Glossary

What we mean when we say “label”, “dormant product” or “structure”.

Basic terms

Revenue

The revenue that advertising brought in over the period.

Spend

How much was charged for clicks and impressions over the period.

Conversion value

The amount the site sends to the ad account together with the order.

Margin

What is left from a sale once the cost of goods is taken out.

Monthly spending limit

The monthly spending limit is the most that Google Ads can charge for one campaign over a month, worked out from the campaign's average daily budget.

Shared budget

A shared budget is one average daily budget that several Google Ads campaigns spend from together.

Campaign total budget

A campaign total budget is one fixed sum for a campaign's whole run, from start date to end date, that Google spreads across the days instead of a daily budget.

Budget pacing

Budget pacing is checking whether ad spend is on course to use up the monthly plan by the end of the month, without running ahead or falling behind.

Limited by budget

Limited by budget is a Google Ads campaign status that means the daily budget runs out before the campaign has taken all the impressions it could win.

Cost of goods sold (COGS)

Cost of goods sold (COGS) is what a store paid to buy or make the products it sold in a period, without the costs of selling them.

Gross profit

Gross profit is the money left from a store's sales once the cost of the goods sold is taken out, before delivery, payment fees and advertising.

Markup

Markup is the amount added to a product's cost to reach its selling price, expressed as a percentage of that cost.

Contribution margin

Contribution margin is the revenue left after the cost of goods and every other cost that comes with each order, and it is what pays for fixed costs and profit.

Price elasticity of demand

Price elasticity of demand is a measure of how much the number of units sold changes when the price of a product changes.

Unit economics

Unit economics is the calculation of how much profit one order leaves after paying for the goods, the costs of fulfilling it and the ads that won it.

Clearance pricing

Clearance pricing is selling slow or leftover stock below its usual price, sometimes below what the store paid, to turn it back into cash and free up space.

Free shipping threshold

A free shipping threshold is the order amount from which a store delivers for free, while customers with smaller orders pay the standard delivery rate.

Currency conversion

Currency conversion is turning product prices and order values from one currency into another, as Google does in Shopping ads and Google Ads reports.

Return rate

Return rate is the share of orders, or of their value, that customers send back or cancel after buying.

Product bundle

A product bundle is a set of several products that a store sells together as one item at a single price.

Efficiency

ROAS

How much revenue every unit of ad spend brings in.

Cost of sale (ACoS)

Advertising cost of sale — what share of the revenue advertising eats up.

POAS

How much profit every unit of ad spend brings in.

ROI

Return on the money invested: how much profit is left over and above the spend.

Conversion rate

The share of clicks that ended in an order.

Clicks

How many times a person went through to the site from an ad.

CTR

The share of impressions that ended in a click.

Cost per click

What one click from an ad costs on average.

Cost per thousand impressions

What a thousand impressions of an ad cost.

Break-even ROAS (return on ad spend)

Break-even ROAS is the return on ad spend at which the margin from ad-driven sales exactly covers the ad spend, leaving neither profit nor loss.

MER (marketing efficiency ratio)

MER is the ratio of a store's total revenue to its total marketing spend over the same period, without splitting sales by channel.

Marginal ROAS (marginal return on ad spend)

Marginal ROAS is the revenue that each extra unit of ad spend brings in at the current level, while ordinary ROAS is the average across all spend.

Break-even CPA (cost per acquisition)

Break-even CPA is the most a store can pay in advertising for one order before that order starts losing money.

Break-even CPC (cost per click)

Break-even CPC is the highest average price per click at which the profit on the orders those clicks bring still covers what the clicks cost.

Revenue per click (RPC)

Revenue per click is the average revenue that one ad click brings in.

Campaign types

Ad campaign

The unit that holds the budget, the goal and the bidding strategy.

Performance Max

A campaign type that spreads its impressions across every Google surface on its own.

Shopping campaign

A campaign type that shows product listings with an image, a price and the shop's name.

Search campaign

A campaign type with text ads shown against what people search for.

Demand Gen

A campaign type for demand that does not exist yet: YouTube, Discover, Gmail.

Awareness campaigns

Campaigns that work on recognition rather than on direct orders.

Targeting

The conditions under which an ad can be shown at all.

Asset group

An asset group is the unit inside a Performance Max campaign that holds its ad creatives, the products those ads can show and optional hints about the audience.

Listing group

A listing group is a node in a Performance Max asset group's product tree that includes or excludes products by a feed attribute, such as brand or category.

Ad strength

Ad strength is Google's rating, from Poor to Excellent, of how well an asset group or an ad, such as a responsive search ad, is set up with assets.

Audience signals

Audience signals are optional hints in a Performance Max asset group that tell Google which people are most likely to buy: a starting point, not a limit.

Campaign overlap

Campaign overlap is a setup in which one product or search can be served by several of your campaigns or asset groups, which split its clicks and conversions.

Feed-only Performance Max

Feed-only Performance Max is a Performance Max campaign that runs on Merchant Center product data alone, with no headlines, images or videos of your own.

Search themes

Search themes are words and phrases in a Performance Max asset group that tell Google which searches to add to those it finds from your feed and site.

