An arbitrarily designated visible portion of a Web page. Page zones are used for advertising and link placement.

PageRank is the concept upon which Google was created. In a nutshell, it is a weighted representation of the "importance" of a particular webpage, based upon the importance of the pages that link to it. PageRank is visually represented by a scale from zero to ten, although there are actually infinite gradations between each whole number. PageRank is a logarithmic scale, with each higher number being approximately eight times the number below it. To illustrate, as of January 2004, there were only thirty-three pages on the entire Web which held a PageRank of ten. When Google first broke onto the search engine scene, a high PageRank was something of a "magic bullet" to high search engine rankings. While the benefits are no longer so extreme, it is still quite important to have a reasonable PageRank on one's site.

The attempt to prevent PageRank or PageRank-like value from leaving a Web site. This concept is nonsensical as all reputable published sources agree that a document’s PageRank must be returned to the collection from which its PageRank is being calculated. See also: PageRank Evaporation, Preservation.

The contoversial concept that PageRank may be lost by linking to other sites. If PageRank leakage actually does occur, the actual affect is certainly minimal.

The theoretical attempt to define the channels within a Web site’s navigation structure through which PageRank and/or PageRank-like values will flow from page to page in an attempt to “show” search engines which pages within a site are the most important pages. See also: PageRank Hoarding and PageRank Sculpting.

The unproven hypothetical practice of managing internal linking structures at a granular, link-by-link level so as to direct the flow of PageRank and/or PageRank-like value within a Web site. Has been associated with PageRank Hoarding and PageRank Management .

A specialized form of link bait, a PageRank trap is a page whose outbound links only point to other pages on the same domain or site. Usually an article or forum discussion thread that attracts links from other sites.

The practice of “riding coat-tails” for one’s own advantage. Parasitical SEO tactics may include: creating competitive content about well-established brands (common in affiliate marketing), injecting content onto an established Web site without the site owner’s knowledge or approval, dropping links into comments and discussions on popular blogs and forums, etc.

A type of program used by search engines to break down your HTML pages into components for indexing. The parser strips your indexable content and passes it to one or more indexers. Many SEO forum moderators and admins who should know better continue to speak of “spiders” doing the parsing and indexing. Spiders basically retrieve files and place them into (search engine internal) queing areas for the parsers to munch on.

Links which do not have any expected expiration date. The opposite of permanent links is rented links.

A media file, typically a sound recording, that is distributed over the Internet. Listeners can play it back on their computers and portable media devices including MP3 players. Just like radio, podcast means both content and the method of syndication.

An abbreviation for PageRank.

The lowest possible PageRank. A PR0 can indicate a new page that has not yet received any links or a page that has been penalized by Google.

The belief that a Web site can retain all or most of its PageRank by “hoarding” or “sculpting” PageRank. The Preservation Principle is an SEO myth. See also: PageRank Hoarding.

A data file sent to price comparison engines by advertisers that includes all the products that the advertiser wishes to promote via the engine.