Glossary

Terms from marketing, search, ecommerce, design and production, explained plainly, each with a link to the service where it comes up.

A

A/B test: Comparing two versions of a page, ad or email by splitting traffic between them, to see which performs better on a chosen measure.; Performance Marketing
Art direction: Setting and guiding the visual look of a shoot or campaign: its concept, styling, set, light and composition.; Commercial
Aspect ratio: The proportion between an image's width and its height, such as square, vertical or widescreen. Each platform favours certain ratios.; Film
Average order value (AOV): Total revenue divided by the number of orders over the same period.; Ecommerce Design

Backlink: A link from another website to yours. Links from relevant, trusted sites are one of the signals search engines use to judge a page.; SEO
Brand guidelines: A document that sets out how a brand is used: logo rules, colour, typography, imagery and tone of voice.; Branding
Brand identity: The visible elements of a brand, such as its name, logo, colour, typography and imagery, used consistently so people recognise it.; Branding

Canonical tag: A tag that tells search engines which address is the preferred one when the same or very similar content is available at several addresses.; SEO
Cart abandonment: When a shopper adds products to the cart but leaves without completing the purchase.; Ecommerce Design
Click-through rate (CTR): The share of people who click an ad or link after seeing it: clicks divided by impressions.; Google Ads
Colour grading: Adjusting the colour and tone of footage or images to give them a consistent look and mood.; Film
Conversion rate: The share of visitors or clicks that complete a chosen goal, such as a purchase, a sign-up or a form submission.; Performance Marketing
Core Web Vitals: Google's measures of real visitors' experience of a page: how fast the main content loads, how quickly the page responds to input, and how stable the layout stays.; SEO
Cost per acquisition (CPA): The average advertising cost of winning one customer or one conversion.; Performance Marketing
Cost per click (CPC): The amount an advertiser pays, on average, for each click on an ad.; Google Ads
Cost per mille (CPM): The cost of one thousand ad impressions. Mille is Latin for thousand.; Performance Marketing
Customer lifetime value (CLV): An estimate of the total revenue, or profit, a business can expect from one customer over the whole relationship.; Data Analytics

Design system: A shared library of reusable components, patterns and rules, with documentation, that keeps a product consistent as it grows.; App Design
Dropshipping: A fulfilment model in which the store keeps no stock: orders pass to a supplier, who ships directly to the customer.; Ecommerce Design

Headless commerce: An approach in which the storefront is built separately from the commerce platform, which supplies products, cart and checkout through APIs.; Web Development

Keyword research: Finding the words and phrases people search for, and weighing their demand, intent and competition, to decide which pages to create or improve.; SEO

Local SEO: Work that helps a business appear in searches with local intent and on maps, including its Google Business Profile, reviews and consistent contact details.; Local SEO
Lookalike audience: An ad audience that a platform builds to resemble an existing group, such as current customers, so a campaign can reach similar people.; Social Media Marketing
Lookbook: A curated set of photographs that presents a collection or season, often styled as complete outfits.; Photography

Marketplace: An online platform where many independent sellers list and sell products, such as Amazon, Trendyol or Hepsiburada.; Web Development
Meta description: A short summary of a page in its HTML. Search engines may show it under the title in results; it can shape clicks but is not a ranking factor in itself.; SEO
Metafield: In Shopify, a custom field that stores extra information on products, collections, customers or orders beyond the standard fields.; Shopify Website Design

Packshot: A clean photograph of a product, usually on a plain background, used in online stores and catalogues.; Photography
Payment gateway: A service that passes a customer's payment details securely from the checkout to the payment processor and returns the result.; Ecommerce Design
Post-production: The work after a shoot: selecting, editing, colour grading, retouching, sound and delivery.; Film
Pre-production: Everything done before a shoot: concept, script, casting, locations, schedule and equipment.; Film
Product variant: A version of a product that differs by an option such as size or colour, often with its own price, stock and SKU.; Shopify Website Design

Responsive design: An approach in which a website's layout adapts to the size and orientation of the screen it is viewed on.; Website Design
Retargeting: Showing ads to people who have already visited a site or engaged with a brand, to bring them back.; Performance Marketing
Retouching: Editing photographs to correct or refine details, such as dust, blemishes or backgrounds, while keeping the image believable.; Photography
Return on ad spend (ROAS): Revenue attributed to advertising divided by what the advertising cost. A ROAS of four means four units of revenue for every unit spent.; Performance Marketing

Search engine optimisation (SEO): Improving a website so it appears for relevant searches in unpaid results, through technical work, content and links.; SEO
Search intent: The goal behind a search, such as learning something, finding a specific site or buying. Pages do better when they match it.; SEO
SERP: Search engine results page: the list of results, ads and other features shown for a query.; SEO
Shot list: A planned list of every photo or video shot needed, with its framing and details, used to keep a shoot on track.; Photography
SKU: Stock keeping unit: a code a retailer gives each distinct product and variant to track inventory.; Ecommerce Design
Storyboard: A sequence of drawings or frames that plans a video shot by shot before filming.; Film
Structured data: Code in a standard format, usually Schema.org vocabulary written as JSON-LD, that describes a page's content to search engines and can make it eligible for rich results.; SEO

Tone of voice: The consistent personality a brand uses in its words, for example formal, warm or playful.; Copywriting
Typography: The choice and arrangement of typefaces, sizes and spacing to make text readable and to express a brand.; Branding

User experience (UX): How easy and satisfying a product is to use, shaped by research, structure and interaction design.; Website Design
User interface (UI): The visual and interactive layer of a product: its layouts, buttons, forms and the states they show.; Website Design
UTM parameters: Tags added to the end of a link, such as utm_source and utm_campaign, that tell analytics tools where a visit came from.; Data Analytics

Wireframe: A simple layout of a screen that shows structure and content priority before the visual design is applied.; Website Design
Wordmark: A logo made only of the brand's name, set in a distinctive typeface or lettering.; Branding