Macrons - not a French Treat! Website Jargon Explained

If you are anything like me and relatively new to the whole 'online-/website-sphere', then maybe you get just as confused as I do.

There are a heck of a lot of words that get thrown around the office and I pretty much never know what they're talking about. It's quite literally a different language.

So I made myself a little glossary and thought others could benefit from it too!

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Macrons

Macrons are the little dashes above vowels to indicate how to pronounce a word correctly. This is super important in multi-lingual websites - especially in NZ when it comes to the Māori language and any translations kiwi websites might have.

This is also the word that triggered my realisation at how little I knew when it came to website jargon. I thought someone in the office was offering little french desserts. They were not. I was very disappointed.

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SEO

This one I did actually know! It stands for 'Search Engine Optimisation' and is a blanket term for all we do on a website in order for the search engine (e.g. Google) to 'like' a website and therefore put it at the top of its list when someone searches for something related to your website.

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SERP

Okay this one was also new to me... "Search Engine Results Page" is, as it suggests, the results page that appears when someone searches for something in Google. Essentially this is how you can see how effective your SEO is and if maybe you need to be doing it more.

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Ranking

This refers to the position of a website in SERPs (we now know what this is!) for a particular search query. The higher a website is ranked, the more likely it is people will click on it and visit your website because it is closer to the top of the first page on Google! This is the goal!

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Hosting

No, not having people over for dinner. But instead, a virtual platform where your website is stored on a server so that it can be found on the internet,

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Domain

This literally just means the name of your website, e.g. growmybusiness.co.nz. You need to purchase this name before you set up anything at all. These are two we have used in the past: Crazydomains and GoDaddy.

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Backlinking

A method of SEO, backlinking means having websites other than your own linking back to your website. For example, if you are in the health sector then being listed on community directories of medical professionals, helps your website to be found as little 'behind the scenes links' that make Google like your website more. Big plus!

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Interlinking

These are the links within your website - taking you between pages without exiting from your website at all. Like clicking on the logo to go back to the home page, or even an article button that takes you to that article. This is a significant aspect of user experience because if things like this are wrong, it's annoying for the user. Not what we want at all.

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UX

I always thought this was something technical and fancy - turns out it's simply shorthand for 'User Experience'. You may have heard of 'UX Design' this again is very simple. It means that the design of the website is designed from a user experience point of view (POV) and not just a 'pretty' POV. Having a great user experience on your website will encourage people to spend more time on it and gives the user a better experience associated with your business.

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API

"Application Programming Interface" This is a set of protocols and tools that allow different software applications to communicate with each other. Essentially it is the bridge between different pieces of software, collecting information from one area and delivering it to the area you want.

For example, how you can use your Google account to log in to various other websites - those other websites are requesting the information and it is the API that allows that request to go through.

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Plugin

When building websites - we use plugins a lot. It is a piece of software that increases the capability of a website - allowing it to do more than be a landing page. Plugins are what allow us to turn a WordPress website into an e-commerce website or add a booking system etc etc.

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CTA

Call to Action! Every little button on a website that is telling you to do something is a CTA. Buy Now, Add to Cart, Contact Us etc etc. It is these little buttons that form the pathways people take in order for them to do what you want them to do (ie buy from you/work with you)

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CSS

Cascading Style Sheets. This is the language used to describe the presentation of a webpage. The layout, typography, colour scheme, etc is written out in HTML in a cascade style so that you can see what the page will look like without seeing the visual representation of it.

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HTML

Hypertext Markup Language. The coding language used in documents that are designed to be displayed in a web browser. Pretty much it is the long lines of jargon on a black background we sometimes accidentally see and don't understand. It is also often used alongside CSS.

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Responsive Design

A type of design that ensures a website can adapt to being viewed on any type or size of device. I go much more in-depth to what it is here!

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Metadata

In its most simple form, metadata is data that describes other data. For example, we use metadata to summarise the basic information about a webpage so that it is more easily found on Google. This is where the use of appropriate keywords is important as this is essentially a form of metadata.

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DNS Records

Full disclosure - this one is a little tricky to explain in one small blurb. Domain Name System (DNS) records are little pieces of text codes that help to build the map to your website. They are what help a website function the way you'd expect it too and are stored on the main servers your website is hosted on. DNS records are part of the basic building blocks of a website and the thing that makes them possible to find on the internet, to begin with.

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Phewf that is a lot to take in. There are definitely many more, but we'll stop it there before our brains implode.

What I have found though, especially while making this list, is that it is easy to get bogged down and overwhelmed by what you don't know. It feels like there are endless words and anagrams when it comes to website jargon and you'll never fully grasp it all.

But instead of wading through the weeds, break it down into small-sized chunks or avoid it altogether and get in touch with us today! Let us deal with the jargon, (most of) our team are fluent in it!
(I'll get there one day I am sure!)

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