Blogging Terminology for Growth and Monetization

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Blogging terminology is definitely not something that comes naturally, however, understanding blog terms is essential to your business as a blogger.

As a blogger, I literally feel like I learn something new about the blogging world every single day. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve had to Google a blog term that I’ve come across while reading blogging articles or when interacting with blogger Facebook groups.

If you’re a new or fairly new blogger, this post is going to go over important blogging terminology that you will need to know as you grow your blog.

From the basics, all the way to monetizing your blog and taking press trips, I will cover it all.

My hope is that instead of having to Google each term individually, Travel With A Plan Blogging Terminology 101 will save you precious time from the hunt.

Let’s get started!

Top US Travel Blog, Travel With A Plan features blogging terminology to help with growth and monetization!

Table of Contents

Blogging Terminology: The basics

Blog: A type of website or part of a website.

The only real difference between a blog and other types of websites is that blogs are regularly updated with new content, which is displayed in reverse chronological order (newer posts first). i.e. I have a blog called Travel With A Plan.

Niche: A niche is simply what your blog is about.

Niche involves narrowing down the focus on a topic, product, or service to appeal to a small, specialized section of the population. i.e. My blog niche is family travel.

Theme: A theme controls how your website will look.

It is how you make your site look pretty and determines the layout of your blog. Blogs are operated within free or paid/premium themes. i.e. My theme is Journey 5.0 purchased through Themeforest for $49.

Blogging Terminology: Blog start-up

Content Management System (CMS): A CMS is a tool that makes it easy to manage important aspects of your website, like content, without needing to know anything about programming.

CMS makes building a website accessible to anyone, even people who aren’t developers. i.e. My CMS is WordPress, which is the simplest, most popular way to create your own website or blog.

Hosting: Hosting is the service that allows bloggers to make their website accessible via the World Wide Web.

When you pay a web hosting company, you are simply renting storage space on the internet — just like you would rent a physical store for your business. i.e. My hosting provider is Bluehost of which I wholeheartedly recommend them. Sign up here today!

Blog identification

URL: Short for Uniform Resource Locator, URL is the internet address of your blog.

It can also be the address of a piece of information that can be found on the web such as a page, image or document. i.e. My blog homepage URL is https://travelwithaplan.com/

Domain: A domain name is your website’s name which is included in your blog’s Internet address. i.e. In the URL https://travelwithaplan.com/ the domain name is travelwithaplan.com.

Meta description: The meta description is an HTML attribute on a web page that explains what the page is about.

In other words, the meta description describes the page and should include its keywords. i.e. The following is an example of a post’s meta description:

Blogging Terminology: Blog make-up

Post: A blog post is simply a blog article.

Blog posts are displayed in reverse chronological order on a blog website. i.e. My first post was titled, “Why in the World Did I Start A Family Travel Blog?

Page: Pages are static content such as your about page, contact page, products or services pages, homepage, and more.

Blog posts are displayed in reverse chronological order (newest to oldest) on a blog page. i.e. This is my About Me page.

Media: Media refers to images (photos), audio, and videos that are placed within a blog.

Plugin: A plug-in is software that can add functionality or new features to a WordPress website. There are free and paid plug-ins. i.e. Yoast SEO is a free plug-in that can be used to optimize your blog posts.

Grammarly: A free editing too that automatically and immediately notifies you of spelling, grammatical, or plagiarism errors as you are writing your blog posts.

This is an invaluable tool that if you don’t have, you should sign up for here today, for free!

Blogging Terminology: Optimization

SEO: SEO stands for “search engine optimization.” It is the process of fine-tuning your blog and blog posts to rank higher and be more appealing to Internet search engines.

Good SEO leads to getting traffic from “organic” search engine results. There are multiple processes required to achieve good SEO. i.e. When Googling, “Blog terminology”, if this post has good SEO it will show up at the top of the list in your Google search.

Image optimization: Image optomization is a process of delivering high-quality images in the right format, dimension, size, and resolution while keeping the smallest possible size.

Image optimization can be done by resizing the images, caching, or compressing the size.

Keyword(s): A keyword is the topic or topics discussed in your blog posts.

When looking to create a successful blog post, careful attention must be placed on choosing relevant keywords (topics) for your intended audience. Consistently utilizing unique and relevant keywords is good for SEO. i.e Keywords for this post include beginner blogger, blogging terminology, and blog terms.

Page speed: Page speed is the average time it takes for a website page to load on a screen.

The faster the page speed, the more likely visitors will stick around on your site. Slower page speed causes higher ‘bounce rates’ – people leaving your page. Check your site’s page speed on: GTMetrix or Google Pagespeed Insights.

Web crawler: A web crawler, or spider, is a type of bot that’s typically operated by search engines like Google and Bing.

Their purpose is to index the content of websites all across the Internet so that those websites can appear in search engine results.

Blogging Terminology: Blog growth

Domain authority, “DA”: A measure of how well a website is likely to perform in search engine results.

It’s a search engine ranking score developed to give an overview of likely site performance. A higher domain authority equals a better chance of your site showing up in a search engine. Check your site’s domain authority here.

Backlinks: Backlink is a link one website gets from another website.

