# Glossary

> Plain definitions of every SerpDad term, from the product vocabulary and the app's screens, in alphabetical order.

**In short:** This page defines every SerpDad term in one or two plain sentences. Terms are in alphabetical order. Where a term has another name in the app, both names are listed.

## A

**Actual vs estimate.** An actual is the cost a provider reported for a call. An estimate is SerpDad's figure from published prices and usage, used when the provider reports no cost. Estimates are always marked as estimates.

**Adjustment.** A manual change to a workspace's usage record, made by SerpDad staff with a stated reason.

**Admin.** A workspace role that manages provider keys, members, runs, briefs and sign-offs, but not billing.

**AI Mode check.** A scheduled check of chosen focus keywords in Google AI Mode, on your DataForSEO key. It records which sources each answer cites and whether your site is among them.

**AI Overview.** The AI-written summary Google shows above some results. SerpDad reads, from results it already fetched, whether one appears and which URLs it cites.

**Allowance.** A monthly count of a per-use meter: drafted sections, voice passes, crawl pages and AI visibility checks. The plan sets no cap. Use is counted and shown.

**Answer to beat.** The featured snippet or AI Overview shown in a brief as the bar to clear. Its label in the brief is "The answer Google shows now".

**Assembly drafting.** How SerpDad drafts: the AI turns each brief section into sentences using only brief items, never facts from its own memory.

**Audit log.** SerpDad's internal record of every staff action, with who did it, what, to whom and when. It cannot be edited.

## B

**Block.** One step in a workflow, with typed inputs, outputs and settings. Blocks come from a fixed catalogue.

**Bonus keyword.** See secondary keyword.

**Branch.** A path out of a workflow block, such as "Is true" and "Is false".

**Brief.** The writing plan for one standalone page: angle, outline with word budgets, terms, questions, and claims with sources.

**Business-value read.** The presence of ads and shopping results in a keyword's results, read as a sign of commercial intent.

## C

**Cannibalization.** Two of your pages chasing the same search phrase. SerpDad's plans give each keyword one owner page so planned pages never do this.

**Claim.** A factual statement in a brief or draft, stored with a source link and a box a person ticks after checking it. Shown as F#.

**Client.** In the Jobs hub, a project in your workspace that a job runs on.

**Clustering anchor.** The keyword a page's group formed around. It equals the focus keyword unless a person changed the focus keyword.

**Connection.** An outside service linked to your workspace or project, such as Slack, Search Console or a draft target.

**Content audit.** The Improve page that sorts your site's pages into buckets from Search Console data: Quick win, Striking distance, Rework, Decay, Prune, Monitor and Keep.

**Content score.** An advisory score from 0 to 100 for one draft version, made of eight sub-scores. It never blocks sign-off and does not predict rankings.

**Contested keyword.** A keyword that ties exactly between two pages. It waits on the suggested page and goes to Review.

**Cost gate.** The screen before a run that shows the dollar estimate on your own accounts, your balance and your cap. Nothing runs until someone approves.

**Coverage.** The share of a brief's subtopics that are planned or dismissed. A brief exports only at 100%.

**Credit, credit rate, credit policy.** Older billing units counted in keywords. They are retired. SerpDad now sells one monthly plan, and runs no longer use credits.

**Customer.** A buying organisation. In the app, a customer is a workspace.

## D

**Decay.** A page whose clicks fell more than 25% from at least 100 clicks, against the 28 days before.

**Decision.** A stored call SerpDad made, such as a keyword's owner page or a page's format, with its receipt.

**Dedicated page.** A search result whose whole page is about the phrase. The opposite of a section.

**Differentiator.** An outline item in your brief that no ranking page has. It is left out of the coverage count.

**Draft.** An article version written only from brief items. Every sentence has a type and cites its items. Versions never change.

**Draft target.** A system where SerpDad can create drafts of signed articles: WordPress, Webflow, Shopify or Google Docs. SerpDad never publishes there.

**Drift re-open.** A pinned keyword sent back to Review because a new run's results turned against the pin.

## E

**Editor.** A workspace role that edits and verifies briefs, drafts and signs articles, and stages signed drafts.

**Engine group.** The fixed set of workflow blocks that fetch results, group keywords, score pages, route around your pages, park weak pages and add secondary keywords, ending with the plan check.

**Existing pages.** Your site's live URLs, from the results SerpDad fetched and from Search Console. The plan routes around them.

