Glossary

A/B testing:

 In marketing, a comparison of two ads, ad campaigns, landing pages, promotional offers, or websites to see which is more effective. In traditional A/B testing, the A version is usually the current design or the control and the B version is the variant, usually identical to the A except for a single change. This change can be as simple as changing a color in a call-to-action from red to blue or as complex as creating an entirely new ad or website. Testing each allows marketers to conclude which performs better to create more conversions.

analytics:

 The study of meaningful patterns of data in order to research trends or analyze performance. For web analytics, web platforms make finding this data easy. Marketers can use this knowledge to fine-tune and improve their marketing efforts.

blogging:

 From a marketing perspective, blogging means regularly publishing fresh content to your website. This content includes things such as articles, commentary, and visual content like infographics, photos, and videos. Blogging functions as an inbound attraction function, inviting new visitors to your site while promoting thought leadership.

bounce rate:

 The rate in which visitors leave the first page of your site they land on without visiting any other pages. A high bounce rate has a negative effect on search engine rankings.

buyer persona:

 See persona.

Buyer’s Journey (also known as the sales funnel):

 This is a way of describing the buying process, and it’s set up in three phases:

• Top of the funnel (ToFu): This refers to the first stage in the buying process; leads are in the first stage of researching a potential problem.
• Middle of the funnel (MoFu): In this phase, customers know they have a problem and are looking for more information. They may download a white paper or an e-book.
• Bottom of the funnel (BoFu): This is the stage of the buying process leads reach when they’re just about to close as new customers. They’ve identified a problem, have shopped around for possible solutions, and are very close to buying. Typically, next steps for leads at this stage are a call from a sales rep, a demo, or a free consultation.

call-to-action (CTA) button:

 A call-to-action button is a button encoded with a web link that website visitors click to move to the next step in the sales funnel. It is usually located on a landing page or conversion page and shows this person is interested in learning more.

Call-to-Action (CTA) Map:

 A Call-to-Action Map is the internal structure of the website created strategically to guide web visitors through the buying process. It includes your website wireframe and site map and is designed as a blueprint to create a streamlined user interface. Users get to the next step, or the next landing page, by clicking a CTA.

clickthrough rate (CTR):

 The percentage of people who click on an ad with respect to the number of times your ad was shown (or click on an email with respect to the volume of emails sent). It is arrived at by dividing the number of clicks by the number of impressions.

closed-loop marketing:

 Holistic tracking goals and campaigns in order to show how marketing efforts have impacted an organization’s business objectives, including the bottom line.

content:

 From a marketing perspective, content consists of articles, blogs, commentary, infographics, ideas, photos, or videos created to attract buyer personas. If created correctly, buyer personas will read it, engage with it, and share it.

context:

 The setting of a word or event. From a marketing perspective, context refers to placing the right type of content in front of the right people. It’s important to ensure your content is created for the intended audience. Keep your buyer personas in mind when creating content, and make sure both the form and substance appeals to them.

content management system (CMS):

 A set of processes that enables the management of your website information from content creation through distribution.

content relationship management (CRM):

 A software platform that allows you to synchronize the marketing data you collect with your sales team.

conversion:

 The willing release of personal consumer data in exchange for something of perceived value, usually a downloadable piece of content. The ultimate conversion is a sale, donation, or subscription.

Conversion Machine:

 A high performance website is also known as a “Conversion Machine” because it is the hub of attraction and conversion.

conversion path:

 The strategically developed path or series of web pages that web visitors are guided through in order to create a conversion. To better assist them throughout your site’s buying process, they are guided along this path with CTA buttons and offers that appear to the consumer as intuitive, logical next steps.

conversion rate:

 The percentage of people who completed your desired action. In the broadest sense, conversion rate is the percentage of unique visitors who became customers.

cost-per-click (CPC):

 The price you pay each time someone clicks on your ad, whether it’s a display ad on a social media platform or search results on Bing or Google.

cost-per-lead (CPL):

 The price you pay for each lead you attract. CPL can be calculated by taking the total dollars spent in a given period of time to attract leads and dividing that by the number of leads you actually received. Digital Dollars Invested divided by the number of leads captured. Calculate on a monthly, quarterly, and annual basis.

cost-per-thousand (CPM):

 A consumer-awareness metric that measures your efficiency in reaching a particular audience via any given media vehicle.

Customer Conversion Chain:

 A series of metrics that measure key conversion points in the customer conversion path including impressions, visits, unique visits, leads, marketing-qualified leads, sales-qualified leads, opportunities, customers, and the lifetime value of a customer.

Einstein Assessment:

 A proprietary, all-encompassing website audit, which includes calculations and consulting, and acts as a roadmap to digital success.

Facebook:

 The largest social-media platform, on which people can find, like, and engage with your business.

The 4 E’s of Content Marketing:

 Educate, Engage, Encourage, and Embrace.

The 4 P’s of Inbound Marketing:

 The “new” 4 P’s of Marketing, used for inbound marketing, are

profile/persona, product pyramid, place in purchase path/loop, and path to conversion.

