SERP is an acronym for the term ’search engine result page’. A SERP refers to the results pages shown by a search engine such as Google on entering a keyword or phrase (or query). For example, if you enter the keyword ‘news’ in Google, the first website at the top of the SERP would most likely be the BBC website if searching on Google.co.uk
Multiple pages are also referred to as SERPs. For example, it could be used in a sentence such as:
“After checking the site to see how it ranked for it’s chosen keywords, it was in the top 10 in all the SERPs.”
A referring site (or a referrer) is the source from which a website came from. For example, a web user might find some recommendations for a restaurant on a good food guide website. If the website includes a link to the restaurant website then it is referring the user to the site. This link is referred to as an inbound link.
If you have are using Google analytics on your website, you can track to see where your visitors are coming from by clicking on traffic sources. This data is divided into direct traffic, referring sites, keywords etc. If you click on referring sites, you will be able to see all the sites that have directed web users to you and how many people they have referred.
In terms of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), it is important to build the amount of inbound links to your site. Not only do they provide traffic to your site, but also improve your Page Rank which can improve your rankings within search engine results pages (SERPs).
PPC is an acronym for Pay per Click, and refers to the cost per click of an advertisement such as Google Adwords. The cost per click generally depends on the competitiveness of the keyword or phrase. Prices start at around £0.04 and some companies are prepared to pay in excess of £5.00 per click because it is worth it to get the searcher to their site and be ranked above their competitors.
PPC advertising can be a very cost effective method of marketing your company or website (like all aspects of Search Engine Marketing), as if done properly you can qualify all of your visitors, ensuring you only get relevant / targeted traffic.
The landing page is the first page a visitor arrives on after clicking on a link or an advertisement. In most cases this will often be the homepage of the website. For example, the Elevator SEO homepage is:
http://www.elevator-seo.co.uk
The URL above will be the landing page for a large percentage of our users. If a PPC (Pay per click) is used, ideally you should have a homepage setup that is specifically related to the search term, such as a service or product that you are offering.
Other pages can also serve as landing pages i.e. a blog entry might be a landing page if someone has found your site from an article or post you have written.
If a user leaves your site after only visiting the landing page, this is known as ‘bouncing’ and will contribute to your ‘bounce rate’.
