchased, targeted cost-per-click or cost-per-impression advertising. Adwords are displayed along with organic search results on Google, as well as on search and content sites within the Google network. |
| GRP (gross rating points) |
Total number of impressions delivered by a media schedule as expressed as a percentage of a market population. |
| GUI (graphical user interface) |
Software that provides an easy-to-use interface between a computer user and an application. |
| Guided navigation |
An analysis tool that presents an interface that keeps information in context by categorizing the dimensions, attributes and relationships in a data set. |
| H |
|
| Hard bounce/soft bounce |
When e-mailing, hard bounce describes an e-mail that has returned to the sender undelivered, denied by the recipient’s mail server. Soft bounce describes an e-mail that has returned to the sender undelivered after being accepted by the recipient’s mail server. |
| Head terms |
Keywords that account for most of the visits to a web site. |
| Hidden text (keyword stuffing) |
A search engine optimization technique used by web designers to overload keywords onto a web page so that search engines will read the page as being relevant in a web search. |
| Hit |
Outdated term used to describe a single request made to a web server for an object on a web site. The object can be an HTML file, a graphic image, or any other embedded object. |
| Home page |
The main page of a web site that typically serves as an index or table of contents to other documents stored at the site. |
| Hosted application/solution |
An information system in which server contains data, files or application that another computer can access by means of a network or modem |
| Hosted |
Operating w web server farm either at a data center or co-location facility. |
| House list (or retention list) |
A permission-based collection of e-mail recipients developed by a company based on current or former customers or inquiries for the company’s product or service. |
| HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) |
Language used to write documents for the web, and to specify hypertext links between related objects and documents. |
| HTML e-mail |
A full-color, interactive e-mail message, containing graphics and links to web pages. |
| HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) |
The standard method of transferring data between a web server and a web browser. |
| Hyperlink |
An element in an electronic document that links to another place in the same document or to an entirely different document. |
| Hypertext |
Text on a web page that will lead the user to other, related information on demand. |
| I |
|
| IFrame |
A floating frame inserted within a web page that is not bound to the side of a browser window. |
| Information Server) IIS (Microsoft Internet |
A popular web server software system for Windows operating systems. |
| Import |
To use data produced by another application. |
| Impression logging |
Tracking impressions in a log maintained by a site server. |
| Impressions (page impressions) |
An online advertising term referring to the number of times a banner ad is downloaded by users. |
| In-context editing |
Editing content elements within the context of a web page. |
| Incremental indexing |
Any backup of data in which only the data objects that have been modified since the time of previous backup are copied. |
| Index |
A systematic guide to the contents of a file, document or group of documents in an arrangement, which represents the references and page numbers, for accessing the content. |
| Index file |
A file created by a search indexer program, designed to store information in a format that makes fast retrieval possible. |
| Indexability |
The ability of a site to be indexed or recorded by a search engine spider. |
| Index-based security |
The resolution of a repository’s document access control list permissions at query time by the index itself through the use of stored metadata. Using this method, the results lists will only include hits for which the searcher has viewing permissions. |
| Ingestion rate |
The number of documents per unit time that an enterprise search platform can process. |
| ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) |
An international communications standard for sending voice, video and data over digital phone lines or normal telephone wires. |
| Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) |
A U.S.-based trade association that promotes and regulates Internet advertising. |
| Interactive television (ITV) |
A number of techniques that enable viewers to interact with television content as they view it. |
| Interchange fee |
A fee that a merchant’s bank pays a customer’s bank when merchants accept a Visa or MasterCard card for payment. |
| Internationalization (I19N) |
Specifications for writing internationalized software, including application that can display text in a country’s language. |
| Internet Protocol (IP) |
The format of electronic information packets, also called data grams and the addressing scheme. Most networks combine IP with a higher-level protocol called TCP, which establishes a virtual connection between a destination and a source. |
| IP address lookup |
Locating an identifier for a computer or device on a TCP/IP network. |
| IP number (Internet Protocol number) |
A unique number designating a computer or device. |
| IPTV (Internet Protocol television) |
IPTV uses a two-way digital broadcast signal that is sent through a switched telephone or cable network via a broadband connection, combined with a set-top box programmed with software that can manage viewer requests to access media sources. |
