Keeping up with digital marketing terms and acronyms can seem like learning a foreign language to even the most seasoned professionals.
However, getting a better grasp on these industry terms can unlock a whole new world in digital marketing.
After this blog, not only will you know that CTR’s and impressions are important, but you’ll know what they are, why you need them, and how they are used.
So without further ado…
22 Essential Digital Marketing Terms
Websites & Emails
A/B Testing
A/B Testing is the process of comparing two versions of an email, web page, or another form of marketing collateral. By using it, you are able to show the two versions to different audiences at random, allowing you to compare performance.
We advise you only change one variable at a time when A/B testing. For example, you can test the performance of a blue button versus a red button in an email.
Analytics
Analytics are a result of the data collected by your website, social media platforms, or other tracking software. With this data, a digital marketer has better insight into who is interacting with their content and how they use it.
An effective digital marketer should utilize analytics to build and adjust their marketing efforts. This incredibly useful data allows digital marketers to make content that creates real results.
Backlinks
Backlinks are links that direct users from another website to your own. They are an essential piece to the SEO puzzle as they tell search-engine crawlers that your website is important because other websites reference it.
You can get backlinks to your website by encouraging suppliers or partners to link to your page, guest writing blog posts, or being a source for a journalist’s news article. With backlinks, you should strive for a balance between quality and quantity.
Bounce Rate
A “bounce” is when a user visits your website and immediately leaves the site without interacting. Typically, a high bounce rate is negative and a low bounce rate is positive.
A high bounce rate may indicate that the quality of your webpage wasn’t well-received or that the person clicking didn’t find the content they expected. However, it could also mean they quickly found what they were looking for.
Call to Action
Call to Action is often shortened to just CTA. It is an instruction for website visitors or newsletter readers to take action. This can include filling out a form, following a link to “Read More,” or subscribing to your newsletter.
With CTA’s it is important to make them eye-catching and easily accessible. This is an action you want your consumer to take, so make it as easy as possible for them to recognize.
Conversion Path
A conversion path is a path a website visitor takes to complete a specific action. For example, a user could follow a Call to Action button to a landing page, sign up for a newsletter, be taken to a confirmation page, and then receive a thank you email.
Every step they take from the call-to-action to the thank you email is part of the conversion path. These paths help you analyze how your visitors are using your website and help you evaluate if there are steps you can remove to still achieve a conversion.
Conversion Rate
A conversion rate is the percentage of people who interact with your website and complete an action that you wanted. This action could be signing up for a newsletter, asking for more information, or completing a purchase.
Whatever the action is, the conversion rate allows you to analyze the percentage of people who interact with your site and actually do what you were hoping they would.
Landing Page
A landing page is a page that someone “lands” on when visiting your site from another. A landing page is often a visitor’s first impression and should always provide accurate and necessary information. It does not always have to be your site’s home page.
Sometimes landing pages can be created for specific events, like a webinar, to make sure your viewers are seeing the information they need immediately. Another common landing page is your contact page.
Page Rank
Your page rank is an estimation of how important or popular your website is. Search engines like Google or Bing determine page ranks. While Google’s page rank is typically viewed as the gold standard, all search engines look into similar considerations.
Your page rank is important because it determines the likelihood of your business showing up in search engines’ results. Since so many people look for new businesses via search engines, this is essential for customers to find you.
Advertising
B2B/B2C
The term B2B describes businesses that sell to other businesses. The term B2C describes businesses that sell directly to consumers.
Digital marketing agencies are a good example of B2B because they sell their service directly to other businesses. A good example of B2C is a typical retail store like Bath and Body Works.
CPC
CPC stands for Cost-Per-Click. It is a breakdown of how much you are paying when someone clicks on the link of your digital advertisement.
If you’ve purchased a Facebook ad with the goal that people read a blog post written on your website, monitoring your CPC allows you to look at whether or not you’re getting the best bang for your buck. The lower the CPC rate, the better.
CTR
CTR is an acronym for Click-Through-Rate. It refers to the number of people who saw your advertisement or content and actually clicked on its link.
This enables you to analyze the effectiveness of your post or advertisement. As a digital marketer, your goal is always to have people interacting with your content in some way. If your CTR is under-performing, it could be an indication that it is not achieving its desired goal.
Customer Segmentation
Customer segmentation refers to the process of dividing your client base by similar characteristics. This division is useful when developing digital advertisement campaigns.
For example, if you are the marketer for a clothing store you could segment your audiences based on how many times they have made purchases from your store. Those who shop regularly should see different marketing materials than those who have never purchased an item before.
Lead Generation
Lead generation is the process of bringing in new leads for your business. This is central to effective general marketing as it produces real results for your business or client.
Lead generation involves getting the contact information from a consumer. This includes getting someone to sign up for a digital newsletter, filling out a contact form, or signing up for a webinar.
MQL
MQL stands for Marketing Qualified Lead. MQL’s are a lead that has previously interacted with your business or brand in some way. Whether they have previously visited your website or they follow you on social media, these people have shown previous interest in what you are offering.
This previous interest is key. Previous interest makes a lead more intriguing to follow as it indicates they are familiar with your product. This makes them more likely to be converted into a customer.
Retargeting
Retargeting is most often used in paid-advertisements to directly advertise to a group of people who have already visited your website or social media pages.
The goal of retargeting is to persue audiences who are already familiar with your brand and are more likely to convert into a full-blown customer.
Social Media
Engagement Rate
Your engagement rate is often a great indicator of your content’s social media success. It tells you the percentage of people who interacted with your content after seeing it.
Social engagement includes likes, comments, and shares. Social media platforms rank this number highly in their ever-changing algorithms.
Impression
An impression is the number of times your content was displayed on someone’s social media feed. Put simply, it tells you how many people had the potential of seeing your content.
Impressions are another key way to analyze the success of a campaign. The more impressions you make, the more likely your target audience is familiar with your brand.
Social Listening
Social listening is a key part of a digital marketer’s job. It means you to “listen” to what is being said about your brand online. Monitoring reviews, hashtags, and other posts about your brand all fall under social listening.
Social listening enables a digital marketer to know all the positives and negatives being said about their brand. This means marketers are able to see if there are any issues that need to be addressed or to analyze the overall success of a new product or campaign based on the digital chatter.
Did you get all of that?
While there are plenty of other digital marketing terms out there, we believe these are some of the most important.
Use this blog post as your go-to digital marketing dictionary when you start to mix up an acronym or want some clarity.