SEO & AEO Glossary

Authoritative glossary of SEO, AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), GEO, and LLMO terms. Definitions for AI visibility and search engine optimization for Nordic businesses.

36 terms covering SEO, AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), LLMO, technical SEO, content, analytics and link building. Every definition is calibrated for the Nordic market.

AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) — AI Visibility: Optimizing content so that it gets selected as an answer in AI-powered search engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews. Focuses on entity clarity, structured data and authority signals.
AI Overviews — AI Visibility: Google's feature where an AI-generated answer is displayed above the organic results on the search results page. Previously known as SGE (Search Generative Experience). Rolled out globally in 2024.
AI Visibility — AI Visibility: How visible a brand or website is in AI-generated answers from platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Copilot. Measured through citations, mentions and recommendations.
Alt Text — Technical SEO: Alternative text that describes the content of an image for search engines and screen readers. Important for accessibility and image SEO.
Backlink — Link Building: A link from an external website to your website. Search engines use backlinks as a signal of credibility and authority. The quality of the link (domain authority, relevance) matters more than quantity.
Bounce Rate — Analytics: The percentage of visitors who leave a website without further interaction. In GA4, this is replaced by 'engagement rate', where an 'engaged session' lasts over 10 seconds, has a conversion, or at least 2 pageviews.
Canonical URL — Technical SEO: An HTML element (rel=canonical) that tells search engines which version of a page is the preferred one. Used to avoid duplicate content issues.
Core Web Vitals — Technical SEO: Three performance metrics from Google that measure user experience: LCP (Largest Contentful Paint, loading), INP (Interaction to Next Paint, responsiveness) and CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift, visual stability). INP replaced FID in March 2024.
Crawling — Technical SEO: The process where search engines (via bots/crawlers like Googlebot) systematically download and read web pages to index their content.
CTR (Click-Through Rate) — Analytics: The ratio of clicks to impressions, expressed as a percentage. A page with 1,000 impressions and 50 clicks has a CTR of 5%. Used in both SEO (Google Search Console) and advertising.
DA (Domain Authority) — Link Building: A scoring scale from 1 to 100 developed by Moz that estimates how likely a domain is to rank in search results. DA is not a Google metric but a third-party indicator based on link profile.
E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) — Content: Google's framework for evaluating content quality. Used by quality raters who evaluate search results. The extra E (Experience) was added in December 2022.
Entity — AI Visibility: A unique concept or object that search engines can identify and categorize, such as a person, business, place or event. Google uses Knowledge Graph to connect entities.
Featured Snippet — SEO: A highlighted excerpt displayed above the organic search results in Google, often called 'position 0'. Can show text, lists, tables or video. The source gets attribution with a link.
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) — AI Visibility: Optimization specifically aimed at generative AI search engines. Builds on AEO with a focus on citation, source marking, statistics and authoritative writing that AI models prefer to reference.
Hreflang — Technical SEO: An HTML attribute that tells search engines which language and region a page is intended for. Used on multilingual websites to show the correct language version to the right user.
Indexing — Technical SEO: The process where a search engine stores and organizes content it has crawled, so it can be retrieved in search results. A page that is not indexed will not appear in search.
JSON-LD — Technical SEO: A format for structured data using JSON syntax. Recommended by Google for implementing Schema.org markup. Inserted in a script tag in the HTML header.
Knowledge Graph — AI Visibility: Google's database containing billions of facts about entities and the relationships between them. Used to generate Knowledge Panels, featured snippets and AI Overviews.
Knowledge Panel — AI Visibility: An information box that appears on the right side of Google's search results (desktop) with facts about an entity. Pulls data from Knowledge Graph, Wikipedia and official sources.
LLMO (Large Language Model Optimization) — AI Visibility: Optimizing content to be cited and recommended by large language models (LLMs) like GPT-4, Gemini and Claude. Overlaps with AEO and GEO.
Long-tail Keywords — Keywords: Search phrases with three or more words that typically have lower search volume but higher conversion rates and lower competition. For example: 'best SEO tool for real estate agents in Bergen'.
Meta Description — On-page SEO: An HTML element that provides a brief summary of the page's content. Often displayed as the description below the title in search results. Google rewrites the meta description in approximately 70% of cases.
Nofollow — Link Building: A link attribute (rel=nofollow) that asks search engines not to pass link authority (PageRank) through the link. Used for paid links, user comments and untrusted sources. Google now treats it as a 'hint', not a directive.
On-page SEO — SEO: Optimization of the content and HTML code on a web page, including titles, headings, internal linking, images, URL structure and content quality.
Orphan Page — Technical SEO: A web page that has no internal links from other pages on the same domain. Search engines have difficulty finding and indexing orphan pages.
PageSpeed — Technical SEO: Google's tool (PageSpeed Insights) and concept for measuring and improving the loading speed of web pages. Uses the Lighthouse engine and provides a score from 0 to 100.
Robots.txt — Technical SEO: A text file in the root directory of a domain that tells search engines and other crawlers which parts of the site they are allowed to visit. Follows the Robots Exclusion Protocol.
Schema.org Markup — Technical SEO: A shared vocabulary for structured data, supported by Google, Bing, Yahoo and Yandex. Helps search engines understand the content on a page. Can result in rich results in search.
SERP (Search Engine Results Page) — SEO: The page displayed when a user performs a search. Contains organic results, ads, featured snippets, Knowledge Panels, videos, images and other elements.
Citation (in AEO context) — AI Visibility: When an AI platform references your brand, website or content in its answer to a user. Citations in AI answers are the new equivalent of links in traditional SEO.
Sitemap (XML) — Technical SEO: An XML file that lists all important pages on a website, making it easier for search engines to find and crawl them. Submitted via Google Search Console.
Structured Data — Technical SEO: Code (usually JSON-LD) added to a web page to help search engines understand the content. Can result in rich results like stars, prices, FAQs and events in search results.
Title Tag — On-page SEO: The HTML element (<title>) that defines the title of a web page. Displayed as the clickable heading in search results and in the browser tab. One of the most important on-page SEO factors.
Topical Authority — Content: A website's perceived expertise within a specific topic, based on the depth and breadth of content. Google favors sources that demonstrate thorough knowledge about a subject.
Zero-click Search — AI Visibility: A search where the user gets the answer directly on the search results page without clicking through to any website. Includes AI Overviews, featured snippets, Knowledge Panels and direct answers.