All the technical terms,
in plain language.

#

5xx error#

A server error (500, 502, 503, 504): the web server could not deliver the page. With Always online, visitors see the last good version.

404 and 410#

404: page not found. 410: page deliberately removed. With a 410, Google removes a page from the index faster.

A

A record#

The rule in your DNS that says which IP address your website is on. With Netslim Edge, the A record points to the edge instead of directly to your web server.

A/B test (SEO)#

A test where half of a group of pages gets a change (for example a new title) and the other half does not. By comparing both groups in Search Console, you see whether the change really brings more clicks, regardless of season and Google updates.

AI crawler#

A program from an AI company that reads websites. Some read for search results with source citations (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot), some for a live question from a user (ChatGPT-User), and some to train models (GPTBot, ClaudeBot). You can block the last group without disappearing from AI search results.

API#

A fixed way for two systems to talk to each other. Price Watch, for example, changes prices through the API of your webshop.

B

Backup#

A copy of your site and database, to restore if something goes wrong. On our hosting, it runs daily and automatically.

Backlink#

A link from another website to yours. Google sees good backlinks as a recommendation. According to Google, paid links must get rel="sponsored".

Price floor#

The lowest price you want to charge for a product. Price Watch never goes below it, even if a competitor slashes prices.

Bot#

A program that visits websites automatically. Good bots (like Googlebot) help you get found. Bad bots steal content, try passwords or overload your server.

Bounce#

An email that does not arrive: the address does not exist, the mailbox is full or the server refuses it. A hard bounce means you need to check the address.

Brute force#

An attack where someone tries thousands of passwords in a row. Edge Shield slows it down and blocks it.

C

Cache#

A temporarily stored copy of a page or file, so it is delivered faster next time without your web server having to calculate it again.

Canonical#

A tag that tells Google: this is the official version of this page. It stops near-duplicate pages (for example with filters in the URL) from competing with each other.

Captcha#

A check that a human is behind the screen. Netslim Captcha works without images: you hold a button for a moment while your browser solves a computing task. No tracking and no Google.

CDN#

Content Delivery Network: servers that sit between your visitors and your web server and deliver files and pages close to the visitor. Netslim Edge is our own CDN in Europe, with SEO and security included.

CNAME#

A DNS record that points one name to another name, such as www to your main domain or a verification record for a mail service.

Core Web Vitals#

Three Google measurements for user experience: how fast the main part loads (LCP), how fast the page responds to a click (INP) and whether the layout shifts (CLS).

Crawler#

See Bot. A crawler reads pages to index them, such as Googlebot or Bingbot.

CTR (click-through rate)#

The percentage of people who see you in Google and actually click. A better title and description, or stars and prices in the search result (rich results), raise your CTR.

D

DDoS#

Distributed Denial of Service: an attack where thousands of devices hit your site at the same time until it goes down. Our servers and Edge Shield absorb it.

Deploy#

Putting a new version of your website live. During a deploy a site can stutter for a moment. With Always online, visitors see the last good version.

DKIM#

A digital signature on outgoing mail, checked through a record in your DNS. It proves the mail really comes from your domain and was not changed along the way.

DMARC#

A DNS record that tells recipients what to do with mail that fails SPF and DKIM: nothing, send to spam, or reject. Start with p=none and a report address.

DNS#

The address book of the internet: it translates your domain name into the IP address of the server.

DNSSEC#

A digital signature on your DNS. It means nobody can return a fake IP address for your domain along the way. You can turn it on in the portal, under your domain.

Dofollow and nofollow#

A regular link (dofollow) passes value to the site it points to. With rel="nofollow", "sponsored" or "ugc", the site asks Google not to do that.

Domain Rank (strength)#

A number from 0 to 100 showing how strong a website is in links, calculated by a search data service. Comparable to DR at Ahrefs. A link from a strong domain usually counts for more.

E

Edge#

The edge of the network: servers that sit in front of your web server. Your own site does not have to handle anything that happens there (SEO rules, security, cache).

Edge SEO#

SEO improvements (titles, redirects, canonicals, hreflang, schema) applied on the edge instead of in your CMS. Live in minutes, no developer needed.

Edge Shield#

The security part of Netslim Edge: attack mode during DDoS, rate limiting, brute-force protection, a firewall (WAF), fake bots (Google, ChatGPT, Perplexity) and unwanted AI crawlers kept out, and management only from your own IP.

F

Failover#

Automatically switching to a backup when the main system fails. With a backup server (shadow origin), the edge takes over if your web server goes down.

G

GEO#

Generative Engine Optimization: making sure AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Perplexity and Claude read, understand and mention your site. The counterpart of SEO for AI.

Googlebot#

The Google crawler. We check through DNS whether it is really Google. We block fake Googlebots.

H

H1#

The main heading of a page. Preferably one per page, saying in a few words what the page is about.

Headless#

A web shop or CMS where the front end is separate from the management system, for example a Next.js site on Shopify or Magento.

HMAC#

A digital signature using a shared secret. Our webhook message for price changes is signed this way, so your system knows it really comes from us.

Hreflang#

Tags that tell Google which version of a page is meant for which country or language. Essential if you sell in multiple countries.

HTTP/3#

The latest version of the protocol browsers use to fetch pages. Faster, especially on mobile networks. The edge supports it by default.