Campaign priority

Campaign priority is a Standard Shopping setting that decides which of your Shopping campaigns bids for a product when several of them include it.

Final URL expansion

Final URL expansion is a setting in Performance Max and AI Max that lets Google send a click to another page of your site that better fits the person's intent.

Query sculpting

Query sculpting is a Standard Shopping technique that combines campaign priority and negative keywords to bid differently on generic and specific searches.

Location targeting

Location targeting is the setting that defines where your ads can show and whether Google reaches only people in those places or also people interested in them.

Keyword match types

Keyword match types are the setting on each Google Ads keyword that decides how far a search can differ from the keyword for your ad to still show.

Negative keywords

Negative keywords are words and phrases you add in Google Ads so that your ads don't show for searches that contain them.

AI Max for Search campaigns

AI Max for Search campaigns is a set of Google AI features inside a Search campaign that reach queries beyond its keywords and adapt ad text and landing pages.

Brand exclusions

Brand exclusions are lists of brands that stop a Performance Max campaign, or a Search campaign with AI Max turned on, from showing ads on searches for them.

Brand bidding

Brand bidding is paying for ads on searches for someone else's brand, such as an affiliate, a reseller or a competitor bidding on your store's name.

Branded search

Branded search is the set of search queries that contain your store's name or the names of your own brands, alone or with other words.

Placement exclusions

Placement exclusions are lists of websites, apps, YouTube channels and videos where a Google Ads account or campaign doesn't show its ads.

Video campaign

A video campaign is a Google Ads campaign type that shows video ads on YouTube and on the sites and apps of Google video partners.

Channel controls

Channel controls are a Demand Gen setting that lets you choose where an ad group's ads appear, such as YouTube, Discover, Gmail, Maps or the Display Network.

Promotion asset

A promotion asset is a Google Ads asset that adds a sale or special offer, with its discount and dates, to your ads.

Strategies

Auction

The mechanism Google uses to pick whose ad to show and in what order.

Smart Bidding

The set of strategies where Google picks the bid in every auction.

Target CPA

A strategy that gathers conversions at the price you set.

Target ROAS

A strategy that gathers the most revenue at the return you set.

Maximize conversions

A strategy that gathers as many orders as it can within the budget.

Maximize conversion value

A strategy that gathers the most revenue it can within the budget.

Enhanced cost per click

An add-on over manual bidding: Google adjusts your bids for the sake of conversions.

Manual CPC

A strategy where you set the click bid yourself.

Learning period

The time a strategy needs to gather data after a change.

Maximize clicks

Maximize clicks is a Google Ads bid strategy that sets bids to get as many clicks as possible within the budget, whether or not those clicks lead to orders.

Value-based bidding

Value-based bidding is the group of Smart Bidding strategies that aim at the total value of conversions, such as order revenue, rather than at their number.

Portfolio bid strategy

A portfolio bid strategy is a Google Ads bid strategy shared by several campaigns, so Google bids towards one goal for the group as a whole.

Maximum CPC bid limit

A maximum CPC bid limit is the highest bid per click that an automated bid strategy is allowed to place in any auction.

Conversion value rules

Conversion value rules are Google Ads settings that raise or lower a conversion's value by the customer's location, device or audience for value-based bidding.

Smart Bidding Exploration

Smart Bidding Exploration is a Google Ads setting that lets a target ROAS campaign accept a lower return for conversions from searches it has not been winning.

ROAS tolerance

ROAS tolerance is the share by which Google Ads may let a campaign's return fall below its target ROAS in exchange for traffic it has not been winning.

Seasonality adjustment

A seasonality adjustment is a note to Google's Smart Bidding that the conversion rate will jump or drop for a few days, for example during a short sale.

Data exclusion

A data exclusion is a Google Ads setting that tells Smart Bidding to ignore the data from a set of dates when conversion tracking was broken.

Promotion mode

Promotion mode is a Google Ads beta setting that changes a campaign's ROAS tolerance and adds daily budget only for the scheduled dates of a sale or short peak.

Customer retention goal

The customer retention goal is a Google Ads lifecycle goal that helps campaigns win back lapsed customers by giving their purchases extra conversion value.

New customer acquisition goal

The new customer acquisition goal is a Google Ads setting that makes a campaign bid higher for people Google counts as new customers, or bid only for them.

Coverage and assortment

Impression share

How much of the available impressions your ads took.

Assortment coverage

What share of the catalogue takes part in advertising.

Products with spend

Products that money was spent on over the period.

Seasonality

The rise and fall in demand that repeats from one year to the next.

SKU

A single catalogue item — the thing that counts as one product.

Product category

The classification of a product in the feed that tells Google what you sell.

Product listing

How a product looks in shopping blocks: image, name, price, shop.

Brand

The feed field that holds the maker of the product.

ABC analysis

ABC analysis is a way to split a catalogue into three classes by revenue share: A for the few products that bring most of it, C for the many that bring little.

Assortment planning

Assortment planning is the process of deciding which products a store carries, in which categories and in what quantity.

Lost impression share

Lost impression share is the share of impressions your ads were eligible for but did not get because the budget ran short or their Ad Rank was too low.

XYZ analysis

XYZ analysis is a way to sort products by how steady their demand is, from X for products that sell evenly to Z for products that sell irregularly.

