SEO Information Glossary
Frequently Used Search Engine Optimization Terminology

AB - C D - E F G - H I - J K L - M N - O P Q - R S - T U - V W X Y Z

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H

Heading – As part of your HTML, the heading section should contain content rich text that includes your best keywords. The Heading is given primary consideration by many of the major search engines.

Hidden Text – When text on a web page is visible to search engine spiders but not visible to the searcher it is called hidden text. Text may be hidden by using the same color as the background, by using multiple TITLE tags or as a HTML comment. Many search engines consider this spamdexing and can detect it, so hidden text is not recommended. Search engines will either remove these pages from their database or lower where they are positioned.

Hit – The loading of an image or HTML page is referred to as a hit. It could take 25 hits to load one page if there were 24 images plus the HTML page. We do not use hits to determine visitor counts.

HTML – HyperText Markup Language is the language used to define and describe the page layout of each web page on the WWW (world wide web).

HTML Source – The actual programming code. It can be viewed within Internet by selecting the "View" menu then "Source".

HTTP – HyperText Transfer Protocol is the (main) protocol used to communicate between web servers and web searchers.

I

Image Map – An image map is a set of hyperlinks attached to areas of an image and if included within the web page, the search engines should have no problem following the links. As an added precaution, be sure to provide text links as well for those users accessing the web with graphics switched off or using text only browsers.

Impressions – The number of times an advertisement is displayed to a user.

Inbound Link – An inbound link is a hypertext link from an outside source that brings traffic to that page. Search engines like inbound links and use them to measure a page's popularity. Searches for the inbound links to a page can be made on Altavista, Infoseek and Hotbot.

Index – An index or searchable index refers to the database of web pages maintained by a search engine or directory. Index can also refer to the default or main page of a website.

Inktomi – a database of search results used to power various websites.  Inktomi is owned by Yahoo!

Inlinks – A synonym for back links. Popularized by Yahoo!

Invisible Web – Coined in 1994 by Dr. Jill Ellsworth. The invisible web refers to the vast amount of information that is not indexed by the search engines.

IP Address – The unique numeric address assigned to a computer and/or system on the internet.