| ISP (Internet service provider) |
A company that provides other companies or individuals with access to or presence on the Internet. |
| Intranet |
A private network within a company or organization that serves shared applications intended for internal use only. |
| Inventory |
Goods and materials held available in stock by a business. |
| ISO (independent sales organization) |
A company or individuals that sell merchant processing services on behalf of banks. |
| Issuer |
The financial institution or company that has provided a credit or debit card to a cardholder or business. |
| Issuing bank |
The bank that maintains a consumer’s credit card account and must pay out to the merchant’s account in a credit card purchase. |
| J |
|
| JavaScript |
A programming language, created by Sun Microsystems, which enables small applications to be downloaded into a computer for playback. |
| JavaServer Pages (JSP) |
A java-based technology enabling developers to embed Java code and specific pre-determined actions to be embedded into static content. |
| JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) |
File format for full-color and black-and-white graphic images. JPEG images allow for more colors than GIF images and usually are smaller in size. |
| K |
|
| Key |
In database management systems, a key is a field used to sort data. |
| KPI (key performance indicators) |
A set of quantifiable measures that a company or industry can use to gauge or compare performance in terms of meeting their strategic or operational goals. |
| Keyword |
Words or a set of words typed into a search engine query. Also a set of words that accurately describes the contents of a single web page or web site. |
| Keyword density |
The measurement in percentage of the number of times a particular keyword or phrase appears compared to the total number of words on a page. |
| Keyword stemming |
When a search engine searches not only for search terms but also for words that are similar to some or all of those terms, including plurals. |
| Keyword tag |
An HTML meta tag used to help define the important keywords of a page. |
| Keyword targeting |
Targeting online ads by matching a user’s most recent search behavior. |
| Kilobyte |
A unit refers to separate but related items that are grouped, packages and supplied together as one unit. |
| L |
|
| LAN (local area network) |
A computer network that spans a relatively small area, confined to a single building or group of buildings. |
| Landing page |
A web page linked to, or landed on, directly from a hyperlink in an e-mail campaign. |
| Lead generation |
The use of marketing tools, devices or techniques to generate leads to new customers or contacts. |
| Lead time |
The total time needed for an order to be processed. |
| Leakage |
A type of dropout form customer engagement that happens before any serious engagement with potential customers takes place. |
| Legacy application |
An information system or software into which a company has invested considerable time and money. Typically, legacy applications are database management systems running on mainframes or minicomputers. |
| Link cardinality |
The number of links in a set that refer to a given document. It is used to determine the relevancy of a web page by factoring in ho many other pages refer to the |
| Link farming |
The process of exchanging reciprocal links with web sites in order to increase search engine optimization. |
| Link popularity |
In search optimization technology, a term used to describe the value of a web site, where the measurement is based on the quantity of quality inbound links to a company’s pages. |
| Linkbait |
A type of web marketing used to increase a web site’s link popularity, such as a blog included by the author to encourage other bloggers and webmasters to link back to that content from their own page. |
| Linux |
A freely distributed open source operating code that runs on a number of hardware platforms. |
| Live chat (live help) |
A web service that enables businesses to communicate, or that, in real time with visitors to their web sites. |
| Log file |
A file created by a web or proxy server that contains all of the access information regarding the activity on that server. |
| Log file analysis |
Analyzing log information to determine where visitors are coming from, how often they return and how they navigate through a site. |
| Log rotation |
The practice of renaming a log file, often by adding a date-stamp, and storing it concurrent with creating a new log file for the storage of web usage data. |
| Long tail |
Key phrases that individually account for little traffic but collectively account for a larger umber of visitors. |
| Long-tailed keywords |
Lesser-searched keywords associated with a common search term. |
| LTV (Lifetime value) |
Customer lifetime value |
| M |
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| Managed hosting |
A hosting company that manages the server administration of another web site. |
| Marketing performance management (MPM) |
Measuring, analyzing and optimizing return on investment of marketing campaigns. |
| Match |
When characteristics are compatible, similar or consistent. |
| Megabyte |
A unit of data storage equal to 1,048,576 Bytes. |
| Merchant account provider |
A third-party company providing merchant accounts and credit card processing services. |
| Merchant identification number (MID) |
A number generated by a processor/acquirer specific to each individual merchant location. |
| Meta tags |
Special HTML tags that provide information about a web page. Meta tags provide information such as who created the age, how often it is updated, what the page is about ad which keywords represent the page’s content. |