Assortment breadth

Assortment breadth is the number of different product categories, or product lines, that a store sells.

Assortment depth

Assortment depth is the number of options a store offers inside one product category: models, sizes, colours and price tiers.

Pareto principle (80/20 rule)

The Pareto principle is the rule of thumb that a small share of causes, such as a few products, accounts for most of the results.

Price tier

A price tier is a band of prices within one product category, such as entry-level, mid-range or premium, used to group products by what they cost.

Private label

Private label is a range of products that a manufacturer makes for a store and the store sells under its own brand.

Long tail

The long tail is the large group of products in a catalogue that each sell only once or twice in a period but together bring in a noticeable share of revenue.

Bestseller

A bestseller is a product that sells more than most others in its range over a chosen period.

Product lifecycle

The product lifecycle is the path a product's sales follow from launch through growth and a plateau to decline.

Catalogue renewal

Catalogue renewal is the regular replacement of part of a store's range with new products, keeping the ones that start to sell and dropping the rest.

Product cannibalisation

Product cannibalisation is a new product taking sales from a store's existing products instead of bringing in extra sales.

New product vitality index (NPVI)

The new product vitality index is the share of a company's revenue that comes from products it introduced within a recent, fixed period.

New product hit rate

New product hit rate is the share of newly added products that sell at least once within a set period after launch.

Inventory turnover

Inventory turnover is the number of times a store sells and replaces its average stock over a period such as a year.

Sell-through rate

Sell-through rate is the percentage of the stock a store received in a period that it sold within that same period.

Merchandising

Merchandising is the work of presenting products so that shoppers notice the right ones and buy them, on a store's shelves or on its website.

Stockout

A stockout is the moment a product runs out of stock and the store cannot sell it, even to shoppers who want it, until it is restocked.

Dead stock

Dead stock is inventory that has not sold within the period a store expects, so the money paid for it stays tied up.

SKU rationalization

SKU rationalization is a review of the catalogue that cuts items whose sales do not justify the money, space and work they tie up.

Reseller

A reseller is a store that buys products made by other companies and sells them under the makers' brands rather than its own.

Print on demand

Print on demand is a way of selling where a product, such as a T-shirt or mug, is printed only after a customer orders it, so the store keeps no finished stock.

Peak season

Peak season is the part of the year when demand for a store's products, or for one of its categories, runs well above its usual level.

Seasonal index

A seasonal index is a number that shows how a calendar month's sales compare with sales in an average month of the year.

Peak-to-trough ratio

The peak-to-trough ratio is a single number for how seasonal a store is: how many times its best months out-earn its worst ones.

Off-season

The off-season is the part of the year when demand for a store's products is regularly lower than in its other months.

Counter-seasonal category

A counter-seasonal category is a product category whose best months fall in the store's weakest months, so it sells when the rest of the range is quiet.

BFCM (Black Friday – Cyber Monday)

BFCM is the sales period from Black Friday to Cyber Monday, at the end of November or the very start of December, when retailers concentrate their discounts.

Promo calendar

A promo calendar is a store's yearly plan of sales events, holidays and seasonal peaks, showing when to prepare stock, offers and ad budget for each.

Feed and Merchant Center

Merchant Center

The Google service through which a shop's products reach shopping ads.

Feed

The file of product data that a shop hands over to Merchant Center.

Feed score

A score from 0 to 100 showing how completely the product data is filled in.

Approval

The share of products Merchant Center has approved and is ready to show.

Disapproved products

Products that Merchant Center rejected and does not show.

GTIN

The global trade item number — the manufacturer's barcode.

Title and description

The text fields of a product in the feed.

Structured title

A structured title is the Merchant Center attribute that carries a product's title together with a mark saying whether generative AI wrote it.

Item ID

An item ID is a store's own unique code for a product in its Merchant Center feed, under which Google keeps the product's data and reports its performance.

Advanced account (Merchant Center)

An advanced account is a Merchant Center account built to manage several other Merchant Center accounts, called sub-accounts, from one place.

Autofeed

An autofeed is a Merchant Center data source that Google builds on its own by crawling an online store and reading the product data on its pages.

Merchant API

Merchant API is Google's programming interface for reading and managing Merchant Center data, and the successor to the Content API for Shopping.

Supplemental feed

A supplemental feed is a secondary Merchant Center data source that adds or replaces attributes for products the primary feed already sends, matched by item ID.

identifier_exists

identifier_exists is the Merchant Center attribute that tells Google whether a product has the identifiers usual for its category, such as GTIN, MPN and brand.

Product variants

Product variants are versions of one product, such as sizes or colours, that a Merchant Center feed lists as separate items sharing one item group ID.

Attribute rules

Attribute rules are Merchant Center settings that change your product data before Google uses it, for example by taking the title from a supplemental feed.

Content language

Content language is the language of a Merchant Center data source, fixed when the source is created; Google shows its products to people who use that language.

MPN (manufacturer part number)

MPN is the code a manufacturer gives a product to tell it apart from the rest of its range; in Merchant Center it goes in the mpn attribute.

Availability

Availability is the product feed attribute that tells Google whether a product is in stock, out of stock, on preorder or on backorder.

