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Ten more website terms you need to know.

At Switch, we love learning about new industries and brushing up on our own. And we’re also invested in helping our clients understand the ever-evolving world of digital marketing, starting with online business tool number one – your website.

Going back to basics, we’ve already shared ten of the most important website terms we think you should know. And, because there’s always so much more to learn, we’ve got ten more terms to help you better understand how your website works and how that impacts your business.

Ten website terms you need to know

1. Content development

Great design is essential to a website that keeps your visitor engaged but that’s only half the battle when it comes to keeping them interested in returning. For that, you need great content. Content refers to all the words and stories (or narratives) that go into communicating your unique selling points and value proposition to website visitors. The words on your home page, landing pages, business blog, as well as any videos, infographics, and images visitors might consume are all content – content that needs to be fresh, relevant, and engaging to do its job just right.

2. Lead form

Like landing pages, lead forms can be placed anywhere on your website to encourage people to input relevant details to request more information or download materials such as company brochures or useful eBooks.

3. White space

This refers to the amount of actual white space you can see around key areas of your website, including content and images. A cluttered website can feel disorganised and off-putting while strategically used white space can create the feeling of control and calm, leading to a better reading experience.

4. Cascading Style Sheet (CSS)

This is a file that organises how elements are displayed on a website. It includes information about font size and colour, page margins, background colours and layouts etc. These files outline how things are arranged on the screen you see when viewing a website.

5. Infinite scrolling

As opposed to different pages that you need to click through to see all the information on a website, infinite scrolling is a method of browsing a website where content loads up as you scroll down the page. This means you have access to more information without having to click a ‘next’ button. This speeds up load times and makes for easy reading.

6. Responsive design

This design and coding technique makes your website more user-friendly on mobile device like your cell phone. In this way, your website ‘responds’ to the device by reframing itself to the screen size at hand to ensure an optimal viewing experience. This is a must for modern websites as, more often than not, individuals are viewing websites from their tablets or smart phones, rather than on a standard desktop or laptop screen.

7. Server

This is a master computer that hosts websites and manages network resources. Your website will probably live on a server managed by your website hosting company. The server delivers your website content to the worldwide web.

8. Website localisation

Have a local and an international market and want your website to speak specifically to each? Responding to cultural differences in different marketplaces, website localisation refers to the process of tweaking your website to fit a specific target audience. This goes beyond language translation to image choice and cultural references to ensure your website’s messaging is appropriate to a particular market or cultural group.

9. Secure Socket Layer (SSL)

Seen ‘https://’ before a website address you’re browsing? That’s SSL – a type of encryption that allows you to conduct secure transactions online. If you run an e-commerce website selling to online customers, you need SSL to securely accept payments online.

10. Country code top level domain

Website addresses typically end in country codes like ‘.co.za’, ‘.uk’, or ‘.us’. These codes refer to the website’s country of origin. The suffix ‘.com’ is the most commonly used domain suffix. It stands for "commercial" and is used by mostly commercial websites though that does not have to be the case. The same is true for ‘.org’ which stands for “organisation” and is most often (but not always) used for no-profit organisation websites.

Got it? Good! But, when it comes to great website design (and other digital marketing tools), getting the lingo right is just the tip of the iceberg. As expert digital marketing consultants, we’re passionate about educating and helping business owners make the best use of tools like websites, and we’d love to have a look at yours.

Want to learn how you can use your website to grow your business? Start with our website ebook.