Glossary

A

Above the Fold: Once a web page has loaded, the part that is visible is said to be ‘above the fold’.

Adsense (Google): Text and image ads that are precisely targeted to page content, from which the webmaster earns a percentage of the price per click paid by the advertsier.

Adware: Also known as “spyware”, a program hidden within free downloaded software that transmits user information via the Internet to advertisers.

Adwords (Google): Google’s Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising program.

A.I.D.A.S:
(see also Attention, Interest, Desire, Action, Satisfaction) A well know acronym explaining what goals a website should have for its visitors. This applies in copy written text as well as web design for business both online and offline. A sales approach or marketing strategy should, by following AIDAS, grab the potential customer’s attention, interest, generate desire through incentives and arguments, action with easy-to-buy step and last satisfaction with usability and good merchandise.

Affiliate:
Individuals or business that, for a commission rate, generates sales, leads or clicks from a website by promoting products or services for a merchant using an affiliate program. Affiliate uses e.g. banner ads or text links to refer website traffic to merchant landing page.

Affiliate Agreement: Terms that govern the relationship between a merchant and an affiliate.

Affiliate Fraud:
Common fraudulent attempt to generate PPC commission. An automated script or person will reenact a legitimate user clicking on affiliate ads without any interest of the promoted product.

Affiliate Link:
A special link placed on an affiliate website letting the merchant know that a transaction or visitor has been sent to the website from that particular affiliate.

Affiliate Managerr:
(see also AM) Assigned person to manage an affiliate program and support affiliates in their efforts to refer traffic and earn commission. Normally the owner or creator of the affiliate program.

Affiliate Marketing:
Popular Internet marketing strategy where a business offers commission, based on sales or acquisition, to affiliates promoting their services/products and referring traffic.

Affiliate Network: A third party providing services to affiliate merchants and affiliates, including tracking technology, reporting tools, and payment processing.

Affiliate Program:
A program through which a merchant pays a commission to an affiliate for generating clicks, leads, or sales. Also known as an associate, partner, referral, or revenue sharing program.

Affiliate Program Directory:
A directory of affiliate programs, containing info about commission rates, number of affiliates, affiliate solution providers and more. Also known as an affiliate directory.

Affiliate Program Manager: The person responsible for administering an affiliate program. Duties should include maintaining regular contact with affiliates, program marketing and responding to queries about the program.

Affiliate Solution Provider:
Company that provides the network, software, and services needed to create and track an affiliate program.

Affiliate URL or Link: Special code in a graphic or text link that identifies a visitor as having arrived from a specific affiliate site.

AM:
(see also Affiliate Program Manager) Person often responsible for creating and maintaining an affiliate program. Together with customer service the affiliate manager works as a contact person for affiliates.

Associate:
Synonym for affiliate.

Attention, Interest, Desire, Action, Satisfaction:
(see also AIDAS) Five steps in the AIDAS model that shows the psychological phases a customer goes through prior to a successful purchase.

Autoresponder: An email robot that sends replies automatically, without human intervention. For example, if you had a page of marketing information, you could ask prospects to send email to “info@yourname.com,” the address of your autoresponder. The autoresponder will automatically email the person your information document. Many autoresponders will, at the same time, send an email to you, listing the requester’s address and the document they requested. This is an important tool for conducting online commerce.

B

B2B:
(see also Business-To-Business) Term used to emphasize the buying processes between businesses rather than businesses and traditional consumers.

Backlinks:
Incoming links from one website or webpage to another. Backlinks help websites in proving their quality and popularity, increasing their rank in the search engines like Google.

Bandwidth:
The amount of data allowed to pass between server and website, often measured bits per second.

Banner Ads:
A typical Internet marketing tool allowing advertisement links to be shown as an image, movie or animation.

Base commission:
Basic reward offered by affiliate programs to new affiliates when generating sales, leads or clicks.

Blog:
A popular type of website, often based on a CMS where publishers easily can post opinions, news, videos and pictures allowing its visitors to comment. With a very typical easy-to-read layout blogs are often described as online diaries when many use them for personal reflection. Blogging became vastly popular with blogging cooperative such as BlogSpot and WordPress.

Blogging:
A verb of our time. Refers to actively posting text, video, images or commenting on a blog.

Bookmark:
A function found in most web browsers letting the Internet user save visited URL’s in bookmarking folders. The user can retroactively find saved addresses, cataloged by name rather than address.

Brick-And-Mortar Business:
Primarily used in web business contexts to define businesses outside of cyber space. Brick and mortar refers to the physical material often used in buildings and houses.

