With a history spanning over 30 years, the internet seems to come up with a new technological term every day! It’s hard to keep up, so here are five important web terms you should know to help keep you and your business current!
Hosting: The place where your website lives
Hosting, or web hosting in our use case, is the process of a company carving out space on their server to “host” your website. Every element of a website takes up space in the cloud, and the host server allows that data a place to live so that your website can be viewed by anyone on the internet. It’s important to distinguish between web hosting and web design, as the former simply gives a website a place to “live” online, while the latter involves crafting the elements of a website and coding the parts that users interact with.
UI (User Interface): The front end of any website
The User Interface of a website refers to anything that a web user can interact with while on your website. Links, pictures, diagrams, blog posts, and more are all a part of your user interface! Having a user-friendly user interface keeps potential customers on your website longer and can lead to higher sales, so this is a very important consideration during the web design process.
Backup: A (hopefully recent) copy of your website
Technology has come a long way, but occasional outages and data losses are still possible! This is why data backups are not only helpful, but necessary! Sometimes outages are beyond the immediate control of those who have access to your website, so keeping a backup of your data in the event of such an outage is essential to making sure your website is back up and running in a timely manner!
Domain: AKA Web Address, the words and letters typed in the address bar!
Your website’s Domain is the series of words and letters users enter into the address bar of their browser to get to your website! For example, familyfuncenter.com would be the domain name for a business called Family Fun Center! Domains are customizable and can include just about any combination of numbers and letters, so some businesses use phrases not necessarily the same as their business name to help direct traffic to their website! A landscaping business in Detroit may use detroitlandscaping.com to direct users to their page, even if the actual name of the business is “Dan’s Detroit Landscaping”. This helps capture the attention of users who may not be familiar with the business itself, but have a specific need they are looking for help with!
SEO: Search Engine Optimization
A tricky subject, SEO refers to crafting elements of your online presence to appear higher in search results. As the algorithm for search engine results is CONSTANTLY changing, SEO tactics are as well. One of the best elements of SEO strategy is frequently updating your website through page updates and blog posts. Search engine crawlers frequently comb the internet looking for new content, so this should help you stay towards the top of search results!
We hope you enjoyed this crash course on some terms from the information superhighway! Remember, TrustWorkz is always available to help with any of your web design and development needs, so just give us a shout!
