Glossary

The words,
explained.

The SEO terms you will meet first. Each one defined in plain words, with a link to the lesson that puts it to use.

Answer engine optimization (AEO)Answer engine optimization is making a site easy for AI answers such as Google's AI Overviews, ChatGPT and Perplexity to find and quote. It is mostly SEO.
Average positionAverage position in Search Console is the highest spot your site held for a search, averaged across every time it was shown. It is not a live rank.
BacklinkA backlink is a link to your site from another website. The number of different sites linking to you is the strongest measured correlation with Google rankings.
Canonical tagA canonical tag is a line in a page's code that tells Google which address is the real one when the same content can be reached at more than one URL.
Click-through rate (CTR)Click-through rate is clicks divided by impressions: the share of times your result was shown that someone clicked it. In Google it depends heavily on position.
E-E-A-TE-E-A-T stands for experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness: the qualities Google's guidance asks content to show. Trust matters most.
ImpressionsIn Google Search Console, an impression is counted each time a link to your site appears in a Google result that someone saw, or could have seen.
IndexingIndexing is Google reading a page and storing it in its index, the database it draws results from. A page that is not indexed cannot appear in Google at all.
Keyword cannibalisationKeyword cannibalisation is two or more of your own pages being shown for the same search, splitting its clicks and links while Google chooses which one to show.
llms.txtllms.txt is a proposed plain-text file at the root of a site that tells AI models what the site contains and where its most useful pages are.
NoindexNoindex is an instruction in a page's code, or its HTTP headers, that tells Google to leave the page out of search results even if other sites link to it.
robots.txtrobots.txt is a file at the root of your site that tells search and AI bots which parts they may read. It controls reading, not whether a page appears.
SitemapA sitemap is a file, usually at /sitemap.xml, that lists the pages on your site so Google and Bing know which addresses exist and when each one last changed.
Striking distance keywordA striking distance keyword is a search your site ranks for on page two, roughly position 11 to 20, close enough that a better page can reach page one.
Topic clusterA topic cluster is one main page on a subject plus pages that each answer a question around it, all linked, so Google can read them as a group.

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The words,explained.

All terms

The words,
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