Just like miscommunication within a company between its management staff and its employees with jargon and corporate acronyms, the same thing can happen between a potential or current client and its agency! A client hired an agency for the simple fact that they are not marketing wizards or SEO connoisseurs so a meeting riddled with acronyms and jargon can start to be a bit overwhelming, but no one will admit it! 

Potential and current clients oftentimes find it difficult to understand and keep track of all the acronyms that are used within marketing meetings. As SEOs and Digital Marketing Strategists, we often forget that our clients are experts in their own industry, which means, they probably are a bit confused when you are throwing around industry jargon like SEO, KW, DM and so many other acronyms we use on a daily basis. 

You are more than likely confused when they throw around their industry jargon, and often just are a bit better at Googling. However, it is important that an agency explains these acronyms continuously! 

For potential clients or those searching for a Dallas SEO Consultant to help with your strategies, here are some common acronyms that our experts might throw out here and there! We do try to keep it to a minimum, but sometimes, we forget! 

Search Engine Result Page (SERP) 

Search Engine Result Page(s) (SERP) kind of sounds like a bad slushy idea at 7-Eleven, but in all reality, this is a pretty easy acronym because the meaning behind it is simple! A SERP is the search results that populate when someone types a search query into a search engine like Google! 

No matter what the search query is, the results that show are part of the SERP of said query! So, the next time you hear a Dallas SEO consultant say “SERP” just remember that it is the results that populate in Google, Bing or Yahoo!. The next acronym deals with a SEO strategy that oftentimes unknown! 

Link Building (LB) 

Link building (LB) has several different names in the SEO industry, but this seems to be the most common acronym that is out there for it! LB is also known as backlinking or inbound links. LB is the process of getting other sites to link back to your website. 

A website needs an active LB strategy because this is one way a website can show its credibility to a search engine, especially Google. A website with a high enough credibility and one that ranks in search engines got there with this strategy in place! 

A website that uses your blog as a source of information in theirs is part of link building. A SEO strategy that implements off-page SEO strategies using directories and other strategies to build links is also part of LB. The better the content that is being published on a website possibly means the more websites will use it in theirs, and in return, this is part of link building 101. 

This is important because referral traffic from link building can help a website garner more qualified website traffic and even leads. This is kind of the whole point of organic SEO strategies, so why not get some qualified traffic from other sources because your content rocks! 

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) 

Everyone knows what a KPI is, but not everyone understands WHAT a KPI truly is. A Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is one of the most common SEO acronyms that our experts hear from potential and current clients more than our team even says them. 

As Gary V would say, “we don’t give advice we don’t think the person can take.” 

A KPI is a measurable value that demonstrates how effective a company is at X value. Whether that is in the supply chain management industry or the agency realm of our industry, a KPI is a measurable value that is set in place during marketing meetings based on a company’s specific goals and the requirements that are set in place. 

If a company wants to increase its sales of X product by 10 percent, where did you start? If you sold  100 pieces of products in Q1 and want to increase by 10 percent in Q2, is that a good KPI?

KPIs are great because they are goals and objectives, but they need to be realistic and achievable, using the right reporting and tools set in place. If a company never sets up their tools to track this KPI, and realize this at the end of the quarter then it is just a KPI that is all too common.  

The thing is, anyone can set a KPI, but without proper understanding, it is just another goal that doesn’t show any effort. So, when our SEOs and Digital Marketing team ask clients, “what are your goals?” Oftentimes, we hear “we don’t have any” or “what should our goals be.” We can’t tell you. You have to figure that one out on your own. 

Start with understanding why you are contacting an agency, no matter the case, this can help to brainstorm goals. If it is brand awareness, great. If it is leads, sales, conversions, percentages and first page ranking in days, let’s have a meeting about those. 

Canonical tag (Can tag) 

Our Dallas SEO consultants rarely have to use this acronym within our marketing meetings, but when we do, heads turn very quickly! This is because this is one of the least common, in our expert opinion, of SEO acronyms that a potential or current client will hear. 

A canonical tag, can tag, is a way for a website to have two pages with the same keyword, but without it affecting the service or product page’s ranking! A can tag often gets put into place when a blog or other website page is ranking before strategies are put into place, and once they are, this helps to diminish the fact that the two pages will compete with each other! It is an effective way to work around cross cannibalization on the content for a website. 

Google Analytics (GA) 

Google Analytics (GA) is one of the most commonly used software for web analytics. This is because GA offers a client the ability to utilize their free software while keeping track of website traffic, audience’s demographics, sales on e-commerce websites and so much more! 

All of our clients who utilize our SEO and Digital Marketing Strategies have a GA account created for them, because to be honest, about 80 percent of them don’t have accounts or it isn’t set up correctly! This helps to keep the most easy and accessible data there for our SEO and Digital Marketing team while clients have access to this information. 

There you have it! Those are the most common SEO acronyms that Dallas Media Group and some of our Dallas SEO consultants will and can use in marketing meetings! For help with a better understanding of SEO and our recommendations for your company, contact us today!