| Metrics |
Numbers used as a measurement for comparing items or time periods. |
| Middleware |
Software that connects two otherwise separate applications |
| Minimum bid |
The minimum price seller will accept for an item in an auction. |
| Mining |
Looking for hidden patterns in a group of data that can be used to predict future behavior. |
| More like this |
A way to refine search by identifying the right set of documents and then locating similar documents. |
| Morphologic analysis |
Used in query analysis, this examination includes all forma of a given word via linguistic normalization. |
| Multi home |
Distributing processing and communications activity evenly across a computer network so that no single device is overwhelmed. Employing two or more web servers in a load-balancing scheme. |
| Multilevel sorting |
Sorting by multiples fields. |
| Multi site search |
Searching multiple sites simultaneously. |
| N |
|
| Natural language Processing (NLP) |
A branch of artificial intelligence that deals with analyzing, understanding and generating languages that humans use naturally in order to interact with computers in both written and spoken contexts using natural human languages instead of computer languages. |
| Navigation |
The movement of a user through a web site or other application interface. Also, the system of available links and buttons that enables a user to navigate through the web site. |
| NSA |
The National Center for Supercomputing Applications, which developed several important web protocols and software systems, including the standard logging type used by Apache. |
| Negative keywords |
Words preceded by a minus sign added to a keyword list to filter out unwanted impressions. |
| No frames tag |
A tag specifically for search engines that cannot read the actual pages in a frame set. |
| No script tag |
The no script tag defines the content that is displayed when a browser agent cannot render the preceding script. |
| Non-referrals |
When a visitor gets to a site by typing the URL directly into the browser window or using a bookmark/favorite rather than clicking on a link to get to the site. |
| Non-qualified transaction fees (Non-qual) |
Bank card sales transactions that do not meet Visa/MasterCard criteria for a particular merchant and are processed at a higher interchange rate. |
| O |
|
| ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) |
A standard database access method developed by the SQL Access group. |
| On-Demand service |
On-demand refers to a technology service or application that addresses the user’s need for immediate use. On-demand applications also are offered by developers and providers as software-as-a-service. |
| Open rate |
The percentage opened of the total number of e-mails sent in an e-mail marketing campaign. |
| Opt-in/subscribe |
The act of a person actively agreeing to become a recipient of e-mail communication. |
| Opt-out (or unsubscribe) |
The act of a person takes when they want to be removed from an e-mail list to stop receiving e-mail communications. |
| Order confirmation |
An e-mail notification sent to a customer confirming the placement of an order. |
| Order management system |
Software a merchant uses to process, track and manage orders. |
| Order tracking |
The process of following the status of a customer’s order from an online retailer. |
| Organic click rate |
The click-through rate for unpaid listings. |
| Organic results |
Unpaid listings on results pages of search engines. The listings appear in order of what the search engine deems most relevant to the query, as opposed to pay-per-click advertising. |
| Organic search |
A type of search in which users find web sites by unpaid listings, which appear because a search engine considers them most applicable for a certain search query. |
| Organic search listings/rankings |
Unpaid search engine rankings of web pages based on editorial relevance. |
| OS (operating system) |
Software that manages the basic operations of a computer system or data-processor, such as Windows and MacOS. |
| Outlet center |
A manufacturer’s store in which it sells its own brands at a discount; also used be e-retailers to sell overstock and discontinued products. |
| P |
|
| Packing slip |
A document included with a package that shows its contents, but not financial or account information. |
| Page duration |
The length of time a visitor spends on a web site. |
| PageRank (PR) |
A part of the technology Google uses to place importance on we pages. In the early years it was the primary factor in determining rankings, but now it is among hundreds of factors. |
| Paid Inclusion |
The process of paying a fee to a search engine in order to be included in its directory. |
| Parameters |
Located in a URL after a question mark and followed by an equal sign and a return value. |
| Parametric search |
Enables users to search for items based on a specific item’s parameters or particular attributes. |
| Parentheses |
A method for grouping search terms, allowed by some search engines. |
| Parsing |
Transforming text into a set of data that can be processed and analyzed to determine its structure with respect to formal grammar. |
| Pay-per-click search engine (PPSCE) |
A search engine that offers pay-per-click advertising as an option to businesses. A search engine that includes paid listings with search results. |
| Path |
The click pattern a person uses as they travel to multiple web pages. |
| Path analysis |
Studying the route a user takes through a certain web site or group of web sites. |
| Payee verification |