Having a large number of backlinks is considered very useful for improving a website’s SEO ranking. i.e. Every time a website or another blog inserts a link to your page on one of their posts, that creates a backlink.

Link building: Link building is the process of getting other websites to link back to your website.

This drives referral traffic and increases your site’s authority. This article discusses specific link building strategies.

Anchor text: Anchor text are the words used to anchor a URL to some text on a web page.

When users view the web page in a browser, they can click the text to activate the link and visit the page whose URL is in the link. i.e This is anchor text (the blue highlighted words).

“Collab” post: Collab is short for collaboration. A collab post is a compilation of several different bloggers coming together to provide text or insight for one post.

It involves working together to create something and helps drive referral traffic back to your site. i.e. This is an example of a collab post that I was a part of, Four Fabulous Midwest Road Trips.

Blogging Terminology: Making money from blogging

Monetization: The act of making money from a blog through a variety of methods. i.e. This post discusses ways to monetize a blog.

Affiliate Marketing: Affiliate marketing involves promoting and adding links to products or services on your blog.

When your readers click those links or make a purchase from the links, you get a commission from the sale. This is a way to monetize your blog.

Media kit: A media kit is a document that outlines the key facts and statistics about your blog.

Media kits are given to potential advertisers or brands that you want to collaborate with and list collaboration options and prices for the services you offer.

I suggest using a user-friendly and editable Blogger Media Kit Template that is both straightforward and professional looking. Templates such as this one portray your statistics, previous work, and help represent why brands will want to work with you.

Pitch: A pitch is an email or conversation with a business, blogger, or product for whom you want to work with.

A pitch explains why you want to work with that person, and of what value you can be to their company, as well as lists potential ways that you can collaborate together.

Guest post pitches involve letting a blogger know what you would like to write about for them.

UMVs: UMVs (Unique Monthly Views) means how many individual users requested to view pages on your blog in a given month.

This information can be found in Google Analytics and will be asked of you when starting to work with brands. Higher UMV means more traffic and exposure to your blog.

Blogging Terminology: Additional writing

Guest posting: “Guest posting” means writing and publishing an article on someone else’s website or blog.

You are not typically paid for a guest post, however, it provides referral traffic and backlinks to your site (which is good for SEO and DA). i.e. Here is a guest post that I wrote on a fellow travel blog: Mount Rushmore & Things to do Nearby.

Freelance writing: Freelance writing involves writing as a contract worker/writer.

You are not tied to one employer, however, can take on a variety of different projects for several different clients. Freelance writers are typically paid per word, or per post.

Ghostwriting: Ghostwriting is a form of freelance writing where your name or blog name is not mentioned in the article or post that you write.

Another person is credited as the author on a post that you write. Ghostwriters are typically paid per word, or per post.

Blog sponsorship

Sponsored travel: Sponsored travel refers to complimentary (or discounted) tours, stays and/or experiences in exchange for a blog post, social media or whatever else from your end.

This tends to happen upon you approaching a brand, or them approaching you.

Press trip: A press trip is a method for a brand or destination to get positive publicity. The brand or destination invests time and money to bring you for a visit and in return, you provide a story and social media promotion to your followers on the experience.

Press trips usually involve scheduled activities with other influencers that have also been invited on the press trip.

FAM trip: A press trip can also go by names like “Fam”, which stands for familiarization trip or media visit.

Brand ambassador: A brand ambassador is a person who is hired by an organization or company to represent a brand in a positive light and by doing so help to increase brand awareness and sales.

Discounted travel

Comped stay: If you identify as a travel writer or influencer and are working with a brand, free tickets, entertainment offerings, and/or accommodations may be offered to you.

Any offer ‘at no cost to you’ is considered a comped stay and typically requires a story and social media promotion to your followers.

Media rate: If you identify as a travel writer or influencer and are working with a brand, a reduced price for tickets, entertainment, or accommodations may be offered to you. This is considered a media rate.

Building your blog team

Travel writer: A person who writes about places they have visited and their experiences while traveling. Most travel bloggers consider themselves travel writers.

Travel influencer: Travel influencers have the ability to engage with a sufficient number of people. They help increase a brand’s profile and engagement by publishing sponsored posts.

Travel writers who participate in and promote sponsored travel or travel products are considered travel influencers.

Virtual assistant, “VA”: A virtual assistant is generally self-employed and hired by a blogger to provide online administrative support.

In the blogging world, VA’s tend to handle a blogger’s social media profile in being responsible for posting, pinning, and engaging on social media on behalf of the blogger.

SEO analyst: An SEO analyst can be hired by a blogger to be responsible for ensuring that your online content can be easily found and viewed by potential and current customers.

They can also be hired to optimize your blog’s SEO and develop growth strategies.

Publicist: A publicist can be hired by a blogger to generate and manage your publicity in order to promote networking, collaboration, and your company’s growth.

Visual editor: A visual editor can be hired by a blogger to edit text files using a textual or graphical user interface which displays the content in an easy to look at and good view.

*Before leaving, be sure to check our Travel Resources Page to find exclusive travel discounts and to book hotels, rental cars, and guided tours.*

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