Online Advertising Terms

This glossary of Online Advertising Terms will help you understand the jargon of online advertising.

Above the fold: Any part of the website that can be seen without the user having to scroll down the page.

Average pages: The average number of web pages a user will view when they visit a website.

Average time on site: The average amount of time a user spends on a website.

B2B: Business to business (B2B) is a term used to describe communication or transactions between businesses, usually over the internet.

Clicks: Measures the response of a user to an online advertisement. A click is when a user clicks on an ad and is taken to the advertiser’s web page.

Click rate: Or Click Through Rate (CTR) is a measure of the success of an online campaign. It is calculated as a percentage of the impressions that resulted in a click. For example, if an ad was delivered 100 times and clicked on once, the CTR would be 1 per cent.

Contextual advertising: Is where the advertisement delivered is relevant to the content on the web page.

Conversion rate: Measures the success of an advertisement in getting the user to take the desired action, such as purchasing the product or accepting an offer. It is expressed as a percentage.

CPC: Cost Per Click. Advertisers pay every time a user clicks on their advertisement.

CPM: Cost Per Mille (thousand impressions). Advertisers pay for every thousand impressions of their advertisement.

Impression: The unit of measurement for every time an advertisement is delivered, or seen by a visitor to a web page.

Island: Refers to the position of the advertisement. Island ads are surrounded by editorial content. SmartCompany island ads are 300×250 pixels in size.

Leaderboard: Refers to the position and size of the advertisement. Leaderboards are usually 728×90 pixels in size and sit at the top of the web page.

Page impression: Page Impression (PI) counts each time a web page is viewed by a user.

Unique visitor: Unique visitor (UV), also known as unique browser (UB). The total number of visitors to a web site over a defined period of time. Each unique visitor is counted only once in that period of time, no matter how many times they visit the web page.