Ensures that payee information has not been changed in any way and reduces the chance of fraud. |
| Payer authentication |
A way of verifying the identity of a cardholder making an online purchase. |
| P4P (pay for performance) |
Similar to PPC advertising. Advertisers pay for each time a user clicks o their sponsored link or every time they receive a phone call. |
| Payment Card industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) |
Data security standard developed by the major credit card companies as a guideline to help merchants secure confidential cardholder information in their databases. |
| Payment cartridge |
A payment solution that provides integrated credit card processing to shopping carts |
| Payment gateway |
A company that provides a secure interface between a merchant’s web site and its merchant bank. |
| Payment plug |
A payment application that provides integrated credit card processing for merchant applications. |
| Pay-per-call |
A model similar to pay-per-click advertising in which an advertiser is charged for every phone call they receive as the result of a search ad, as opposed to flat monthly or yearly rates. |
| Pay-per-click (PPC) |
A model of online advertising in which advertisers pay for each time a user clicks on their sponsored link that directs them to a specified landing page from a search engine results page. |
| PCI compliance |
Merchants acting in accordance with the PCI Data Security Standard when storing and processing confidential credit card data. |
| PEF (personal experience factor) |
A customer’s interaction with a company’s web site or brand. |
| Performance indicators |
Metrics that provide a business with knowledge of a site’s performance. |
| Permission-based-e-mail |
E-mails sent with the permission of the recipient |
| Persistent identification element (PIE) |
A type of tag that attaches to a user’s web browser that provides a unique ID. |
| Personal home page (PHP) |
A script language and interpreter used for web site development that is freely available and used primarily on Linux web servers. |
| Personalization |
Defining of different user subgroups including several attributes such as age, gender, location, marital status, lifestyle characteristics and other definable behaviors. Retailers used these to target certain population segments. |
| Personas |
Profiles of different user subgroups including several attributes such as age, gender, location, marital status, lifestyle characteristics and other definable behaviors. Retailers use these to target certain population segments. |
| Phishing (pronounced “fishing”) |
E-mail scams designed to gain personal and financial information form the recipient for use in identity theft. |
| Phrase searching |
An option given by some search engines to search for a group of words as a phrase, usually by putting the phrase in quotation marks, to ensure all matches will contain every word in the correct order. |
| Phrasing |
The way a statement is put together, particularly in matters of style and word choice. |
| Pick and pack (pick, pack and ship) |
A term referring to the steps in order fulfillment during which a fulfillment house receives products and prepares them for shipment. |
| Pick-and-pass |
A sorting method used by distribution centers handling multiple SKU’s. |
| Pick accuracy (or picking accuracy) |
Statistics measuring the accuracy of the order picking process. |
| Pick list |
A computer generated list of items to be shipped. |
| Pixel |
One of many tiny dots that collectively represent an image on a computer screen. Pixels very in color and intensity and combine to form a single, smooth picture on a monitor or on paper. |
| Platform |
A specific combination of computer hardware and operating system that represents a user’s method of accessing the Internet. |
| Plug-in |
A software module that “plugs” into an application in order to give it specific additional functionality; a program that enables a web browser to display a wider range of content than originally intended. |
| PMML (Predictive Modeling Markup Language) |
Based on XML, a programming language that supports several different statistical predictive model types. |
| POA (point of action) |
The location of a conversion |
| Podcast |
A media file distributed over the Internet that can be played back on portable devices and personal computers. |
| Point-in-time services |
When customers are directed to a web page to execute a certain task at a well-defined time, such as filling out a customer satisfaction survey or registering for a certain product or service. |
| Port |
A particular web server location at which two-way communication takes place, including http, ftp and e-mail |
| Portal |
A gateway with content management capabilities that enables users to access content, services and applications from a single interface |
| Position |
The placement of a paid or natural link on a search engine results page. The top three paid ads are known as premium positions. |
| Position preference |
A search engine feature that enables advertisers to specify the positions they would like to occupy. |
| Post |
A method of sending HTML-formatted data to a server that enables sending larger amounts of information. |
| PPC (pay-per-click) |
A model of online advertising in which advertisers pay each time a user clicks on their sponsored link directing the user to a specified landing page from a search engine results page. |
| PPC advertising/Management |
The observation and maintenance of a PPC ad campaign. Management includes adjusting keyword bids, testing for effectiveness and conversion, and measuring for campaign results. |
| PPP (point-to-point Protocol) |
