Marketing glossary

Ad copy is the written text used in advertisements to persuade an audience to take action. It needs to be clear, concise, and compelling to be effective.

Ad extensions add extra information to your search ads, like phone numbers or links to specific pages. They make your ads bigger and more useful, helping you get more clicks.

Ad groups organize your paid advertising campaigns by grouping similar keywords and ads together, ensuring your messages are highly relevant to specific searches. This helps improve ad performance and management.

An ad impression is counted every time an ad is displayed to a user, whether they click on it or not. It measures how often your ad is seen.

Ad position refers to the order in which your paid advertisement appears on a search results page or website. A higher position means your ad is shown closer to the top, increasing its visibility.

Ad rank is a score that determines your ad's position on search results pages, calculated using your bid, ad quality, search context, and ad extensions.

Ad relevance measures how well your ad matches what a person is looking for. High relevance means your ad is useful and interesting to the audience it reaches.

Ad scheduling lets you choose specific days and times for your ads to run, helping you reach your audience when they are most likely to engage. It optimizes your budget by preventing ads from showing at less effective times.

An affinity audience is a group of people identified by their shared interests, habits, and passions, indicating a strong potential for engaging with specific products or services. Marketers use this data to target ads to users who are already likely to be interested.

An attribution model is a rule or set of rules that determines how credit for sales and conversions is assigned to different touchpoints in the customer journey.

Auction insights show how your paid ads perform against competitors in Google Ads. It helps you understand your market position and identify improvement areas.

Audience targeting focuses paid advertising efforts on specific groups of people most likely to be interested in a product or service. This strategy boosts ad relevance and efficiency.

A bid strategy determines how an ad platform bids in auctions to achieve specific advertising goals, such as maximizing clicks, conversions, or return on ad spend. It's crucial for campaign performance.

Broad match is a keyword setting in paid advertising that allows your ads to show for searches closely related to your keywords, including misspellings, synonyms, and related terms. It helps reach a wide audience.

A call extension adds a phone number to your ad, letting people call your business directly from their mobile devices. It helps customers connect quickly.

Callout extensions add extra non-clickable text snippets to your ads, highlighting unique selling points or important information to attract more clicks.

Campaign structure refers to the hierarchical organization of ad accounts, campaigns, ad groups, and keywords/ads within paid advertising platforms. A well-organized structure helps manage budgets, target audiences, and optimize performance effectively.

Conversion tracking measures specific actions users take after interacting with your ads, like purchases or sign-ups, to optimize campaign performance and understand ROI.

Conversion value measures the monetary worth of a conversion action, helping businesses understand the revenue generated by their marketing efforts. It's crucial for optimizing ad spend and maximizing return on investment.

Cost per acquisition (CPA) measures how much it costs your business to gain one new customer through marketing efforts. It helps you understand the efficiency of your advertising spending.

Cost per click (CPC) is a paid advertising metric that shows how much you pay each time someone clicks on your digital ad. It helps you understand the efficiency of your ad spending.

Custom intent audiences let advertisers target people on Google's network who are actively researching products or services related to their business. It uses keywords and URLs to identify users showing strong buying signals.

Customer Match lets you use your existing customer data, like email addresses, to target specific ads to them across various platforms. It helps you reach known audiences with highly relevant messages.

Data-driven attribution uses algorithms to assign fractional credit to marketing touchpoints by analyzing individual customer journeys. It helps marketers understand the true impact of each channel on conversions.

Dayparting is an advertising strategy that schedules ads to run only at specific times of day or on certain days of the week. It helps optimize ad spend by reaching your audience when they are most likely to convert.

Display ads are visual advertisements like banners or images that appear on websites, apps, and social media. They help businesses reach potential customers with engaging visuals.

Display advertising shows visual ads like banners and videos on websites and apps. It helps brands build awareness and drive traffic by reaching specific audiences.

Dynamic Search Ads (DSAs) automatically generate headlines and landing pages for your ads based on your website content, helping you capture relevant searches.

Enhanced CPC (ECPC) is a bid strategy in Google Ads that automatically adjusts your manual bids up or down in real time to help you get more conversions. It optimizes bids for clicks more likely to lead to a sale or lead.

Exact match is a keyword targeting option in paid advertising that shows your ad only when someone searches for that exact phrase or a very close variation. It helps you reach the most relevant audience and control your ad spend.

Expected CTR is an estimate of how likely people are to click your ad, based on its relevance to keywords, ad copy, and landing page quality. It helps search engines predict ad performance.

Feed optimization involves refining your product or service data feed to enhance ad performance, visibility, and relevance on paid advertising platforms like Google Shopping and Facebook.

First-click attribution gives 100% of the credit for a conversion to the very first interaction a customer has with your brand. It helps marketers understand which channels introduce new leads.

Geotargeting lets you show your ads to people based on their location, like a specific city, state, or even a small radius around your business. It helps you reach local customers more effectively.

Google Ads is an online advertising platform where businesses bid to display ads on Google's search results and other sites. It helps reach potential customers actively looking for products or services.