**Experience interview.** 3 to 5 questions only a practitioner can answer. Each saved answer becomes an E# item a draft can cite.

**Experience item.** A first-hand answer from the experience interview. Shown as E#.

## F

**Fact library.** The list of every claim across your briefs and articles, with its source, last tick and where it is used.

**Fair-use limit.** The one size limit on the plan: up to 200,000 keywords per run.

**Focus keyword.** The keyword that names a page and leads its title, H1 and URL. Also called the founder keyword or leader.

**Focus pin.** A person's choice of focus keyword for a page, kept on later runs.

**Format.** The page type to build: list, how-to, comparison or landing.

**Format vote.** Choosing the format from the most common page type among the top 10 results.

**Founder keyword.** See focus keyword.

**Free first plan.** One run before you subscribe: up to 1,000 keywords, briefs for the top 5 pages, secondary keywords off, once per verified user.

**Freshness window.** How recent a stored result must be to reuse it. The default is 30 days.

## G

**GSC avg.** A position taken from your Search Console average, shown when your page is past the top 10 or not in the fetched results.

**GSC verdict.** The comparison of a planned page with your live pages: build a new page, optimize an existing one, or consolidate pages that compete.

## H

**H2 section.** A small group of keywords folded into a related page as a heading, because it did not earn its own page.

**Hub.** A top-level page in the plan, together with the sections folded into it. Hubs have names you can change.

## I

**Impersonation.** SerpDad staff viewing the app as a customer sees it, view-only, with every change blocked and the session recorded.

**In the lists.** The AI visibility view that finds list articles in your keywords' top 10 results, split into "Already listed" and "Not listed".

## J

**Job.** A pre-built workflow you turn on for many clients by answering three questions.

**Junk keyword.** A keyword you marked as worthless for a project. It leaves the plan and is never imported, fetched or billed again in that project.

**Junk list.** A project's list of junked phrases. You can restore any of them.

## K

**Keys pill.** The top bar status of your required keys, for example "2 of 2 valid".

**Keyword.** One unique search phrase in a project, after removing exact duplicates.

**Keyword inbox.** Search Console queries that no keyword in the project covers yet. They cost nothing until you route them.

**Keywords stored.** The count of unique keywords across your workspace's live projects. It is a count, not a limit.

## L

**Landlord panel.** SerpDad's internal admin area, used only by SerpDad staff.

**Living plan.** A plan whose pages, briefs and human work are kept and matched up across re-runs instead of rebuilt.

**Low-balance pause.** A run pauses when your DataForSEO balance drops below $2.00 and asks you to top up.

## M

**Manager.** A workspace role that approves runs, settles reviews, generates briefs, invites members and signs articles.

**Mixed-vintage plan.** A plan built from results read on different dates. The cost gate and receipts say so.

**Monthly spend cap.** The most provider spend your workspace allows through SerpDad in a month. The suggested default is $50.

## N

**Next actions.** The feed of what to do next across projects, each with a reason, a source, a receipt and one button.

**Normalized phrase.** A keyword lowercased and trimmed, used only to find exact duplicates.

## O

**Optimize, Optimize #N.** A verdict that says to improve a page your site already has. "#N" is its Search Console average position.

**Outline approval.** Approving a page's outline on the Outlines page. In that path, it is the human approval of the article.

**Owner.** The one workspace role that can do everything, including billing and deleting the workspace.

**Owner approval line.** The per-run estimate above which an Owner or Admin must approve. Labelled "Owner approval above". The default is $25.00.

**Owner page.** The one page a keyword belongs to.

**Owner pin.** A person's choice of owner page for a keyword, made by moving it. SerpDad never moves a pinned keyword on its own.

## P

**Page.** A group of keywords that one web page should serve. It is either standalone or an H2 section.

**Pages compete.** On the plan tiles, the count of keywords two planned pages both target, always 0. As a verdict chip, two or more of your existing pages earn impressions for one planned page.

**Parked.** A keyword kept in the plan sum without a page, because it has no search volume or nothing to join.

**Plan.** The page plan a run builds. Also the one monthly SerpDad subscription.

**Plan sum.** Keywords on new pages, plus keywords on existing pages, plus parked keywords, equals keywords routed.

**Price band.** The monthly price a workspace pays, set by when it first pays: $15, $25 or $35.

**Price lock.** A workspace keeps the band price it first paid for as long as it keeps paying.

**Price sheet.** SerpDad's internal table of provider prices, used to estimate costs.

**Project.** One site and one market inside a workspace. The market is United States, English, desktop, fixed at creation.