Feed label

A feed label is a short code on each Merchant Center product that groups products into sets, so you can point a Shopping or Performance Max campaign at one set.

Automatic item updates

Automatic item updates is a Merchant Center feature that corrects a product's price, availability or condition to match its page on your website.

Sale price

A sale price is the reduced price a store sends to Google in the sale_price feed attribute, while the full price stays in the price attribute.

Sale price annotation

A sale price annotation is the original price that Google may show crossed out next to a product's current, lower price, together with a sale badge.

Automated discounts

Automated discounts is a Merchant Center feature in which Google lowers the prices of products a store opts in, never below a minimum price the store sets.

Custom label

A custom label is one of five optional Merchant Center fields a store fills with its own values to group products in Shopping and Performance Max campaigns.

Popularity rank

Popularity rank is an optional Merchant Center product attribute in which a store states how well a product sells compared with the rest of its own catalogue.

Excluded destination

Excluded destination is a Merchant Center attribute that keeps a product in the feed but out of the places you name, such as Shopping ads or free listings.

Merchant promotions

Merchant promotions are special offers, such as a discount, free shipping or a gift, that a store sets up in Merchant Center to show next to its products.

Product type

Product type is an optional Merchant Center attribute, product_type, that puts a product in the store's own category tree, which campaigns can use for grouping.

Local inventory

Local inventory is the stock data per product and per physical store that a retailer sends to Merchant Center for local inventory ads and free local listings.

Product image

A product image is a photo a store sends to Merchant Center for a product: the one required main image or an optional additional or lifestyle image.

Shipping settings

Shipping settings are the delivery rules a store sets in Merchant Center for each country, telling Google what delivery costs and how long it takes.

Product highlight

A product highlight is an optional Merchant Center attribute, product_highlight, that holds short bullet points about the most important features of a product.

Return policy

A return policy is a store's terms for taking goods back, such as the time limit, the return method and who pays, which Google can show next to its products.

Conversational attributes

Conversational attributes are six optional Merchant Center attributes that add product facts, several meant primarily for conversational search like AI Mode.

Seller ratings

Seller ratings, now called store ratings, are Google's five-star score for a whole online store, built mainly from customer reviews and shown with its ads and listings.

Unit pricing

Unit pricing is showing a product's price per standard quantity, such as per kilogram or per litre, so that buyers can compare packs of different sizes.

Product ratings

Product ratings are 1-to-5 star ratings with a review count that Google shows for a product on Shopping ads and free listings, compiled from several sources.

Needs attention (Merchant Center)

Needs attention is the Merchant Center tab, formerly called Diagnostics, that lists the products with issues to fix.

Account suspension

Account suspension is a block on a whole Merchant Center account that stops all its products from showing, unlike the rejection of individual products.

Business verification

Business verification is the check in which Google confirms who stands behind a Google Ads or Merchant Center account.

Misrepresentation

Misrepresentation is Google's Shopping policy against presenting a business, its products or its offers in a way that misleads shoppers.

Best sellers report

The Best sellers report is a Merchant Center ranking of the most popular products and brands on Google, by category and country, that shows which you carry.

Competitive visibility

Competitive visibility is a Merchant Center report on how often other shops appear on Google next to and above yours in one product category and country.

Price competitiveness

Price competitiveness is how a product's price compares with the benchmark price at which other retailers sell the same product on Google.

Price insights

Price insights is a Merchant Center report that suggests a sale price for a product and predicts how its clicks and conversions would change at that price.

Measurement and tracking

Conversion action

A conversion action is a Google Ads setting that defines one kind of conversion, such as a purchase or a call, and how it is tracked, counted and valued.

Conversion goal

A conversion goal is a group of Google Ads conversion actions of one category, such as purchases or calls, that a campaign bids towards.

Primary conversion action

A primary conversion action is a Google Ads conversion action set to drive bidding and count in the Conversions column; a secondary one is for observation only.

Google Tag Manager (GTM)

Google Tag Manager is Google's tag management system, which lets a store add and change tracking tags on its site without editing the site's code.

dataLayer

dataLayer is the JavaScript array on a web page that the site uses to pass data, such as order details, to Google Tag Manager and the Google tag.

Default conversion value

A default conversion value is the fixed amount Google Ads records for a conversion when the order amount is missing or the action is set to always use it.

All conversions

All conversions is a Google Ads column that counts conversions from every action in the account, including the secondary actions that bidding ignores.

Conversion adjustment

A conversion adjustment is a correction a store sends to Google Ads for a conversion already recorded, usually to cancel it or change its value.

Micro-conversion

A micro-conversion is a step towards an order, such as an add to cart or a checkout start, that a store tracks as a conversion before any money is paid.

Transaction ID

A transaction ID is the unique order number sent with each purchase conversion, so Google Ads and GA4 count every order once and can match refunds to it.

Conversion window

A conversion window is the period after someone interacts with an ad during which a purchase or other conversion is still credited to that ad.

View-through conversion

A view-through conversion is one Google Ads records when someone sees an ad, doesn't interact with any of the advertiser's ads and converts within a set window.

Conversion lag

Conversion lag is the time between an ad click and the purchase that follows it, which leaves the latest days of a report short of orders still to come.