Set of rules governing communication between two devices through a data connection, such as a personal computer connected to a server. |
| Precision and recall |
Widely used measures for evaluating the quality of results in domains such as information retrieval. |
| Pre-order |
An order placed for an item that has not yet been released. |
| Privacy policy |
A document explaining a merchant’s policy regarding the handling of its customer’s information. |
| Private label card |
A retailer’s proprietary credit card. |
| Processor |
A company that sends a merchant’s request for authorization of a purchase to the customer’s card issuer and delivers the funds to the merchant. |
| Procurement card |
A commercial card issued to a company’s employees to purchase supplies and services. |
| Product content management |
Managing the appearance and content of online catalogs |
| Product ratings/recommendations |
Customer comments about products or services posted on a web site. |
| Production environment |
A live web site that serves content to site visitors; also referred to as a delivery system. |
| Proper name recognition |
A way of identifying word sequences that is defined as proper names. |
| Protocol |
Set of rules related to data transmission between tow or more devices |
| Proximity boosting |
The process in which web pages that contain the query terms closer together are ranked higher on search engine results pages than documents with the query terms distributed throughout. |
| Proximity searching |
An advances search technique based on the proximity of terms within a text, relative to one another |
| Purchased order (PO) |
A commercial document requesting something in return for a customer's payment, providing specifications and qualifications including an order number used to identify the specified purchase. |
| Q |
|
| Quality score |
A number Google assigns to paid ads in auction format that, combined with several other factors, determines where each ad page ranks. |
| Query |
A keyword or phrase entered into a search field that searches through a database and produces organic and paid results. |
| Query syntax |
The rules that must be followed when entering a query into a search engine. |
| Query term weight |
The ability to assign a different relevance value to certain words in a query. |
| Query token |
A special character, often a question mark, in a URL that differentiates the main URL from a query. |
| Query transformation |
The analysis and adjustment of a query using linguistic tools like spell-checking. |
| R |
|
| Radio button |
A click able button that changes appearance when clicked to indicate a selection (e.g., it changes from white to black). If another item in the list is selected, the first choice becomes deselected; often used in windows applications. |
| Range restrictions |
The ability to limit search results to a specified range in a numerical search field. |
| Rank |
The relative placement of a particular web page on a search engine results page. Generally, the higher the rank, the more effective it is. |
| Rank profile |
Enables total control of the relative weight for each element of a particular query. |
| Ranking models |
Models that determine the proximity of a match for a particular query. |
| Raw data feed |
Information that has been collected but not formatted that can be used to build an XML feed. |
| Reach |
The size of the audience interacting with a message in a certain amount of time - can be referred to as an absolute number or as a percentage of a population. |
| Real-time indexing |
The ability to index content with short latency, or time delay, typically within seconds from when the enterprise search platform receives a document for indexing. |
| Real-time processing |
Credit card processing completed online, while the customer is still visiting the site. |
| Rear-view mirror metrics |
Metrics that measure what has previously occurred. |
| Recall |
The ability to retrieve as many results as possible that are related to a certain query. |
| Recency |
The amount of time that has elapsed since a visitor's last site visit. |
| Reciprocal link |
Two separate web sites that link to each other (also called "cross linking"). |
| Referral errors |
When someone clicks on a link that points to a site but contains a reference to a non-existent page or file. |
| Referrals |
When users click on a link that takes them to any page or file on another web site; when a web user arrives at a site by clicking on a link at another site. |
| Registry |
A database used by the Windows operating system to store configuration information. |
| Relationship marketing |
Marketing focusing on the relationship between the merchant and the customer as opposed to just focusing on selling the product. |
| Relative boosting |
Enabling a document to always be displayed among the first 20 documents in the results list, provided a user searched with a specific query. |
| Relative URL's link |
A URL that changes the browser location relative to the file that is making the request. |
| Relevance |
A subjective measure of how well a document satisfies the user's information need. |
| Rental list (or acquisition list) |
A third-party mailing list that can only be used once or for a limited time, for a fee. |
| Repository |
A central location where digital data is stored and maintained. |
| Results list |
The results displayed be a search engine or directory after a search term has been entered. |
| Return code |
The value returned by an OLE DB (Object Linking and Embedding for Databases) method. |
| Returning sessions |
The number of times unique visitors returned to web site during a specified time period. |
| Returning visitors |