Browser: A program that allows you to access and read hypertext documents on the World Wide Web. The most popular browsers are Internet Explorer and Firefox.

Business-To-Business:
(see also B2B) A term used to define the nature of companies that are selling services or products to other businesses.

C

Cache:
When entering a website the web browser needs to process the websites data. In order to make Internet access faster, not having to reload all the data every time, web browsers use cache. It’s a copy of the processed data helping the web browser to remember and upload faster next time the user enters the domain.

Calls-To-Action:
(see also CTA or PTA) A value in text and design that encourages the reader or user to take action, e.g. purchasing a product, signing up for a newsletter or registering for a membership.

Charge Back:
Affiliate commission deduction due to an incomplete sales transaction.

ClickBank:
Popular online billing, 3rd party payment processor and marketing service for the development of affiliate programs, and the largest distributor of digital information products on the Internet. Eliminates the need for a merchant account. Known for its ease-of-use.

Click-Fraud:
(see also Affiliate Fraud) When Pay-Per-Click is a common way of affiliate programs rewarding their affiliates automatic script or live persons attempt to gain commission by assimilating a legitimate user.

Click Fraud Detection/Monitoring: Service that provides independent monitoring of clicks from your PPC campaigns. If you notice fraudulent activity, Google or Yahoo!/Overture may provide a refund.

Click-Through: When a user clicks on a link and arrives at a Web site.

Click-Through-Rate:
(see also CTR) A measuring method to see how many visitors that have clicked, though, the ad or link in question to the landing page.

Cloaking: Hiding of page content or affiliate linking code.

Co-branding:
When an affiliate gets to include its own logo and branding on the page (known as landing page) to which they send visitors through their affiliate links.

Comment Spam: Unwanted comments posted to blogs in an attempt to gain a link back to the poster’s site. Usually generated automatically by software known as ’spambots’ and occassionally by individuals.

Commission:
The income an online affiliate gets for generating a sale, lead or click-through based on the merchant’s settings.

Commission Junction:
Affiliate network connecting merchants with publishers, offering commission account, statistics and a clientele for affiliates and a reliable affiliate program for merchants.

Content Linking:
Implementing links in website content, such as articles, forum posts or comments.

Contextual Link:
Integration of affiliate link within related text. Contextual links are often used in newsletters and related articles.

Conversion:
When a referred visitor actively takes the desired action, converting from just being a visitor to becoming a registrant or customer.

Conversion rate:
(see also CR) The percentage of clicks that result in a commissionable sale or lead. Conversion is measured in several places: conversion of your PPC ad on Google, conversion of incoming visitors to your landing page, conversion of your generated leads once they arrive at the merchant site.

Cookies:
A cookie is a piece of information sent by a Web Server to a Web Browser that the Browser software is expected to save and to send back to the Server whenever the browser makes additional requests from the Server. You may set your browser to either accept or not accept cookies. Cookies can contain user preferences, login or registration information, and/or “shopping cart” information. When a cookied browser sends a request to a Server, the Server uses the information to return customized information.

Copywriting:
A common marketing tool. Signifies the process of producing text with a defined purpose, for a defined target group.

Cost-Per-Impressions:
Advertising payment plan based on the amount of impression an ad gets. Common is paying for every thousand impression, meaning that the ad has to be viewed, not clicked, at least one thousand times before payouts are made.

Cost-Per-Action(Acquisition):
(see also CPA) A payment method in affiliate marketing where advertisers pays affiliates for actions taken by referred visitors; sales, when referred visitors takes an action, e.g. makes a purchase.

Cost-Per-Click:
(see also CPC) Payment plan used by advertisers, paying affiliates for every click on an ad or link made by visitors.

Cost-Per-Lead:
(see also CPL) An agreed amount to be paid to affiliate for every lead generated to merchant. A lead defines a potentially interested customer often generated though reviews and evaluation details on the affiliate website.

Cost-Per-Order:
(see also CPO) A cost paid to affiliates for every order their referrals make. Normally a percentage of the product price is rewarded by the affiliate program.

Cost Per Thousand (CPM): The amount you pay per 1,000 impressions of a banner or button.

Cost-Per-Visitor:
(see also CPV) Cost paid by advertisers for every visitor affiliates refer. Cost is normally measured by clicks on the ad that is linked to the advertiser’s landing page.

CPA:
(see also Cost-Per-Acquisition) Cost Per Acquisition means that every sign up, or acquired new customer generates a payment for the affiliate and a cost for the affiliate program. Cost incurred in getting a user/Visitor to e.g. sign up for a subscription .

