Translating marketing speak - your starter for 10!

At Design Eclectic we think we might be allergic to trendy marketing buzz words, ok that’s probably not medically possible but although we try not to use them ourselves we also realise that there is a lot of technical jargon, complicated language and acronyms being used out there so we’ve started to compile a handy translation guide.

Here’s your starter for 10, we did say there was a lot …

1. A/B Testing

This is essentially like test-driving two cars and deciding which one delivers the best performance so in marketing terms it’s sending out two different versions of your email or serving slightly different landing pages to enable you to determine which performs best.

2. Above The Fold

Obviously you cannot currently (who knows what might happen) fold a website but for some reason the point on a browser window where you have to scroll to see the rest of the page is called the ‘fold’. We have no idea why as it’s best described as the ‘scroll line’ but we don’t make up the rules!

3. Application Programming Interface (API)

The official definition of APIs is that they are a series of rules in computer programming, which allow an application to extract information from a service and use that information either in their own application or in data analyses. We prefer to explain it as a ‘phone’ for applications to have conversations so an API basically "calls" one application and gets information to bring to you to use in your software.

4. Bounce Rate

Your website bounce rate is the percentage of people who land on a page on your website and then leave without clicking on anything else or navigating to any other pages on your site. So it’s essentially like not swiping right on a dating app (not that we’ve ever used one).

A high bounce rate generally means you will have poor conversion rates because your visitors are not staying on your site long enough to read your content. For emails the bounce rate is the rate at which an email was unable to be delivered to your recipient's inbox. If you have a high bounce rate it generally means your lists are out-of-date or purchased, or they include many invalid email addresses. However, in email not all bounces are bad, so it's important to distinguish between hard and soft bounces (more on this in my next blog post) before taking an email address off your list.

5. Call-to-Action (CTA)

This isn’t as dramatic as it may sound so sadly it’s not a rallying cry for a political uprising instead it’s anything that encourages your website visitor (text link, button, image) to become a lead. Some examples are “Subscribe Now” or “Download the Whitepaper Today.”

6. Clickthrough Rate (CTR)

This is the percentage of your visitors who advance (or click through) from one part of your website to the next step of your marketing campaign much like advance to GO in Monopoly. In mathematical terms, it’s the total number of clicks that your page or CTA receives divided by the number of opportunities that people had to click (eg: number of pageviews, emails sent etc).

7. Content Management System (CMS)

Whilst it would be great if someone had invented a system that would create and manage all your website content unfortunately it’s not yet that advanced however a good CMS is still incredibly clever saving you both time and money. A website with a CMS basically allows you to control and manage the content within your website, with no knowledge of web design or coding. It removes the need to involve your web design agency or a website programmer for all but major changes and can reduce the time required to publish, allowing you to get your new content on-line faster and at no additional cost. We’ve created lots of websites with CMS so clickhereif you’d like to see what can be achieved.

8. CSS

CSS sounds like some kind of secret military unit but actually it stands for Cascading Style Sheets, and it's what gives your entire website its style, like colours, fonts, and background images. It's also what allows websites to adapt to different screen sizes and device types.

9. HTML

No this isn’t yet another courier company who will lose your important parcel nor is it the latest boyband to come out of XFactor. HTML is actually short for HyperText Markup Language, a language used to write web pages. It's at the core of every web page, regardless of the complexity of a site or number of technologies involved, and provides the basic structure of the site which is then enhanced and modified by other technologies like CSS and JavaScript

10. Infographic

We love infographics and we like to think we’re rather good at designing them. Take a lookhere at some recent examples of infographics we’ve created - oh and here’s the official explanation which is a lot less interesting but we did promise so an infographic is a highly visual piece of content that relays complex concepts in a simple and visual way (we did warn you … click hereif you’d rather see what we mean!)

And as I either got carried away or can’t count to 10 here’s an extra one to the 10 I promised at the start!

11. JavaScript

You might think you’re going to need some coffee liqueur and a shot of espresso for this one but actually JavaScript is a lot less tasty unless you’re a programmer in which case you’ll already know it’s a programming language that lets web developers design interactive sites. Most of the dynamic behaviour you'll see on web page is there thanks to JavaScript with uses including pop-ups, slide-in calls-to-action, security password creation, check forms, interactive games, and special effects. It's also used to build mobile apps and create server-based applications.

If you’d like to talk to us about your marketing, your website or you’d just like some straight talking terminology translation please do get in touch as we’d love to hear from you! Get in touch with us today on01635 278388 or email joanne@designeclectic.com