Say What?! Glossary of Internet Marketing Terms for Real Estate

Most agents are familiar with the acronyms and terms that are unique to the real estate industry. But what of the myriad, and often strange, terms common to the world of online marketing?

Marketing yourself and your listings online is one of the best things you can do for your business. After all, over 90 percent of consumers use the internet at some point in their home search, so it's critical that agents have at least some passing familiarity with the concepts of online marketing.

However, we know that because the internet's such a big and ever-changing place, it can be hard to keep up with everything. To take the confusion out of online marketing terms, we've rounded up a list of the most common and their meanings. Feel free to bookmark it or print it out so you can refer to it later!

• A/B Testing - A method of fine-tuning content or design for email blasts, websites, landing pages and more for performance. By running two versions of the same piece of content, you can track the effectiveness of each version and use that data to decide what type of content/design to use going forward. You can learn more here.

• AdWords - Google's advertising service that serves keyword targeted ads on its search engine and across participating websites. Many real estate professionals leverage AdWords to target consumers searching for homes in their area.

• ALT Tag - Short for "alternative text," ALT tags describe what an image on your website it. Though its original purpose is to assist those who are visually impaired (or those who have turned off images in their browser), search engines love this text, too.