CPA:
(see also Cost-Per-Acquisition) Payment plan on commission paid by merchants to affiliates when referred visitors to landing page takes desired actions, e.g. signs up or makes a purchase.

CPC:
(see also Cost-Per-Click) Cost incurred in getting a user to click on a banner or text advertisement. Affiliates are paid by merchant for every referred visitor, for every unique click.

CPL:
(see also Cost-Per-Lead) Cost for every lead a affiliates generates. A lead is considered to be a visitor forwarded to the advertiser, interested in becoming a customer based on education or enlightenment by the affiliate.

CPM:
(see also Cost-Per-Thousand-Impressions) Rather than paying for clicks or sales many advertisers pay for their ads to be shown a large number of time. Hence only paying every time an ad has been viewed a thousand times.

CPO:
(see also Cost-Per-Order) Commission type implicating a reward to affiliate when referred visitor makes an order. A percentage of the sale is paid the affiliate not only for one purchase but for every future purchase as well.

CPV:
(see also Cost-Per-Visitor) Similar to cost per click affiliates get commission on every referral to advertisers landing page.

Cross-linking: Linking a group of domains, usually your own, to each other for the purpose of increasing its popularity with search engines. Excessive cross-linking may lead to your site being penalized by Google or Yahoo!

CTR:
(see also Click-Through-Rate or Click-Through-Ratio) Number of impressions/Number of clicks. How often a visitor makes a sales or order after clicking through.

Customer Bounty:
Commission amount paid to affiliate for every new client or customer that they direct to merchant.

Customer Service:
Part of business staff dedicated to supporting existing and future customers.

D

Dedicated Server Hosting:
In comparison to shared server hosting, clients here get their own complete server indicating more capacity in both volume and bandwidth. Dedicated server hosting is a good idea for websites with a lot of content and activity. The server is completely dedicated to one user (i.e. BlueHost).

Disclaimer: A disclaimer states the terms under which the site or work may be used and gives information relating to what the copyright owner believes to be a breach of his/her/their copyright.
In some cases you may wish to permit certain activities, in others you may wish to withhold all rights, or require the user to apply for a license to carry out certain actions.

DNS:
(see also Domain Name System) Translates and associates domain names with proper IP addresses so information can be delivered over the Internet and its users can type a name rather than numbers.

Domain name:
The registered name of a domain. A domain is the website’s address and can be displayed either as IP-address, e.g. 123.44.234.34 or as a domain name (i.e. AffiliateBizCafe.com) in order to be located.

Domain Name System:
(see also DNS) Domain names are allowed to easier remember the address of a website. When typed in the web browser the domain name system translates the URL back to a Internet readable form; the IP-address.

Doorway Page: Also known as bridge pages, gateway page, entry pages, portals or portal pages, these pages are used to improve search engine placement. Caution: some search engines will drop a site entirely if the existence of doorway/gateway pages is detected.

Download: Transferring a file from another computer to your own.

E

E-commerce:
Term defining existing trade relations on electronic systems like the Internet.

E-tailing:
Retailing on the Internet put quite simple. Thus selling retailed purchased products on the web.

Earnings-Per-Click:
(see also EPC) Average amount of income generated per click on ads.

eBusiness:
Electronic businesses. Refers to any business related activity based on the web.

Endorsement Letter: Also known as a “product review”, an endoresement is a promotional statement outlining features and benefits for a particular product or service.

Email: Electronic mail, a message sent to another Internet user across the Internet. An email address looks like this jimsmith@bubblee.com, whereas, “jimsmith” is your user name, your unique identifier; “@” stands for “at”; ” bubblee.com” is the name of your Internet Service Provider.

Email Link: An affiliate link to a merchant site contained in an email newsletter or signature file.

Email Signature (Sig File): A brief message embedded at the end of every email that a person sends.

EPC:
(see also Earnings-Per-Click) Term used by the Commission Junction affiliate network, this is your ‘average earnings per 100 clicks’. This number is calculated by taking commissions earned divided by the total number of clicks times 100.

Exclusivity: A merchant that that stipulates ‘exclusivity’ in their affiliate agreement usually prohibits the affiliate from promoting competing products on their site. (I recommend against entering into exclusive agreements.)

Exit Popups:
Pop-ups only appearing when visitors are leaving to an external webpage.

Eye Tracking:
Researching study to measure peoples eye-movement patterns. Is used to see how Internet users scan website and editorial content for information.

eZine: Short for ‘electronic magazine’.

F

Face-To-Face:
Offline communication between two or more people.

FAQ:
(see also Frequently Asked Questions) To prevent that the customer service will be stuck answering the same questions over and over again, lists of frequently asked questions are normally included.

