Search term
A search term is the word or phrase a person types into a search engine. In AI search, the question they ask plays the same part.
A search term is the exact word or phrase someone types into a search engine, like "decaf coffee beans" or "Fernhill Coffee opening hours." It's also called a search query. SEO people often use keyword for the phrase they target and search term for what people actually type, which is rarely quite the same.
Search terms tell you, in your customers' own words, what they want. That's why they sit underneath keyword research, ad campaigns and content plans.
Search terms vs keywords
A keyword is a phrase you choose to target. Search terms are the many real phrases that lead to you. If you target "coffee subscription," the search terms that bring visitors might include "monthly coffee delivery," "coffee subscription gift for dad" and a few misspellings.
In Google Ads, the search terms report shows the actual searches that triggered your ads. In Search Console, the Queries list in the Performance report does the same for organic results.
From search terms to prompts
With AI platforms, people ask full questions, often with details a search term leaves out. "Coffee subscription" becomes "What's a good coffee subscription for someone who only drinks decaf and lives in Scotland?" The words you track need to look like that.
The search term doesn't vanish, though. Many platforms turn the question into a few shorter searches of their own, and those look a lot like classic search terms. For example, the question above might lead the platform to search "decaf coffee subscription UK" and "Kestrel Roasters decaf review."
In AnswerOrbit
Your prompts are the questions we ask each platform for you. On ChatGPT, Perplexity and Copilot we also keep the searches the platform ran before answering, so you can see the search terms behind each answer. Open an answer in Answers, or see the Searches tab in Sources.