The 4 P’s of Marketing:

 Typically used in the basics of marketing. The 4 P’s are

product, place, price, and promotion.

Google+:

 A social platform that allows users to create profiles and engage with business profiles.

G.O.S.T.: 

Acronym for goals, objectives, strategy, and tactics.

HTML (Hypertext Markup Language):

The language and set of codes used to write web pages.

inbound marketing: 

A set of marketing processes and concepts designed to attract qualified leads digitally, rather than through the use of more traditional means of marketing, such as TV, radio, and print. By aligning your content with your buyer personas’ needs, leads are naturally attracted to you, allowing them to convert and become your customer. At its core, inbound marketing consists of customer attraction and conversion.

inbound marketing assessment: 

A strategic way to grade your digital marketing with a holistic focus. Reports attraction and conversion statistics, while pinpointing pitfalls and opportunities.

keywords: 

The terms, phrases, subjects, and categories people use to search for you or your organization online. Choose keywords that aren’t too difficult to rank for, making it easy for search engines, such as Google and Bing, to find you. Also be sure to choose keywords your buyer personas are searching for.

landing page: 

A landing page is a page on your website that includes a form designed to capture visitor contact information, making them a lead. In exchange for their information, the page offers an e-book, a webinar, or some other valuable offer.

Lifestyle Loop: 

An ongoing process allowing marketers to connect with individuals, rather than with the masses, in a continuous “loop” of interactivity that includes attraction, reattraction, engagement, and reengagement throughout a dynamic customer purchase path.

Lifestyler: 

A loyal customer advocate or brand evangelist.

LinkedIn: 

A social-networking site for professionals and businesses.

marketing automation: 

A software platform with associated tools and analytics designed to incorporate an automated attraction, lead-nurturing, conversion, and analytics reporting strategy with behavior-based workflows, triggered emails, and analytics.

marketing qualified lead (MQL): 

Leads who match your buyer profile model. Whether or not a lead fits your buyer profile is a judgement call, typically made by a human within your organization, so predetermined lead scoring may help to quantify.

off-page optimization: 

A type of SEO that refers visitors to other pages that share your content and creates incoming links. When you create useful, interesting content, people are more likely to share a link to it.

on-page optimization: 

A type of SEO that takes place on any particular website page to ensure search engines find you. This includes using a title tag, URL, image tags, and keywords.

open rate: 

The rate in which your sent emails are opened by the addressee.

pay-per-click (PPC): 

A digital advertising option for marketers to choose on an online platform, like Google or Facebook. When this option is selected, ads will show on their customers’ screens, and marketers will pay only when someone clicks the ad. Opportunities exist to customize your target audience and analytics to show exactly how well it performed.

persona (buyer persona): 

A profile of your target customer. It includes demographics, psychographics, behaviors, wants, and needs. This helps you market and write content that helps or intrigues them because it is deemed valuable and attractive to the user.

Pinterest: 

A photo- and image-sharing social media platform.

product pyramid: 

A consumer conversion path with its own set of keywords, for each product.

qualified lead: 

A contact who requested additional information about a product or service and/or filled out a website form. Qualified leads have a need for your services/products.

QR code: 

A QR code (abbreviated from quick-response code) is a square barcode that looks pixelated and can be read by smart phones. It is encoded and, when scanned, directs a user to a URL.

remarketing: 

A digital marketing effort aimed at a known person who has previously engaged with you, whether it’s the first conversion or the end action of your specific inbound marketing campaign.

retargeting: 

A digital marketing effort aimed at an unknown person who has not yet engaged with you but has visited your website.

return on investment (ROI): 

What you get back from the marketing effort investment you make.

sales qualified lead (SQL): 

A lead that has been scored and evaluated based on need, intent, budget, and timeline.

search engine optimization (SEO): 

Optimizing/enhancing your web page or website so that search engines can easily find it and place it at the top of the search results.

search engine results pages (SERPs): 

Pages that display from the search engine when you type in a particular keyword or phrase.

Shared Strategic Blueprint (SSB): 

A plan for business success in which you have a quarterly internal marketing meeting, collaborate with your team to create marketing goals and priorities, and make sure each objective is S.M.A.R.T. (specific, measureable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound).

S.M.A.R.T.: 

When creating internal objectives, make sure they are specific, measureable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound.

spaghetti theory: 

When you create a workflow for each of your products/services, your workflows can easily get intertwined and confusing, and can appear to be thoughtless, spammy emails to the customers you’ve worked so hard to gain — in other words, a big bowl of “workflow spaghetti.” Thoughtfully consider and plan each workflow you build with a purpose.

Twitter: 

Twitter is a social-media platform on which users follow one another and provide short blurbs or “tweets” others can see and share.

URL: 

The direct address to a web page or piece of information on the web. Typically begins with www and ends with .com.

website grader: 

A tactical way to “grade” your website to see how you are doing with technological metrics and website statistics.

workflow: 

A set of triggered emails sent to a lead with the intent to nurture and guide him or her through the conversion path. These can be automated as well as behavior-based. A workflow is sometimes referred to as a drip campaign.

YouTube: 

A video-sharing website and social-media platform.