FFA:
Free for all links. No requirements for adding a link

Firefox:
(see also Mozilla Firefox and Web browser) Web browser gaining more and more popularity and Internet users by introducing tabbed browsing and is currently the second most used web browser with Internet Explorer in first place.

Forum:
A user driven web platform where administrated topics are discussed and commented through message boards and discussion groups.

Frames:
Frames are used when building and structuring websites, though not advisable since it makes it harder for search engines to read the websites content.

Frequently Asked Questions:
(see also FAQ) Listing of answers to commonly occurring queries made by users. The idea is to be able to find the answers to the most frequently asked questions rather than contacting the support.

Froogle.com:
Google’s search engine for products.

G

Global Acceptance:
Allowing registrants, customers or signups from all over the world.

Google:
(see also Search Engine) Online search engine created by Larry Page and Sergey Brin based on search result being presented and ranked according to how many backlinks a website has. When other search engines graded a website according to how many times the search term appeared on a website the founders of Google were convinced that backlinks was the best way of knowing the importance and quality of a website.

Google AdSense:
Advertising of Google search result on other websites. Affiliates choose search result to be displayed based on desired keywords and get commission for clicks made on the ads.

Google AdWords:
Google’s PPC advertising tool and main source of income. Ads are made according to different search terms and their position decided based on a bidding system. Highest bidder, highest position. Ads are displayed above, beneath and on both side of the search result. Ads consist of title and short description.

Graphic Interchange Format (GIF): An image file format, suitable for simple files. A JPEG is the preferred format for storing photographs.

Gross profit:
The result after revenue and production or service costs have been put together and calculated.

H

Headers:
The main title and sub-titles of a text. Headers are tagged in HTML, the numbers increasing for every sub-title level.

Hit:
A visit to a site counts as a hit. A unique hit is counted once for every visitor’s first visit.

Home Page:
The first web page a visitor is taken to when entering a website URL. Also known as the index page. In order for the web browser to be able to tell which page is the home page, that file has to be named index.

HTML:
(see also Hypertext Markup Language) Primary method of website programming to describe content and define qualities such as links, headers, paragraphs, images etc.

Hybrid Model:
Affiliate commission model that combines payment options.

Hypertext Markup Language:
(see also HTML) Language used in web page programming to structure and characterize website content, such as text, links, lists, headings, images etc.

I

ICANN:
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. Management service of Top-Level Domains; domain names and IP addresses.

iGaming:
Includes sports betting, casino games and other gambling activity taking place online.

Image Ad:
An image ad allows advertiser to graphically promote a service, product or campaign. The image is simply linked and direct clicks to landing page.

Impression:
When an advertisement on a site is displayed to a web user.

In-House:
Normally referred to expertise, knowledge, resource or service available within a company or service.

Incentive:
Promotional motive to encourage visitors or customers to take a desired action.

Internet:
A network of IP-addressed locations allowing users to visit any part of the network using the Internet Protocol. Also know as the Web or World Wide Web.

Internet Explorer:
(see also Microsoft Internet Explorer) Web browser produced by Microsoft and default browser on Windows operative system.

Internet Marketing:
Marketing strategies developed for businesses online like affiliate marketing, PPC marketing, sponsored marketing etc.

Internet Protocol Address:
(see also IP-Address) Any device that communicates and integrates within a network has an address, an identification. IP-addresses identifies a computer or server within a network in order for data to be received and sent.

Internet Service Provider (ISP): The company you call from your computer to gain access to the Internet.

IP-Address:
All locations in a network such as the Internet requires an address and identification. An IP address are normally found by visitors using domain names. The Domain Name System then translates the domain name to the right IP address.

IP-Tracking:
Method used in order to know which affiliate that has referred the visitors in question. By storing the visitor’s IP address when he/she enters the landing page through an affiliate link the merchant will know which affiliate to pay commission on visitor’s purchase, sign-up or action. Other common method is to store a cookie. Note that both tracking methods fail if referred visitor returns to merchant website from another computer.

J

Javascript:
A programming language developed by Sun Microsystems designed for writing programs that can be safely downloaded to your computer through the Internet and immediately run without fear of viruses or other harm to your computer or files. Java requires a browser compatible with Java. Using small Java programs, Web pages can include animations, calculators, and other features.

Joint Venture:
When two businesses join in creating a new entity both putting in capital, thus sharing gross profit, control and ownership. Can be for a specific project but also to define a longer partnership.