Attribution model

An attribution model is the rule that decides how to split the credit for one order among the ad clicks and channels a customer went through before buying.

Consent Mode

Consent Mode is a Google tag feature that tells the tags each visitor's cookie consent choice, so they adjust what they store and send to Google.

Modeled conversions

Modeled conversions are estimates that Google Ads or GA4 add to measured conversions for visitors they cannot fully observe, such as those who declined cookies.

Conversions with cart data

Conversions with cart data is an extension of purchase tracking that tells Google Ads which items were in each order, at what price and in what quantity.

Enhanced conversions

Enhanced conversions is a Google Ads feature that adds hashed customer data, such as an email address, to a conversion so Google can measure it more accurately.

Conversion Linker

Conversion Linker is a Google Tag Manager tag that stores ad click details in the shop's own cookies, so a later purchase can be tied back to that click.

Auto-tagging

Auto-tagging is a Google Ads account setting that adds a click ID, the GCLID, to the landing page address, so that Google can tie a later order to the ad click.

GCLID (Google Click ID)

GCLID is the Google Click ID, a parameter Google Ads adds to the landing page address so a later conversion can be tied to the click and its campaign.

Offline conversion import

Offline conversion import is the upload to Google Ads of orders completed off the website, such as by phone or in a shop, matched to the ad clicks behind them.

UTM parameters

UTM parameters are tags added to a link, such as utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign, that tell an analytics tool where a visit came from.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4)

Google Analytics 4 is Google's analytics service that records what visitors do on a website or app as events and shows which channels bring them to a purchase.

Key event

A key event is a Google Analytics 4 event, such as a purchase, that you mark as important so GA4 reports it separately and Google Ads can import it.

Measurement Protocol

The Measurement Protocol is Google's way to send events to Google Analytics 4 from a server, for actions the site's tag cannot see, such as a refund.

Google tag gateway

Google tag gateway for advertisers is a setup that loads Google's measurement tags from the store's own domain and sends some of their requests through it.

Server-side tagging

Server-side tagging is a setup where a site sends tracking events to a server container the store controls, which decides what goes to Google, Meta and others.

Conversions API (Meta CAPI)

The Conversions API is Meta's connection for sending a store's events, such as purchases, to Meta from the store's server instead of the shopper's browser.

Data-driven attribution (DDA)

Data-driven attribution is the attribution model in which Google splits the credit for a conversion among the ads before it, using the account's own data.

Event deduplication

Event deduplication is how an ad platform merges two copies of one event, one sent from the browser and one from the server, so that it counts the event once.

Event match quality (EMQ)

Event match quality is Meta's score out of 10 for how effective the customer information in a server event may be at matching it to a Meta account.

TikTok Pixel

The TikTok Pixel is code on a store's website that sends events, such as product views, adds to cart and purchases, to TikTok to measure and optimise ads.

UET tag (Universal Event Tracking)

A UET tag is the Microsoft Advertising tracking code, added to every page of a site, that records what visitors do for conversion tracking and remarketing.

Cross-domain tracking

Cross-domain tracking is a Google Analytics setup that keeps one visitor and one session as a shopper moves between your own domains, such as shop and checkout.

Reports and analysis

Anomaly detection

Anomaly detection is the automatic search for figures in an ad account that break sharply from their usual level, such as a sudden drop in sales.

Auction insights

Auction insights is a Google Ads report that compares your ads with other advertisers in the same auctions, such as how often their ads showed when yours did.

Channel performance report

The channel performance report is a Performance Max report that splits a campaign's impressions, spend and conversions by Google channel, such as YouTube.

Incrementality

Incrementality is the part of sales that would not have happened without the advertising, as opposed to the sales the ads were merely given credit for.

Campaign experiment

A campaign experiment is a Google Ads test that splits traffic between a campaign and a changed version of it over the same dates to show what the change does.

Geo lift test

A geo lift test is an experiment that switches ads off or raises ad spend in some regions but not in others, so the gap in sales shows what the ads really add.

Halo effect

The halo effect is the rise in sales or searches in one channel caused by advertising in another, such as Meta or YouTube ads lifting Google Shopping sales.

Statistical significance

Statistical significance is the verdict that a difference seen in a test is unlikely to be chance alone at a threshold set before the test began.

Marketing mix modeling (MMM)

Marketing mix modeling (MMM) is a statistical model that estimates what each marketing channel adds to sales from weekly totals, without tracking customers.

Lookback window

A lookback window is the stretch of past data you look at, such as the last month or the last year, when you judge how products and campaigns perform.

Product-level reporting

Product-level reporting is the breakdown of Shopping and Performance Max results by product, with each product's impressions, clicks, cost and conversions.

Search terms report

The search terms report is a Google Ads report that lists the actual searches your ads appeared for and how each of them performed.

Search terms insights

Search terms insights is a Google Ads report that groups the searches your ads appeared for into categories by intent and shows results for each group.

Custom columns

Custom columns are columns you add to Google Ads tables yourself, with a formula built from the account's own metrics, typed-in numbers and filters.

Looker Studio (now Data Studio)

Looker Studio, now called Data Studio again, is Google's free tool for building reports and dashboards from Google Ads, GA4 and other data sources.

