Pay Per Click Advertising – Glossary of Terms
CPC – Cost-per-click. The maximum amount that you are willing to pay per click.
CPM – Cost-per-impression. The maximum amount you are willing to pay per 1000 impressions.
Impressions – The number of impressions is the number of times an ad is displayed on the Google search and display network.
Keyword – A keyword is a word, which is included in an advertisers “keyword list” within his/her pay per click campaign. It is a word that is relevant to his/her ad campaign, website content, products & services. When a user performs a search query for one of these words, the advertiser’s ad will be displayed within the SERP’s.
SEM – Search engine marketing is a blanket term which covers the many forms of internet or online marketing, including search engine optimisation (SEO) and search engine advertising (SEA). The aim of SEM is to improve a website’s visibility on the web and in the search engine results pages (SERP’s) via the many online marketing methods available to us today.
SEO – search engine optimisation is the ongoing process of improving a website’s organic search engine rankings. This process is ongoing and usually requires professional help. The results are not immediate and SEO should rather be seen as a long-term investment, and not a quick fix.
SEA – search engine advertising is basically the placement of ads on the web, particularly in the search engines. Most of the major search engines offer advertising products to the public, enabling literally anyone to make use of “paid search”.
Organic listings – these are your search results which appear in the left hand side of the page. These results are organic, because they appear there “naturally”. You cannot pay Google to have your website appear on the first page of organic results, and the only way to improve your web rankings, is through the use of SEO.
Paid listings – are the search results that appear in the top left and right hand side of the search engine results pages (SERP’s). These results are placed there by advertisers, who have paid or are paying to have them there.
SERP’s – Search Engine Results Pages
PPC – Pay Per Click advertising. Web advertising whereby an advertiser pays for each click that his/her ads receive.