K

Key Performance Indicators:
(see also KPI) Method used in organizations to evaluate progress according to set goals. A way to see what resources have contributed to a company’s success. Emphasis is put on performance within the company, such as leadership and engagement. The production process is thus left out.

Keyword:
Word or phrase carefully chosen by online business or website owner that is then implemented in website content, headers, meta data, body text and URL string etc in order to rank higher according to that keyword in search engines.

Keyword Density:
A way to measure how often a keyword or phrase appears on a web page. By retrieving a certain percentage of how often the keywords appears in relation to number of words of the web page, the importance of the page according to the keyword can be determined. Often used in search engine optimization. Keyword density can also be used to see if keywords appear to often, risking to be consider spam by the search engines.

Keyword Placement:
Referring to keywords implemented in the content and pages of a website. The placement of selected keywords can make a big difference for both search engines as for visitors.

Keyword Selector Tool: Displays how many times a certain keyword was searched for at Yahoo! Search Marketing during a given month.

Keyword Targeting:
Online marketing strategy optimizing website content according to set keywords in order to rank high in search engines.

KPI:
(see also Key Performance Indicator) Used to measure and define progress within a company. Often values like leadership and engagement are considered. This to establish key indicators that ensures an organization’s progress.

L

Landing Page:
Designed and customized merchant web page to receive referred traffic from affiliate websites. A landing page are often optimized for visitor’s to take a desired actions, such as making a purchase or signing up for a membership. Lead: A lead is normally considered to be a visitor that has been informed by an affiliate website and referred to merchant with an interest to sign up, buy etc. Many online merchants pay commission to affiliate website that generate leads to their site.

Lifetime Commissions:
Affiliate will continually get commission on referred customer’s every purchase, during the whole lifetime of the customer.

Lifetime Value: The total amount that a customer will spend with a particular company during his or her lifetime.

Link:
Word or phrase that when clicked on leads to another internal or external webpage.

Link Popularity: The total number of qualified Web sites linking to your Web site.

LS:
LinkShare – Affiliate Network

M

Manual Approval: Process in which all applicants for an affiliate program are reviewed individually and manually approved.

Marketing:
A tool for businesses to spread awareness and interest of their products or services. Either to create brand awareness or directly sell a product or service.

Merchant:
An online business that markets and sells goods or services. Merchants establish affiliate programs to get consumers to purchase a product, register for a service, fill out a form, or visit a website.

Meta data:
Includes a title, keywords and description of a web page’s content. This is used by search engines to see what the web page is all about. Keywords are often implemented in meta title and description.

Meta Description:
A short summary of the content including desired keywords. When keyword later is used in search engines the meta data will appear to describe the web page. By matching searched keywords or phrases search engine will rank the web page higher.

Meta Tags: Information placed in the header of an HTML page, which is not visible to site visitors.

Meta Title:
The meta data of a web page consists of meta title where keywords are used to describe and title the content.

Microsoft adCenter:
Provider of PPC advertising on MSN website. Management center of MSN advertising services.

MLM:
(see also Multilevel Marketing) Consultants, businesses, retailers, franchise companies etc selling and marketing products from a certain company for a commission for every sale. The company enables their business to flourish on a multitude of marketing levels.

Mozilla Firefox:
(see also Firefox and Web browser) Web browser gaining more and more popularity and Internet users by introducing tabbed browsing and is currently the second most used web browser with Internet Explorer in first place.

Multilevel Marketing:
(see also MLM) Two-tier affiliate marketing.

N

Newbie: Someone who is new to the Internet.

Newsgroup: A newsgroup is a discussion that takes place online, devoted to a particular topic. The discussion takes the form of electronic messages called “postings” that anyone with a newsreader (standard with most browsers) can post or read.

Niche Marketing: Focused, targetable market segment.

Non Hosted Co-Registration:
Sign up offers (for e.g. newsletters) wherein you opt-in to a mailing list. (See Opt-in or Opt-out)

O

Online Marketing:
Marketing strategies developed for online businesses to attract visitors to their websites and customers to their products. Sponsored marketing, PPC marketing and affiliate marketing are all popular strategies of online marketing.

Opt-in:
Consent based newsletter and mailing list subscription. Often offered in combination of membership registration.

Opt-out:
Enabling the receiver of unsolicited emails or spam to avoid any further messages or information. Opt-out services often allow recipient to cancel newsletter subscription etc by e.g. a clickable link. This can also verify the e-mail marketer that the email is valid resulting in even more spam.

Outsourcing:
Rather than keeping and using resources within the company desired services are bought from another source. This is common concerning smaller tasks.

P

PageRank:
Google trademark used to rank websites according to how many quality backlinks they have. This enforces Google’s concept of verifying the importance and quality of a website based on how many other quality website that are linking to it.