Search volume

Search volume is the number of times people search for a query on Google over a period, most often given as an average per month.

Keyword Planner

Keyword Planner is a Google Ads tool that suggests keywords and estimates how often they are searched each month and what advertisers pay to show ads on them.

Performance Planner

Performance Planner is a Google Ads tool that forecasts the clicks, conversions and conversion value your campaigns would get at a different budget or target.

Google Trends

Google Trends is a free Google tool that shows how search interest in a term or topic changes over time and by place, as a relative index, not a search count.

Year-over-year (YoY)

Year-over-year (YoY) is a comparison of a period with the same period a year earlier, so that seasonality does not pass for growth or decline.

Detrending

Detrending is removing a store's overall growth or decline from its monthly sales, so that what is left shows the season without the growth.

Demand forecast

A demand forecast is an estimate of how much a store will sell in the coming months, built from the shape of its season and its current level of sales.

Customers and retention

Customer acquisition cost (CAC)

Customer acquisition cost is what a store spends to win one new customer, meaning a person who places their first order.

Customer lifetime value (CLV)

Customer lifetime value is the revenue, or the margin, that one customer brings a store across all the orders they place.

LTV:CAC ratio

The LTV:CAC ratio is the value a customer brings a store across all their orders, divided by what it cost to win that customer.

Purchase frequency

Purchase frequency is the average number of orders a customer places in a chosen period, such as a year.

Repeat purchase rate

Repeat purchase rate is the share of a store's customers who placed two or more orders within a chosen period.

Returning customer

A returning customer is a buyer who places an order when their order history with the store already includes at least one earlier order.

Customer retention rate

Customer retention rate is the share of a store's customers at the start of a period who are still active customers at the end of it.

Churn rate

Churn rate is the share of a store's customers who stop buying, counted as those with no order within a chosen period.

Cohort analysis

Cohort analysis is a way to follow groups of customers who started at the same time, such as one month's first-time buyers, and see how many buy again.

RFM segmentation

RFM segmentation is a way of grouping a store's customers by how recently they last ordered, how often they order and how much they have spent.

First-party data

First-party data is information a store collects directly from its own customers and visitors, such as orders, email addresses, phone numbers and activity on its site.

Remarketing

Remarketing is advertising aimed at people who have already visited a store's website or app, or who are on its customer lists.

Customer segmentation

Customer segmentation is dividing a store's customers into groups by their behaviour or characteristics so that each group gets its own message, offer or bid.

Loyalty program

A loyalty programme is a scheme that rewards a store's customers for buying again, with points, cashback, member prices, free shipping or membership tiers.

Referral program

A referral programme is a scheme in which a store rewards existing customers for bringing in new ones, usually also giving the new customer a discount.

Customer Match

Customer Match is a Google Ads feature that matches a store's own customer data, such as emails and phone numbers, to Google accounts to build an ad audience.

Lookalike segments

Lookalike segments are audiences of people who share characteristics with a store's existing customers or visitors, built from a seed list the store provides.

Dynamic remarketing

Dynamic remarketing is a form of remarketing whose ads show past visitors the products they viewed on a store's site, taken from its product feed.

Marketing consent

Marketing consent is a person's permission for a store to send them promotional messages, such as offers and newsletters by email or text message.

Email list

An email list is a store's own register of people it may send marketing emails to, built from signup forms, a box ticked at checkout and other subscriptions.

Email flow

An email flow is an automated series of emails sent to each shopper who triggers it, for example by subscribing, leaving a checkout or placing an order.

Abandoned cart email

An abandoned cart email is an automated message sent to a shopper who added products to the cart or started checkout but left without placing an order.

Back-in-stock alert

A back-in-stock alert is an automated message that tells shoppers who asked to be notified that a sold-out product can be bought again.

Price-drop alert

A price-drop alert is an automated message that tells shoppers who looked at a product that its price has gone down.

Win-back campaign

A win-back campaign is a series of messages, offers or ads aimed at past customers who have stopped buying, to bring them back for another order.

Email deliverability

Email deliverability is a sender's ability to get emails into recipients' inboxes rather than spam folders once the receiving mail server has accepted them.

Email open rate

Email open rate is the share of delivered emails that an email service records as opened, judged by whether a tracking image inside the email was loaded.

SMS marketing

SMS marketing is a store's use of text messages and messenger apps such as Viber, WhatsApp or Telegram to send customers offers, reminders and order updates.

Website and SEO

Ecommerce SEO

Ecommerce SEO is the work of making an online store's category and product pages easy for search engines to find, understand and show in unpaid results.

Organic traffic

Organic traffic is visits that a site gets from unpaid results, such as regular search results and free product listings, rather than from ad clicks.

Google Search Console

Google Search Console is a free Google service that shows how a site performs in Google Search: queries, clicks, indexed pages and the problems Google finds.

SEO audit

An SEO audit is a review of a site for technical and content problems that hold back its unpaid Google traffic, with an estimate of what each fix would bring.

A/B test

An A/B test is a comparison of two page versions shown at random to different visitors at the same time, to see which leads more of them to the target action.

Googlebot

Googlebot is the generic name for Google Search's web crawlers, the programs that fetch a site's pages so that Google can consider them for its index.