Visitors who have been to a site prior to a report period and have come back. |
| Reverse DNS |
Name resolution software that looks up an IP address to obtain a domain name. |
| Revision tracking |
Tracking the revisions made to a document. |
| Revenue sharing/revshare |
The sharing of profits and losses among different groups. |
| RFM analysis |
Scanning the database for three criteria-recency, frequency an monetary value-enabling companies to aim offers at the customers who are most responsive, thus saving promotional costs while increasing sales. |
| Rich media |
A term used to describe a broad range of advanced interactive technologies commonly used on web pages, such as streaming video. |
| Right rail |
The right-most column or section of a web page that I soften used to display advertisements. |
| ROAS (return on advertising spend) |
The number of times an advertising investment is returned based on the ration of total revenue/total cost. |
| ROI (return on investment) |
An accounting formula used to obtain an actual or perceived future value of an expense or investment. |
| ROMI |
Return on marketing investment. |
| Rotating log files |
The process of ceasing to write to a particular log, renaming the file, moving it to another directory and instructing the web server software to open a new log file for writing. |
| Router |
A device that forwards data packets along networks. |
| RSS (Really Simple Syndication) |
A family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated content such as blog entries, new headlines or podcasts. |
| RTF (Rich Text Format) |
A standard formalized by Microsoft Corp. for specifying formatting of documents. RTF files are ASCII files with special commands to indicate formatting information, such as fonts and margins. |
| S |
|
| Sampling |
The key technique used to digitalize analog information. |
| Scalable |
The ability of an information technology implementation to grow as the usage of the service increases. |
| Scenario analysis |
A quantitative modeling technique that involves interring different sets of data into a model and then determining how changes in the input data affect the model's output. |
| Screen resolution |
The number of pixels per inch that a monitor screen is able to display. |
| Search analytics |
Analyzing search terms and behavior of visitors using the web site search engine. |
| Search directory |
A web site that displays listings of other web sites corresponding to a search word or phrase. A directory is put together by humans placing the web sites into categories |
| Search engine |
An application that searches documents for specified keywords and returns a list of the documents where the keywords were found, ranked according to relevance. |
| Search engine optimization (SEO) |
The progress of choosing targeted keyword phrases related to a site and ensuring that the site places well when those keyword phrases are part of a web search. |
| Search form |
A screen in which a user enters criteria for a search. |
| Search Submit Pro (SSP) |
Yahoo's sponsored search program. |
| Secure Electronic Transaction Protocol (SET) |
A standard that enables secure credit card transactions on the Internet by employing digital signatures. SET has been endorsed by virtually all the major players in electronic commerce. |
| Secure HyperText Transfer Protocol |
An extension to HTTP that provides security features for use in communications and performing transactions. |
| Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) |
A protocol developed by Netscape for transmitting private documents via the Internet. IT uses a cryptographic system with two code "keys" to encrypt data. |
| Security certificate |
Information used to establish a secure connection by SSL protocol. For an SSL connection to be created, both sides must have valid security issued by a certificate authority. |
| Segmentation |
The practice of dividing a customer base into categories or markets such a income level, geographic location or subscription type. |
| Sentiment analysis |
The evaluation of the sentiment-typically positive of negative-of the text based on the use of language. |
| SERP (Search engine results page) |
The web page a search engine returns with the results of its search. |
| Server |
A computer that hosts information available to anyone accessing applications in a network, such as the Internet or an internal intranet. |
| Server-side tracking |
Tracking visitors to web pages served by proxy servers, which link users to other servers containing the information sought. |
| Session |
A specific visit to a web site that ends when the user has taken no further action after a given period of time, typically 30 minutes. |
| Session ID |
A unique identification for a user visiting a site. |
| Settlement |
The process by which merchant and cardholder banks exchange financial data and value resulting from sales transactions, cash disbursements and merchandise credit. |
| Share of voice |
Share of advertisement activity achieved by an advertiser or product in a category or market over a fixed period of time. |
| Shopping cart/basket |
An application or module that acts as an online store's catalog and ordering process. |
| Shopping cart software |
An interface between a company's web site and its deeper infrastructure, enabling consumers to select merchandise, review what they have selected, make necessary modifications or additions, and purchase the merchandise. |
| Signature file |
A personal footer that can be automatically attached to an e-mail. |
| Siloing |
Multiple versions of the same data that cannot easily be integrated; data in disparate information systems. |