Paid Inclusion:
(see also PI) Similar to pay-per-click advertisement many search engines offer paid inclusion to website owner in order to index their website. Thus web pages are included in the search engine index for a required fee.

Pay-Per-Action:
(see also PPA) Merchant payment method of commission to affiliate based on referred traffic taking the desired action of the merchant. E.g. signing up for newsletter or purchasing a product.

Pay-Per-Click:
(see also PPC) Advertising service offered by search engines enabling merchants to advertise on the search engine result page. Ad position is managed by a bidding system and merchant pays every time a visitor click on the ad.

Pay-Per-Lead:
(see also PPL) Offering visitors a consumer based website, evaluating products and services affiliates can generate leads to evaluated merchants websites and get a commission in return.

Pay-Per-Sale:
(see also PPS) Affiliates receive a commission on every sale merchants make to a referred customer. Normally a certain percentage is withdrawn from the product or service price.

Payment Threshold:
Minimum amount of commission an affiliate needs to earn before payment is made.

PayPal:
Offering members a neutral money account for online transactions.

PI:
(see also Paid Inclusion) Guaranteed listing is a search engine for a fee.

Plug-in:
A build-on function to an already installed software. Often offered to specific users with specific needs.

Pop-ups:
Advertising displayed in own window when entering or leaving a website.

Portable Document Format (PDF) : PDF stands for Portable Document Format. It’s a distribution format developed by Adobe Corporation to allow electronic information to be transferred between various types of computers. The software that allows this transfer is called Acrobat.

Portal:
A web portal is a source of gathered information and functions from all over the web. Email, search engine, news etc. A web portal is made to offer its visitors a wide range of content.

PPC:
(see also Pay-Per-Click) When an affiliate receives a commission for each click (visitor) they refer to a merchant’s web site.

PPL:
(see also Pay-Per-Lead) When an affiliate receives a commission for each sales lead that they generate for a merchant web site.

PPS:
(see also Pay-Per-Sale) When an affiliate receives a commission for each sale of a product or service that they refer to a merchant’s web site.

Privacy policy:
An official legal policy describing how personal information is used on e.g. a website.

Profit: The amount of money you earn from your sales. For example, if you sell 10 videos at $47.00 each, and each costs $10 to produce and ship, your profit would be $37.00 per video or $370.00 total.

PRP:
(see also Percentage Revenue Plan) Affiliate earns a percentage of the net lifetime revenue for each new referral.

R

Ranking algorithm:
Algorithm used to rank websites according to a certain value. Google’s ranking algorithm is based on PageRank, the value of backlinks.

Raw visitor:
Counted every time a page is viewed.

Real Simple Syndication (RSS): An XML-based format for syndicated content.

Reciprocal Linking: The process of exchanging links with other websites to increase search engine popularity.

Recurring Commissions: Earn commissions both on the initial sale and subsequent purchases of the same product or service. Examples of affiliate programs that may pay recurring commissions are online dating services and web hosting services.

Refer-a-friend:
Promotion used on registrants to spread the word about a business amongst friends, encouraging signing up since the promotion normally includes a commission.

Referring URL:
URL address that you clicked on a page and then were “referred” to the new site.

Residual Earnings:
Structure that pays commissions made at a merchant site for the life of the customer.

Return on Investment:
(see also ROI) Calculation of the benefits and profits of a certain investment. Simply a measure according to the amount of money the investment will generate.

Revenue: Total income for your sales. For example, if you sell 50 ebooks at $27.00 each, your revenue would be $1350.00.

Revenue per lead:
Business ratio that shows the conversion strength of the affiliate program to which you send leads – but also the quality of your leads.

Revenue Share:
Total profits and losses that are shared between a company’s alleged partners. Often occurring in poker and casino affiliate marketing where affiliate are offered a commission based on a share of referred players total losses and profits.

ROAS:
(see also Return on Ads Spent) Percentage of income vs. expenses generated by advertising.

ROI:
(see also Return on Investment) Percentage of income earned vs. total investment. Shows how much you get in return for each dollar invested. For example, how much you earn on average for each click in your Adwords campaign or for a certain search term, related to how much you pay Google for the clicks.

RSS:
Really Simple Syndication; also know as feed, web feed. Free web service enabling feeds on recently updated content such as news articles or blog posts.

S

SAS:
Shareasale – Affiliate Network

Scannable Text:
Term used to define the different reading patterns website visitors have compared to the same group in other forums. Internet users rather scan the website content making the importance of a scannable text very high. Headlines, bold text and bulletin points are key elements in a scan friendly text.