Indexing

Indexing is the stage at which Google analyses a crawled page and stores it in its index, the database that search results come from.

noindex

noindex is a rule in a page's code or HTTP header that tells Google and other search engines that support it to keep the page out of search results.

XML sitemap

An XML sitemap is a file that lists the URLs of pages a site wants search engines to find, with optional details such as when each page last changed.

Canonical URL

A canonical URL is the main address of a page that opens at several addresses: the site suggests it, and Google makes the final choice.

Duplicate content

Duplicate content is the same or nearly the same page content that can be reached at more than one address, on one site or across its country versions.

hreflang

hreflang is an annotation that tells Google which pages are language or country versions of one page, so Search can show each searcher the right one.

Structured data

Structured data is markup that describes a page's content in a standard vocabulary, such as a product's price and availability, so search engines can read it.

Category page

A category page is a page of an online store that lists the products of one category, such as all wine glasses, and links to each of them.

Faceted navigation

Faceted navigation is a set of category-page filters, such as price or colour, that narrow the product list and usually give each combination its own address.

Pagination

Pagination is splitting a long list, such as the products of one category, into numbered pages, each with its own address.

Core update

A core update is a broad change to how Google ranks organic search results, made several times a year, that can move a store's pages up or down even when nothing is wrong with them.

Internal linking

Internal linking is the set of links between a site's pages that visitors and Google follow to find pages and that Google uses to judge each page's importance.

Merchant listing experiences

Merchant listing experiences are the ways Google Search can show a product from a page where shoppers can buy it from you, with price and shipping details.

Image SEO

Image SEO is the work that helps Google find and understand the photos on a store's pages, so they can appear in Google Images, Google Lens and search results.

Review snippet

A review snippet is a Google Search result with star ratings and a review summary, which Google may show when a page has valid review or rating markup.

Conversion rate optimisation (CRO)

Conversion rate optimisation (CRO) is the work on a store's website that gets a larger share of visitors to place an order, without paying for more traffic.

Add-to-cart rate

Add-to-cart rate is the share of sessions in which a shopper puts a product in the cart, or the share of a product's viewers who add it.

Crawl budget

Crawl budget is the set of a site's URLs that Google can and wants to crawl, limited by how much load the server can take and by Google's demand for those pages.

Checkout

Checkout is the sequence of steps after the cart in which a shopper gives contact, delivery and payment details and places the order.

Cart abandonment rate

Cart abandonment rate is the share of shopping carts with at least one product that are left without an order.

301 redirect

A 301 redirect is a server response saying a page has moved to a new address for good, so visitors and Google are sent there automatically.

Soft 404

A soft 404 is a page that says there is nothing here, such as a removed product, yet returns a success code, so Google leaves it out of Search as an error.

Site migration

A site migration is a store's move to a new platform, domain or URL structure, after which the same pages and products must keep their history at new addresses.

Content marketing

Content marketing is publishing useful articles, guides and reviews that help people choose, so that shoppers still deciding find the store and buy from it.

Buying guide

A buying guide is a store's article that helps a shopper work out which kind of product fits their needs and then leads them to the matching products.

Page speed

Page speed is how quickly a web page loads and becomes usable for a visitor, measured on real visits or in a simulated test.

Core Web Vitals are three Google metrics of how a page feels to real visitors: how fast the main content loads (LCP), how quickly the page responds to a tap or click (INP) and how stable the layout stays (CLS).

Landing page experience

Landing page experience is Google Ads' estimate of how relevant and useful the page behind an ad will be to people who click it, rated for each keyword.

Cloaking

Cloaking is showing search engines different content from what people see, to manipulate rankings and mislead users, which Google's spam policies forbid.

Scaled content abuse

Scaled content abuse is generating many pages mainly to manipulate search rankings rather than to help users, a practice that breaks Google's spam policies.

Channels and markets

AI Overviews

AI Overviews are short AI-generated answers that Google Search shows above the ordinary results, with links to the pages they draw on.

Free listings

Free listings are unpaid product results that Google builds from Merchant Center data and can show on the Shopping tab, in Search, on YouTube and elsewhere.

AI Mode

AI Mode is a conversational mode of Google Search that answers a question with an AI-generated response and links to the web, then takes follow-up questions.

Agentic commerce

Agentic commerce is shopping in which an AI agent acts for a person, from finding and comparing products to placing the order.

Online marketplace

An online marketplace is a website or app run by one company on which many other sellers offer their products and shoppers buy from them.

Marketplace commission

Marketplace commission is the fee a marketplace charges a seller for each item sold, usually a percentage of the price at a rate set by product category.

Catalog ads

Catalog ads are ads that a social platform such as Meta, TikTok or Pinterest builds automatically from a store's catalogue, picking products for each person.

Multichannel selling

Multichannel selling is selling one catalogue through several sales channels at once, such as your own website, marketplaces and social media shops.

Retail media

Retail media is advertising that a marketplace or retailer sells to its sellers and brands, targeted with its own shopper data, on its own site and beyond it.

Offsite ads

Offsite ads are ads a marketplace buys on Google, social media and other outside channels to promote its sellers' listings, paid for out of the sellers' sales.