| Similarity searching |
The ability to search for similar documents. |
| Site-targeted ads |
Ads that appear on sites selected by the advertiser. |
| Slotting |
A numbering technique used to provide an "address" or location for all products is a warehouse. |
| Social media |
A category of sites that is based on user participation and user-generated content. |
| Social search |
The combination of technology and user-generated rankings and ratings. The technology enables people to share bookmarks, rankings and recommendations. |
| Software-as-a-service (SaaS) |
SaaS refers to software that is accessed through a web browser and paid for on a subscription basis. |
| Spam (or spamming) |
Electronic junk mail or junk newsgroup postings. |
| Splash page |
A web page, commonly the home page, that consists either of large graphic image and a link instructing visitors to "enter" a web site or a Flash animation, a link to skip the Flash animation (Skip intro) and redirect to a new page after the animation is completed. |
| Sponsored links |
Pay-per-click ads displayed at the top and on the right side of search engine results. |
| Sponsored listings |
Paid ads on the results pages of search engines |
| SQL (Structured Query Language) |
A standardized query language for requesting information from a database. |
| SSP (storage service provider) |
A company that provides computer storage space and related management services. SSP's offer periodic backup, archiving and the ability to consolidate data from multiple company locations so that data can be effectively shared. |
| Statistical validity |
The degree wo which an observed result, such as the difference between two measurements, can be relied upon and not attributed to random error in sampling and measurement. |
| Status code |
A three-digit code number assigned to every request received by a server. |
| Stock keeping unit (SKU) |
A unique numeric identifier used to refer to a specific product in inventory or in a catalog. |
| Stop word |
A word ignored in a query because it is so commonly used that it doesn't contribute to relevancy, for example, "and" and "the." |
| Subject line |
The field at the top of an e-mail template in which the title or subject line of the e-mail can be typed. |
| Submission |
Adding a web site URL and details to search engines. |
| Substring search |
Searching for parts of a string as with a wild card search. |
| Super affiliate |
An affiliate that generates a high number of quality click-throughs. |
| Supply chain management |
The control of materials, information and finances as they move from supplier to manufacturer to wholesaler to retailer to customer. |
| Suppression list (or opt-out list) |
A mailing list that transmits e-mails to people who have not subscribed and lets them choose to be removed from the list. |
| Suffix |
The portion of a URL, referring to the top-level domain name, such as .com or .gov. |
| Syndicated content |
A download of a content that is automatically transmitted for an agreed-upon price. |
| Synonym expansion |
The process of increasing the set of terms in a query to include synonyms of the original terms. |
| Syntactic analysis |
Studying a query through entity/phrase extraction, anti-phrasing, to remove word sense ambiguity. |
| T |
|
| Tail terms |
Low-cost, low-volume keywords. |
| Taxonomy |
A classification format that specifics categories to which individual content may be assigned. It also can define logical relationships among categories. |
| Template/templating |
In spreadsheet and database applications, a blank form that shows what fields exist, their locations and their length. |
| Term Frequency/Inverse Document Frequency (TF/IDF) |
A statistical measure used in information retrieval and text mining. |
| Text link |
Text that directs Internet users or spiders to a new web page or different location within the same web page when clicked. |
| Third party logistics (3PL) |
An organization that manages and executes a particular logistics function, using its own assets and resources on behalf of another company. |
| Thread |
In online discussions, a series of messages that have been posted as replies to each other. |
| Time offset |
The amount of time that a server logging in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) needs to be adjusted to arrive at the correct local time for the site. |
| Time zones |
A report showing the time zone of a web site visitor. |
| Title tag |
An HTML tag describing a specific web page but not visually displayed on the page. |
| TLP (transaction log processor) |
A server-side program that parses server logs for relevant transactions for recording into a second system (TLP feed). |
| Tokenizatoin |
The detection of white space characters and other symbols that separate words from each other and that are not relevant to the matching process. |
| Top sellers |
A category listing the top-selling items on a web site. |
| Top-level domain |
The suffix attached to Internet domain names, such as .com and .gov and .org. |
| Total unique visitor sessions |
A count of visitor sessions to a web site. |
| Tracking |
The ability of online advertising to measure every step of the advertising process from impression to click to action to advertiser revenue. |
| Tracking URL |
A specific URL with code that identifies information about the resulting clicks. |
| Trademarks |
A name, symbol or other device identifying a product, officially registered and legally restricted to the use to the owner or manufacturer. |
| Transactional or relationship e-mail message |
A type of web-based marketing in which e-mail recipients can buy goods and services directly from an e-mail message without being redirected to the retailer's web site. |
| Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) |
TCP enables two hosts to establish a connection and exchange extremes of data. TCP guarantees delivery of data in the same order in which it was sent. |
| Traffic |
The number of users that visit a web site. |
| Two-tier affiliate program |
A program in which an affiliate is rewarded for signing up sub-affiliates. |
| U |
|
| Uniform Resource Locator (URL) |
A means of identifying an exact location on the Internet. The global address of documents and other resources on the web. |
| Unique IP addresses |
The number of unique IP addresses that visit a site during a given time frame. |
| Unique users |
An unduplicated count of all individually identified machines that made a visit to a selected domain during a given analysis period. |
| Unique visitor |
A person who visits a web site more than once within a specified period of time as measured according to their unique IP addresses. |
| Unique visitor session |
The amount of visitor interaction with a web site for which the visitor can be tracked and declared with a high degree of confidence as being unique for the time period being analyzed. |
| UPS (Universal Product Code) |
A unique 12-digit number assigned to retail merchandise that identifies both the product and the vendor that sells the product. |
| Unsubscribe request |
A request from a customer to be removed from the subscriber list for e-mails or newsletters. |
| Untraceable session |
A period of visitor interaction with a web site for which the visitor cannot necessarily be distinguished as unique or not. |
| URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) |
The generic term for all types of names and addresses that refer to objects on the web. |
| Usability |
A quality attribute that assesses the efficiency and ease with which a user can perform desired tasks on an interface throughout the design process. |
| Usability testing |
The measurement of how well a web site aligns with the behaviors of online users, enabling them to complete their tasks efficiently, effectively and satisfactorily. |
| User agent |
Any program used for accessing w web site. |
| User profile |
A mini database of information about a user's content preferences, market segmentation, past visit and purchase behavior, and other user information. |
| User session |
The session of activity that a user with a unique IP address spends on a web site during a specified period of time. |
| Username |
A name used to gain access to a computer, network or web site. |
| V |
|
| Value proposition |
The sum total of benefits that a vendor promises a customer will receive in return for the customer's associated payment. |
| Value-added netword (VAN) |
A private network provider that leases communication lines to its subscribers. |
| Vertical portals |
Sites that provide information on a specific topic. |
| Viral marketing |
Spreading a brand message using word of mouth from a few points of dissemination. Techniques include e-mail messages, web addresses and video dips that are forwarded by recipients. |
| Visitor |
A distinct person who visits a web site. |
| VoD (video on demand) |
An umbrellas term for a wide set of technologies and companies whose common goal is to enable individuals to select videos from a central server for viewing on a television or computer screen. |
| W |
|
| Web 2.0 |
Made up of social networking sites, wikis, podcasts, RSS feeds and other digital communities or communication tool that enable online collaboration and sharing among users. |
| Web analytics |
The study of the impact of a web site on its users. Web analytics software measures such concrete details as how many people visited a site, how they came to the site and what keywords they search with on the site's search engine. |
| Web site performance efficiency |
The technical performance of a web site, which reflects it efficiency and is key to retaining customers. |
| Weighting |
A process used to ensure that statistics produced from a sample are representative of the population from which the sample was drawn. |
| Widgets |
A generic term for the part of a GUI that enables the user to interface with the applications and operating system. Typical widgets include buttons, dialog boxes, pop-up windows, icons and pull-down menus. |
| Wiki |
A web site that allows multiple users to create, modify and organize web page content in a collaborative manner. |
| Wish list |
Registry type functionality that enables site visitors to select products they could be interested in receiving from gift givers. |
| WML (Wireless Markup Language) |
An XML language used to specify content and user interface on wireless devices, such a mobile phones, smart phones and pagers. |
| W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) |
An International association of companies involved with the Internet. |
| X |
|
| XML (Extensible Markup Language) |
A specification developed by the W3C that enables designers to create their own customized tags, enabling the definition, transmission, validation and interpretation of data between applications and organizations. |
| Y |
|
| YOY (year-over-year) |
Comparing data, such as sales, to the same time period in the previous year. |
| YSM (Yahoo Search Marketing) |
Yahoo's sponsored search marketing program. |
| Z |
|
| Zero latency |
No delay between an event and its response |
| Zeus |
A commercial web server software application that competes with Apache, Microsoft IIS and iPlanet web server software systems. |
| Zoom |
To make an image larger or enlarge the view of an object to show more detail. |