Scumware: Software that contains additional ‘features’ for the purpose of displaying advertisements. This software will modify web pages from their original content to put ads on the user’s computer screen. Examples of scumware propagators included: Gator, Ezula, Surf+ and Imesh.

Search Engine:
Navigation platform that helps Internet users in finding websites and information based on keywords. E.g. Google, Yahoo, AltaVista and MSN Live Search.

Search Engine Optimization:
(see also SEO) Optimizing of website by implementing e.g. keyword in title, headers, body text, meta tags to increase amount and quality of traffic from search engines.

Search Engine Results Page:
(see also SERP) The result page displayed by search engine according to searched keyword.

Search Marketing:
An Internet marketing strategy offered to businesses by search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN live search. PPC ads are displayed in the search engine result page and are acquired through a bidding system where highest bidder gets highest ad position.

Search Term Suggestion Tool: Displays how many times a certain keyword was searched for at Overture during a given month.

Second-Tier System:
(see also 2-Tier System) Affiliate program may offer a second-tier commission incentive meaning affiliates are rewarded when referring additional affiliate to the program. Commission is normally paid when second-tier affiliate generates a sale, lead or action.

SEM:
(see also Search Engine Marketing) The marketing possibilities available to businesses through search engines. (e.g. PPC advertisement, sponsored search etc.)

SEO:
(see also Search Engine Optimization) Changes and modifications done to a website in order to optimize its content for the search engines. E.g. implementing keywords, create backlinks etc.

SEO Copy:
Copywriting with purpose to enhance the search engine optimization of a website.

SERP:
(see also Search Engine Results Page) The listing a search engine (for example Google) returns in response to a search query.

Shared Server:
In order to lower the prices on web hosting shared web server hosting is often offered. In contrary to dedicated server hosting a server is shared between several hosting clients. Thus, sharing bandwidth but maintaining own storage space.

Site Map:
Assigned web page of a website with a list or “map” displaying all web pages of the website. This is to give both visitors and search engines an overview of the website’s structure and size.

Social Bookmarking:
Constructed communities allowing users to bookmark, hence sharing website tags, tips and opinions. An alternative web site navigation source to search engines.

Social Media:
Platforms based on social networking and interacting activities. Examples are forums, blogs, e-communities and message boards.

Social Networking / Marketing: Meeting and building relationships with people using one or more of a broad range of sites, such as MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

SPAM:
The term “spam” is Internet slang that refers to unsolicited commercial e-mail (UCE) or unsolicited bulk e-mail (UBE). Some people refer to this kind of communication as junk e-mail to equate it with the paper junk mail that comes through the US Mail. Unsolicited e-mail is e-mail that you did not request; it most often contains advertisements for services or products.

Sponsored Search:
Search engine marketing strategy offering business ads to be displayed in the search engine result page.

SPV:
(see also Sales-Per-Visitor) Applied for statistical purposes to see the average sales amount per visitor.

Spyware:
A computer software that, much like a virus, installs itself on a computer without the user’s knowledge. As it is commonly thought to only collect personal information, Spyware is also known to be able to control and download other software.

Squeeze Page – A squeeze page, also known as a ‘name squeeze page’ is a landing page specifically created to solicit name and email addresses from site visitors. Many webmasters collect only email addresses.

Stickiness:
Defines how “sticky” a website is; how long visitors maintain on a website measuring the attractiveness of its content.

Storefront:
Prefabricated HTML page, with integrated affiliate links, that displays new or specialized products.

Super Affiliate:
The top 1 or 2% of affiliates that generate approximately 90% of any affiliate programs earnings.

T

Targeted Marketing:
Aiming for a niche market and targeting their consumers group many companies use targeted marketing. It’s simply a marketing strategy where you collect all marketing effort for one target group rather than trying to cover many markets.

Targeting:
Decision process when a businesses disclose their desired target group.

Terms of Service:
(see also TOS) Rules and regulations that normally requires approving when enrolling for membership or service. Terms of Service are almost always legally binding.

Testimonials:
Comments and opinions made by customers about a service or product later used by the company to create a promotional confirmation of the products quality.

Text Link:
Word, phrase, sentence or complete text used for linking to internal or external webpage.

Third Party Tracking Software: Software located on a server other than your own, that tracks and records visits to your Web site.

TOS:
(see also Terms of Service) Also known as Affiliate agreement.

Tracking:
To ensure affiliates receive proper commission for all referrals, tracking is used to keep track of the origin of landing page visitors.