Feed syndication

Feed syndication is turning one master catalogue into a separate feed for each sales channel, such as Google, Meta, price comparison sites and marketplaces.

Multi-store

Multi-store is a set-up in which one owner runs two or more online stores or brands, either in one Google Ads account or in separate accounts.

Media mix

Media mix is the split of a store's advertising budget between channels, such as Google Ads, Meta ads and advertising on marketplaces.

Meta catalog

A Meta catalog is the container in Meta's Commerce Manager that holds a store's products and their details for ads and shops on Facebook and Instagram.

Product set (Meta)

A product set is a group of products from a Meta catalogue, chosen by filters or by hand, that an ad promotes instead of the whole catalogue.

Advantage+ sales campaign (Meta)

An Advantage+ sales campaign is a Meta sales campaign in which Meta picks the audience, placements and budget split; it replaced Advantage+ shopping campaigns.

Channel cannibalization

Channel cannibalization is competition for one buyer between a store's own sales channels, such as its website, its marketplace listings and a second store.

Creative fatigue

Creative fatigue is the drop in response to an ad that its audience has seen too many times, which can show up as fewer clicks and a higher cost per result.

Connected TV (CTV)

Connected TV (CTV) is a television that streams over the internet, as a smart TV or through a game console or streaming device, and can show ads in apps like YouTube.

Microsoft Merchant Center

Microsoft Merchant Center is the part of Microsoft Advertising where a store keeps its product catalogue for Microsoft Shopping campaigns and Performance Max.

Cross-border ecommerce

Cross-border ecommerce is selling online to customers in other countries, either from one store or from a separate store for each market.

Localisation

Localisation is adapting a store and its ads to a new market's language and buying conditions, from product data and site texts to prices, delivery and returns.

Channel conflict

Channel conflict is competition for the same buyer between businesses that sell the same products, such as a brand, its resellers and marketplace sellers.

Price parity

Price parity is keeping a product at the same price in every sales channel, whether a brand asks resellers for it or a platform requires it of sellers.

Price comparison engine

A price comparison engine is a website where shoppers compare one product's offers from many shops, then click through to buy on the chosen shop's own site.

Comparison Shopping Service (CSS)

A Comparison Shopping Service (CSS) is a comparison website that places stores' Shopping ads on Google in 21 European countries, including the UK and Switzerland.

Product matching

Product matching is how Google or a price comparison site recognises offers from different shops as one product, so it can show them side by side.

Account and tools

PPC agency

A PPC agency is a company that runs a business's pay-per-click advertising, such as Google Ads, for a fee, with a team rather than one person doing the work.

Manager account (MCC)

A manager account is a Google Ads account that lets you view and manage many other Google Ads accounts with one sign-in, without running ads of its own.

Access levels

Access levels are the roles in a Google Ads account that decide what each user can see and change, from receiving emails to managing other users.

Google Partner

Google Partner is a status Google gives to agencies and other companies that run Google Ads for clients and meet its performance, spend and certification requirements.

Account currency

Account currency is the currency a Google Ads account is billed in and reports in, chosen once when the account is created.

Management fee

A management fee is what a store pays an agency or a freelancer for running its ads, on top of what it pays Google for the ads themselves.

Google Ads recommendations

Google Ads recommendations are changes that Google suggests for an account, such as a higher budget or a new bid strategy, and that you can apply or dismiss.

Optimization score

Optimization score is Google's estimate of how well a Google Ads account or campaign is set to perform, shown as a percentage.

Auto-apply recommendations

Auto-apply recommendations is a Google Ads setting that lets Google apply the recommendation types you select without asking you to approve each change.

MCP server (Model Context Protocol)

An MCP server is a program that lets an AI assistant, such as Claude or ChatGPT, read data from another system or act in it through the Model Context Protocol.

Account audit

An account audit is a step-by-step review of a Google Ads account that checks whether its data, products, campaigns and bidding work for the store.

Ads Transparency Center

The Ads Transparency Center is Google's public ad library: anyone can look up an advertiser or website and see the ads it has run, without account access.

Change history

Change history is the Google Ads log of edits to an account: what was changed, when, by whom and with which tool.

Explanations (Google Ads)

Explanations is a Google Ads feature that tells you why a campaign's performance changed significantly and sometimes suggests what to do about it.

Automated rules

Automated rules are if-then instructions in Google Ads that change a status, a budget or a bid, or send you an email, when conditions you set are met.

Google Ads scripts

Google Ads scripts are pieces of JavaScript code that run inside Google Ads, on demand or on a schedule, to read an account's data, change it and send reports.

Google Ads Editor

Google Ads Editor is Google's free desktop application for editing accounts in bulk: you download an account, change it offline and post the changes back.

Google Ads API

The Google Ads API is Google's programmatic interface to Google Ads, which lets software read an account's reports and settings and change its campaigns.

GAQL (Google Ads Query Language)

GAQL is the query language of the Google Ads API: each SQL-like query names one resource and the fields, segments and metrics to return for it.

BigQuery Data Transfer Service

BigQuery Data Transfer Service is a Google service that copies Google Ads and Merchant Center data into BigQuery on a schedule, so the store keeps its own copy.