Paid advertising glossary
The terms you'll meet advertising on Google, social media and ChatGPT, each with a worked example.
Reviewed by Chris Day, COO Last reviewed
34 terms
- AEO answer engine optimisation Structuring content so it's chosen as the direct answer
- Affinity audience People with a lasting interest, such as coffee or fitness
- AI search answer engines Tools that answer with a written reply instead of links
- Audience targeting Start here: how each channel decides who sees your ads
- Click Someone clicking or tapping your ad
- Context (AI chat) Everything in a conversation an AI uses to shape its answer
- Conversation context The situation a conversation describes; ChatGPT ads match it
- Conversational advertising Ads shown beside the answers in AI assistant conversations
- Conversion An enquiry, call, booking or sale that follows a click
- Conversion tracking The code that tells a platform an ad led to an enquiry
- Cookie A small file that lets a website remember a visitor
- CPA cost per acquisition What each enquiry, booking or sale costs you
- CPC cost per click What you pay, on average, for each click
- CPL cost per lead What each enquiry, call or booking costs you
- CPM cost per mille The price of 1,000 views of your ad
- CTR clickthrough rate The share of people who saw your ad and clicked it
- Described audience Describe your customer in words; the Guru builds the profile
- GEO generative engine optimisation Earning mentions and citations in AI-written answers
- Impression One showing of your ad to one person
- In-market audience People Google sees researching a purchase right now
- Keyword Targeting what people search for, word by word
- Landing page The page someone arrives at after clicking your ad
- Lead Someone who's shown interest and left a way to follow up
- Location targeting Where your ads can show, from a radius to the whole UK
- Lookalike audience New people who resemble your existing customers
- Match type How closely a search has to match your keyword
- Negative keyword A word that stops your ad showing for a search
- PPC pay per click Paying only when someone clicks your ad
- Professional targeting Reaching people by job, seniority, industry and company
- Prompt What someone types or says to an AI assistant
- Remarketing retargeting Showing ads again to people who've visited your site
- ROAS return on ad spend Revenue brought in for every pound of ad spend
- SEO search engine optimisation Improving your site to rank in unpaid search results
- Sponsored card ChatGPT's ad format: a short labelled card beside an answer
No terms match “”.
Try a shorter word, or an abbreviation such as CPC.
Are you ready to grow your business?
No retainers. No lock-ins. Campaigns when you need them.
Strategy calls run for 30 minutes — bring your business and your goal, we will do the rest.