Google Merchant Center is a platform where businesses upload their product information to make it available for Google Shopping ads and other Google services. It's essential for any e-commerce business looking to advertise products on Google.

Impression share shows the percentage of times your ads were shown compared to the total possible impressions they could have received. It helps you understand your ad visibility.

An in-market audience consists of people actively researching or planning to buy a specific product or service. They are highly likely to convert, making them a key target for advertisers.

Keyword match type tells advertising platforms how closely a user's search query must match your chosen keyword to trigger your ad. It helps control who sees your ads.

Landing page experience measures how relevant and useful your landing page is to someone clicking your ad. A good experience means better ad performance and more conversions.

Last-click attribution gives 100% of the credit for a conversion to the very last interaction a customer had before making a purchase or completing an action.

Location extensions add your business address, phone number, and a map marker to your ads, helping customers find your physical store easily.

Lost impression share indicates the percentage of times your ads didn't show due to budget limitations or low ad rank, representing missed opportunities for visibility.

Manual CPC lets you set the maximum price you're willing to pay for each click on your ad. It gives you direct control over your ad spend for specific keywords.

Maximize clicks is an automated bidding strategy in paid advertising that aims to get the most website clicks possible within your daily budget. It's ideal for driving traffic and increasing brand visibility.

Maximizing conversions means getting the highest possible percentage of your website visitors or ad clicks to complete a desired action, like making a purchase or filling out a form. It's about optimizing your efforts to turn more interest into results.

Negative keywords are specific words or phrases you tell ad platforms to not show your ads for. They prevent your ads from appearing in irrelevant searches, saving money and improving ad performance.

Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is an online model where advertisers pay a fee each time their ad is clicked. It is a quick way to drive targeted traffic to your website by appearing on search engines or other platforms.

Performance Max is an automated campaign type in Google Ads that uses AI to find converting customers across all Google channels. It helps advertisers achieve their goals by optimizing bids and placements.

Phrase match shows your ad to people searching for your exact keyword phrase or close variations, allowing other words before or after it. It offers more control than broad match.

Price extensions display specific products or services with their prices directly within your Google Ads text ads, giving users a quick look at costs before they click.

A product feed is a file containing a list of products and their detailed attributes, essential for displaying items across online shopping channels and powering paid advertising campaigns.

Product listing ads (PLAs) are a visual ad format that displays product images, prices, and store names directly in search results, crucial for e-commerce sales.

Programmatic advertising uses software to automate the buying and selling of ad inventory, allowing for precise targeting and real-time optimization of campaigns. It streamlines the ad placement process.

Quality Score is a diagnostic tool in Google Ads that measures the relevance of your keywords, ads, and landing pages. A higher score typically means lower costs and better ad positions.

RLSA (Remarketing Lists for Search Ads) allows advertisers to tailor search campaigns to people who have previously visited their website or used their app. It optimizes bids and ad messaging for valuable returning users.

Remarketing targets users who previously interacted with your website or app, showing them tailored ads to encourage a return visit or conversion. It helps businesses re-engage interested audiences.

A remarketing list is a collection of website visitors or app users who have shown interest in your brand, allowing you to target them with specific ads.

Responsive search ads (RSAs) automatically mix and match headlines and descriptions to create ads optimized for performance. They help show the most relevant message to potential customers.

Retargeting shows targeted ads to people who have previously visited your website or interacted with your brand, helping to bring them back and encourage conversion.

Return on ad spend (ROAS) measures the revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising. It helps marketers understand the effectiveness of their ad campaigns.

Search ads are paid advertisements that appear on search engine results pages, usually at the top or bottom. They help businesses reach customers actively looking for their products or services.

A search term report shows the exact words people typed into a search engine before seeing or clicking your ad. It helps you understand what users are really looking for.

Shopping ads display product information like images, prices, and store names directly in search results, helping businesses showcase their products to potential customers.

A Shopping campaign showcases products directly in search results with images, prices, and store names, helping retailers drive sales.

Similar audiences help advertisers find new customers who share characteristics with their existing best customers. They expand reach by identifying users likely to be interested in a product or service.

Sitelink extensions add extra links below your main search ad, allowing users to navigate directly to specific pages on your website. They help make your ads more comprehensive and useful.

Smart Shopping campaigns are an automated Google Ads solution that uses machine learning to optimize bids and ad placements across Google's networks, aiming to maximize conversion value.

Target CPA (Cost Per Acquisition) is an automated bidding strategy that helps advertisers get as many conversions as possible at or below a specific average cost. It uses machine learning to optimize bids for each ad auction.

Target ROAS (Return On Ad Spend) is an automated bidding strategy that helps you get the most revenue for your ad spend by setting a specific return goal. It tells your ad platform how much revenue you want back for every dollar you spend on ads.

Video ads are short promotional videos businesses use to reach customers online. They appear on websites, social media, and streaming services to showcase products or services.

A view-through conversion happens when someone sees an ad but doesn't click it, then later completes a desired action on your site. It measures the impact of ads even without direct clicks.