Tracking Method: Different ways for affiliates to track their referrals. Most common is a tracking link in the ad. Can be customized to keep track of each website where referral is placed.

Tracking URL: A tracking URL is a web site URL with your special affiliate code attached to it, i.e. http://www.awebsite.com/?myID. Visitors arriving at the side are tracked back to you through your special code, or ID.

Traffic:
The amount of Internet users, new and returning, visiting a certain website.

Tutorials:
Web content for educational purposes. Often found at website’s support centers to further inform and teach about tools, software or other applications.

Two-tier affiliate marketing:
Business model through which affiliates can sign up additional affiliates below themselves. The original affiliate receives a commission when the second-tier affiliates earn a commission. This is also known as Multilevel Marketing (MLM).

U

Uniform Resource Locator (URL): The address of a site on the World Wide Web. Here’s an example URL: http://www.diannehumphries.com/articles/index.html The “http” stands for “hypertext transfer protocol”; “://” signals the beginning of the address; “www.diannehumphries.com” is the domain name; “/articles” is the directory; and “index.html” is the name of the HTML file.

Unique Click:
Enables the advertiser to see how many distinct clicks an ad has received. It’s one unique click per individual and IP address with a set time frame.

Unique Hits:
see Unique Visits

Unique Selling Point:
(see also USP, Unique Selling Proposition) Selling proposition presenting an original and never seen before concept, service or product.

Unique Selling Proposition:
(see also USP, Unique Selling Point) Distinctive quality of business concept, service or product.

Unique User: A unique visitor to your Web site. Probably the best indicator of site traffic.

Unique Visits:
Way of measuring volume of traffic to a certain website. Although a visitor may enter the website many times, only the first unique visit is considered in the statistics.

Upload:
Contrary to downloading, a user uploads files like, videos, images or document on a web server, often displayed for other users to see.

URL:
Known to many as the address of a website written in the web browser but more specifically defined as a indicator of an address and its qualities. Examples are HTTP:// indicating that the source is a website using hypertext. Other examples are file:// and ftp://.

URL Tracking:
In order for affiliates to get paid for their referred traffic, the traffic needs to be tracked properly. URL Tracking is based on several techniques making sure that affiliates get the credit for the visitors that have clicked through their website to the landing page. For example, a special URL link can be implemented in the ad to see from where the visitor has come from (e.g. which of your websites, landing pages, etc).

Usability:
Also know as User-Friendly, usability is used to rank a website, software or tool based on how easy it is for the user to reach the goal intended.

USP:
(see also Unique Selling Point, Unique Selling Proposition) Characteristic of a business concept, service or product that stands out from its competition often used in marketing context.

V

Video Hosting:
Internet service offering a platform and server space for its users to store and upload video clips. An example of a video host is YouTube.

Viral Marketing:
Marketing strategy focusing on creating brand awareness by encouraging word of mouth and satisfied customers to spread the word. Viral marketing is often applied to already-made social networks like social bookmarking sites, forums or blogs.

Virus:
A computer virus is defined as a set of commands, created intentionally, that will do some level of damage to a computer. A computer virus does not float around in cyberspace, but is always attached to something. That ’something’ could be a text file (MSWord document), an email, a photo, a music clip or a video clip. Your computer must receive one of these ‘carriers’ in order to get a computer virus.

VPV:
(see also Value-Per-Visitor) Measured by dividing number of sales by amount of visits.

W

Web Browser:
The main tool used to access the Internet. Web browsers are software enabling its users to access websites and its content.

Web Design:
Design developed and made for websites.

Web Host:
Organization that bases their business on letting clients rent space on business owned web servers.

Web Hosting:
A web based service offering hosting of server space, domain name registration, email accounts, sitebuilding and server maintenance (i.e. BlueHost).

Web Page Content:
A web page is normally filled with text, videos, images or animations. What ever is displayed on the page is its content.

Web Site:
Any location that has a URL, domain name or IP address.

WHOIS:
A web based directory that stores and collects information concerning the ownership of a domain name or IP address. The word is an acronym for the question Who is?

World Wide Web:
(WWW, or Web): A section of the Internet containing “pages” of information, including text, photos, graphics, audio, and video. You can search for documents by using one of the many search databases. To access the Web, you must use a browser.

WWW:
(see also World Wide Web)The Internet we know as web servers all over the world containing registered domains which are present on the World Wide Web through its URL or IP address. With HTTP verification and DNS translation information are allowed to be sent from website to Internet users. All websites creates the Internet and construct a big network linking each other.

Yahoo SM:
Yahoo Search Marketing, a sponsored search service allowing businesses to advertise through PPC on Yahoo websites.