The area on a web page that is viewable without the user having to vertically scroll the bar. In terms of media buying, this area is prime and the most expensive because it is more likely to be viewed by the user.
Ad Space
The space on a web page that is reserved for displaying advertisements. Typically, above the fold or the right or left column of the back.
Adword
System used by Google to drive its CPC [Cost Per Click] advertising system.
Affiliate Marketing
An ad system where web sites place ad banners for free and get paid on any sales or registrations as a result of the user clicking on the banner ad.
Alt tag
The alternate text associated with a web page graphic that gets displayed when the Internet user hovers the mouse over the graphic. Alt tags should convey what the graphic is for or about and contain good relevant keywords. Alt tags also make web pages more accessible to the disabled. For example, a vision-impaired user may have a web browser that reads aloud the text and alt tags on a page.
Anchor Text
This is the actual text part of a link. Used by search engines as a ranking factor in their hypertextual algorithm.
Bandwidth
The amount of data that can be stored and moved on a website. This includes videos, text, pictures, animation, etc.)
Banner
An advertising image online that links to the advertisers website.
Bidding
Placing a bid price that you are willing to pay as an advertiser on a pay-per-click search engine. The highest bid for a given keyword achieves the top spot in the PPC search results.
Blog
Also known as a "weblog". An online diary with entries made on a regular if not daily basis.
Click Rate
The percentage of impressions that resulted in a click through. Calculated by dividing the number of clicks by the number of impressions. For example if a banner was click on 13 times after being displayed 1000 times, the banner would have a click rate of ( 13 ÷ 1000 = .013 ) 1.3%. This is also commonly know as a banners click through rate.
Conversion
Term used to describe the process of getting a web visitor to accept an offer or become a paying customer. Advertisers strive for high conversion ratios.
Cost Per Click (CPC)
One of the online payment models by which advertisers pay for each click through made on their advertisement. Prices typically range from 1¢ to over 50¢ per click through. This is an ideal method of payment for advertisers who need to guarantee they only pay for those viewers of the banner that click on it and visit a page on their site. Also measured in Cost Per Thousand (CPM)
Demographics
Information regarding the size and characteristics of a particular population of people of interest to advertisers; such as their age, sex, income, education, size of household, ownership of home, etc. This does not include psychographics such as classification by subjective attitudes or opinions of consumers.
DNS
A Domain Name Server is a computer on the Internet that helps to translate domain names into IP addresses. Without it web sites could not be found when typed into a browser.
Domain Name
The part of an Internet address including and immediately preceded by the domain extension. For example, advbt.com is our domain name. The domain name is part of a web sites URL. Each web site has its own unique domain name.
Flash
A software plugin that enables browsers to play multimedia animations. Some rich media advertisements require users to have this plugin.
Frequency
A term used to describe the number of times the same advertisement is shown to the same visitor during a particular session or time frame. This can be accomplished through the use of cookies.
HTML
Hyper Text Markup Language is a computer programming language that helps control the format of a documents content and design on the web. An HTML editor is a software program that enables one to easily create HTML pages.
Impressions
The number of times a banner ad was requested and presumably seen by users. It is often hard to obtain an accurate impression count as they can be undercounted due to issues relating to cache or over counted due to requests that were not completed.
IP Address
A Internet Protocol (IP) address is the numeric address (207.235.5.120) that is translated into a domain name (adratesonline.com) by a domain name server (DNS). Each server connected to the Internet is assigned a unique IP address.
Java
Java is a programming language, created by Sun, which enables developers to write software on one platform and run it on another. It is popular on the Internet as it allows programmers to create programs called applets to run within a web browser and develop server-side applications for online forums, stores, polls, processing HTML forms, and more.
JavaScript
JavaScript is a cross-platform, object-based scripting language developed by Netscape for client and server applications. It is commonly used on web pages to add interactivity and dynamic content such as banner rotation.
Keyword
A word or phrase entered into a search engine in an effort to get the search engine to return matching and relevant results.
Landing Page
The page on a web site where one is taken after clicking on an advertisement. While this can be any page, it is often a page designed to expand upon the service or product mentioned in the initial advertisement.
Media Kit
Information offered to potential advertisers by publishers to help advertisers understand the publishers rates, visitor demographics, terms, etc.
Opt In
A process where by a user voluntarily agrees to start receiving email, usually commercial, about a topic of interest.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
Advertisers bid on "keywords" that they believe their target market (people they think would be interested in their offer) would type in the search bar when they are looking for their type of product or service.
Pop-Up
A type of advertisement that is automatically displayed in a second smaller browser window upon loading or unloading a normal web page. Pop ups advertisements tend to cost advertisers more since their visibility is higher but are often considered annoying by web site visitors since they are considered obtrusive.
Rank
A web site or advertisement's standing in comparison to other web sites or advertisements. Rank provides advertisers with information on performance comparisons.
Referring Page
The web page that a visitor was previously at before arriving to the current page as a result of clicking a hyperlink on the previous web page.
SEO
Search Engine Optimization attempts to improve rankings for relevant keywords in search results by improving a web site's structure and content.
Social Networking
Online sites used to link people to other people. A user creates and then builds a profile that creates a personal network for their self. This allows the user to be linked with other people that have similar interests.
Spam
The sending of unsolicited emails or newsgroup posts in bulk often containing commercial advertising messages. Considered bad netiquette, bad business and illegal in some states. The opposite of spam would be permission-based email whereby customized information is emailed to individual users who have previously requested such information.
Spider
A software program that automatically follows links on the web. The most common types of spiders are those used by search engines for the purpose of indexing web pages. Many spiders follow banner links thus over counting click throughs.
Splash Page
Also known as a "jump page", a splash page is a special entrance page to a site. Advertisers often use it to direct people who click on a particular banner to more information about what the banner was regarding rather then sending them directly to the sites homepage. This can be useful for banners advertising free registrations; contests, coupons or other special offers the advertiser does not want to put on the sites main page.
Sticky
A term used to describe a web site on which visitors stay at for longer than normal. This is often due to the variety of content and features offered to the visitor, which prevents them from needing to go elsewhere for more information. For example, online game sites are sticky as users tend to stay and play for a while where as link directories are not as visitors tend to leave as soon as they find what they were looking for.
Virual Marketing
Advertising that propagates itself by web visitors use of a web sites feature or service. For example, most administrators of free web based email accounts attach an advertisement at the end of each message each time a user sends an email.
Webcasting
A process where by sound and/or video is broadcast online. The process can deliver live or prerecorded information. Often advertisements are inserted at the beginning of the broadcast.
Zine
Magazines that are published online instead of in print. Often cover very specific subjects and thus have very targeted readers. Sometimes referred to as "E-Zines".