**Provenance map.** The per-sentence record on a draft: its type and the item it cites.

**Provider fetch.** A paid call to a data provider on your key.

**Provider key.** Your own credential for DataForSEO, an AI provider, Spiral or Ahrefs, stored encrypted and shown only as its last 4 characters.

## Q

**Question network.** The set of questions a page should answer, grouped by the kind of answer each needs.

**Quote.** Exact words from a named person, with a source. Shown as Q#.

## R

**Ranks #N.** A verdict that says your page appears at position N in the fetched top 10.

**Read the published answer, never guess.** SerpDad's rule that every decision comes from counting Google's actual results, never from what the words seem to mean.

**Receipt.** The saved evidence behind one decision: the top 10, the overlap, the fetch dates, the provider, the key and the model.

**Receipts log.** The Write page that lists the receipts behind your content.

**Reconciliation.** Matching each page of a new run to last run's page, first by focus keyword, then by its keywords.

**Red flag.** A drafted sentence that asserts something checkable with no brief item behind it. It blocks sign-off.

**Refresh toggle.** The choice on the cost gate to fetch results again for keywords that already have fresh ones. Off by default.

**Related page.** Another standalone page whose results share one or two results with this page's, so they should link but stay separate.

**Report a wrong call.** The link on every receipt and review card to tell SerpDad a decision looks wrong.

**Re-run.** A new run on a project's stored keywords. It is free on SerpDad.

**Review queue.** The list of calls that need a person. Only real ties and changes reach it.

**Run.** One pass over a project: import, estimate, approval, fetch, grouping, checks and review.

**Run trace.** SerpDad's internal timing record for each run step.

## S

**Secondary keyword.** A keyword a page should also target, found from what the top pages also rank for. It is only ever on its own owner page. Also called a bonus keyword.

**Section.** A search result that covers the phrase as one part of a bigger page. Also, see H2 section.

**SERP.** Google's top 10 organic results for one keyword, in the project's market, stored with its fetch date.

**SERP results.** The ten rows of a SERP: URL, rank, title, format and dedicated or section.

**Settled call.** A small call SerpDad answers itself with its own pick, kept in history with a receipt.

**Shared cache.** Stored search results and volumes reused to save provider cost. Each workspace's stored data serves only that workspace.

**Signal 1: SERP overlap.** How many of two keywords' top 10 results are the same URL. At least the project's line (default 3) puts them on one page.

**Signal 2: ranking-page footprint.** What else the top-ranking pages rank for. It finds a page's secondary keywords.

**Signal 3: standalone scope.** How many of the top 10 are dedicated pages. It decides whether a page stands alone or becomes a section.

**Sign-off.** A named person approving one exact draft version. Any edit removes it.

**Spend ledger.** SerpDad's internal record of provider spend on each activity.

**Stakes.** The pill on a review card: Low stakes, Worth a look, or Changes traffic, set by the searches a month the call moves.

**Standing approval.** An Owner or Admin's approval for runs that start without a person, up to a per-run ceiling.

**Superadmin.** A SerpDad staff role for the internal admin area. It is not a workspace role.

**Suspension.** A staff action. A suspended user cannot sign in. A suspended workspace cannot start runs or make purchases.

## T

**Template.** A ready-made workflow you copy into your workspace as a draft.

**Topical map.** The view of the plan as hubs and sections, with Hub map, Tree and Radial modes.

**Top-up pack.** An older one-off credit bundle. It is retired and cannot be bought.

**Trigger.** The block that starts a workflow run, such as Manual, Schedule or Webhook.

## U

**Unsourced sentence.** A sentence whose numbers, names, dates or quotes do not appear in its own cited items. It blocks sign-off.

## V

**Verdict.** What the plan says to do with a page: New page, Optimize, Ranks #N, Pages compete or Parked.

**Version.** A frozen copy of a workflow or a draft. Old versions never change.

**Voice pass.** An optional rewrite of a checked draft in your voice, on your own Spiral key. Facts and quotes never change.

## W

**Workflow.** A chain of blocks a trigger starts, run against one project per run.

**Workspace.** Your team's space in SerpDad. It holds projects, members, provider keys, billing and the data bought with its keys.

**Writer.** A workspace role that edits, verifies and exports briefs and drafts articles, but does not sign.

## Related

- [SerpDad documentation](../index/)
- [Read the plan](../read-the-plan/)
- [FAQ](../faq/)