I

Impression#

One time your site was shown in Google's search results, even if nobody clicked on it.

IndexNow#

A way to tell Bing, Yandex and others right away that a page has changed, so they read it again sooner.

L

Lowest price guarantee#

With Price Watch: your price is automatically set just below (or equal to) the cheapest competitor, never below your minimum price.

LLM#

Large Language Model: the language model behind AI assistants, such as Claude, GPT or Gemini. You can also connect your own model to the SEO assistant.

llms.txt#

A text file in the root of your site with a summary for AI models: who you are, what you do and which pages matter. Not an official standard yet, but used more and more.

M

Meta description#

The short text below your title in Google. It does not count directly towards your position, but it does affect how often people click.

MX record#

The DNS record that says which server receives the email for your domain, for example at Google Workspace.

N

Nameserver#

The server that manages the DNS of your domain. Whoever manages the nameservers decides where your domain points.

Fake bot#

A bot that pretends to be a well-known crawler, such as Googlebot or GPTBot, to avoid being blocked. The edge recognises them through DNS or through the IP lists that OpenAI and Perplexity publish, and stops them.

O

OAuth#

Log in securely to another service without sharing your password. This is how you connect Google Search Console to your account.

Open and click tracking#

For email: seeing whether a message was delivered, opened or clicked. An open is an indication (some email programs open everything automatically), a bounce is certain.

Origin#

Your own web server, the place where your site actually runs. The edge fetches pages from there.

P

PageSpeed Insights#

Free test from Google that loads a page like a mobile visitor and gives a score from 0 to 100, with figures such as LCP and the server time (TTFB). Where available, figures from real Chrome visitors are shown too.

Position#

Your average place in Google's search results. Lower is better: position 1 is at the top. No one can guarantee a fixed position.

Proof-of-work#

A small computing task in the browser. A human notices nothing, an attacker with millions of requests does. Netslim Captcha and the browser check of Edge Shield work this way.

R

Rate limiting#

A maximum number of requests per visitor per unit of time, so one bot can't overload your site.

reCAPTCHA#

Google's captcha. Version 2 has you click on images, version 3 gives an invisible score based on behavior and Google cookies. It works well, but it sends visitor data to Google.

Redirect (301, 302)#

A redirect from an old address to a new one. 301 is permanent (Google carries over the value), 302 is temporary.

Backup server (shadow origin)#

A second web server with a copy of your site. If the origin server goes down, the edge fetches pages from the backup. Orders and forms never go there.

Rich results#

Extras in the search result, such as stars, prices, stock or shipping costs. They come from structured data (schema) and often increase the click rate. Since 2023, Google only shows FAQs for a few government and health sites, but AI assistants do read them.

Robots.txt#

A file that tells crawlers what they may and may not read. Also the place where you can block AI trainers.

S

Schema (JSON-LD)#

Structured data in the code of your page, so search engines and AI understand exactly what it says: a product, a price, a review, a company.

Search Console#

Google's free dashboard with your clicks, impressions, positions and errors. Once it is linked to your account, you can see the results of Edge there.

SEO#

Search Engine Optimization: making your site so that search engines find it easily, understand it and rank it high.

SEO guard#

Part of Netslim Edge that compares every page with what it saw earlier. If an update accidentally turns on noindex, a title disappears or a page with Google traffic suddenly returns 404, you hear about it within minutes and fix it with one click at the edge.

Serverless computing#

Running code without managing servers yourself. The provider only starts computing power when it is needed (such as AWS Lambda or Cloudflare Workers). Netslim Edge is not a serverless platform: it runs on our own edge servers in Europe. For you it feels similar, though: you don't manage any servers for your rules.

Sitekey and secret#

Two keys to connect a captcha. The sitekey is public in your page, the secret stays on your server and checks the response. A stolen sitekey is worthless without the secret.

Sitemap#

A list of all the pages you want in Google. Helps crawlers find everything, especially on large sites.

SPF#

A TXT record that says which servers may send email on behalf of your domain. There can be only one: two SPF records make both invalid. Combine services with include: in a single record.

SSL / TLS#

The encryption behind the padlock and https. We handle certificates automatically, on the edge too.

Staging#

A test copy of your site, to try changes before they go live.

T

Top pages#

The pages of a site that get the most traffic from Google. For a competitor, they show where their visitors come from.

TTFB#

Time To First Byte: how long it takes before the server starts to respond. From the edge cache, often a few milliseconds.

TTL#

Time To Live: how long something may stay in the cache before it is fetched again.

U

Uptime#

The percentage of time your site is reachable.

W

Waiting room (virtual waiting room)#

A waiting page that the edge shows when it gets too busy, for example during a sale. Visitors see their place in line and move on automatically, so your web server stays up.

WAF#

Web Application Firewall: a filter that detects attacks on your code, such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting and attempts to read .env or backup files. The WAF in Netslim Edge can only monitor, automatically block what a normal visitor never does (such as searching for .env or backups), or block everything, with exceptions per path.

Webhook#

A message one system automatically sends to another system when something happens. For example: "price of SKU X becomes € 119.45".

Z

Keyword gap#

Keywords a competitor ranks well for in Google and you don't. One of the fastest ways to find new pages or better copy. In Netslim Edge under Competitors, per competitor.

Nothing found. Missing a term? Let us know.