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Business Glossary: Discover the Meaning of 24 Terms That You Should Know

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To facilitate understanding of marketing and business concepts, we have chosen to create this glossary, which allows you to get a very specific idea of ​​the main terms related to business.

This list is created with the help of Dataedo. Datadeo has been named a 2020 Gartner Peer Insights Customers Choice for Metadata Management Solutions. If you like this list, don’t forget to check out Datadeo’s data catalog software and business glossary software.

SWOT analysis:

It is a method to evaluate the possibilities of the company or of a specific project in the market. It is based on the analysis of the company’s Strengths and Weaknesses (internal factors) and its Threats and Opportunities (external factors). The analysis seeks to reinforce the Strengths and take advantage of the Opportunities, while combating the Threats and eliminating the Weaknesses.

Angel Investment:

It is a business model in which an investor acts as a “godfather” of a start-up, providing it with the necessary financial support, but also contributing their knowledge or experience. In return, this “angel investor” obtains a shareholding in the company.

Big Data:

Big Data is called the accumulation and management of large amounts of data and information. Big Data technologies are not only in charge of data storage, but also of its search, organization, visualization and analysis, which is why they are basic for companies in today’s information society.

Branding:

Branding is called any process aimed at reinforcing the brand image and corporate identity of a company. At first, only the phase of choosing the name and the logo design was considered as branding, but today branding covers any area of ​​the company and is basic for the identification of the individual with the brand.

CEO:

It is an acronym of English origin that means “Chief Executive Officer” and that began to be used in Anglo-Saxon countries to designate the person with the greatest responsibility within a company.

Coaching:

It is a term that designates those activities aimed at motivating, educating, training and instructing a person or a group of people with the aim of achieving certain goals. In the business environment, it would be to motivate, educate, train and instruct a worker or group of workers in order to achieve the goals set by the company.

Core Business:

In companies that have diversified their activity into different areas, the core business refers to the basic nucleus of their activity, that is, to their main business sector.

Coworking:

It is a type of business organization in which several companies, generally SMEs or Start-ups, share the same work space and even the same tools and equipment, each carrying out their activities independently, but also promoting collaboration between companies. different companies and professionals who share this workplace. 

Crowdfunding:

It is a form of financing that is based on the collective contributions of people interested in making a certain project go ahead. Each interested person must contribute a minimum of money to finance the project and, in return, will obtain certain rewards (privileged accesses, special editions, price discounts, gifts, etc.).

Customer Relationship Manager (CRM):

Two meanings can be distinguished. On the one hand, the orientation of the business is thus defined based on customer satisfaction (in this case we would speak of Customer Relationship Management). On the other, it refers to the software tools in charge of managing a company’s clients.

Efficiency:

This is the name given to the ability of a company to improve its results (income, benefits, maximize its performance) by minimizing investment (money invested, human capital, resources used). 

Company:

Legal person with headquarters and registered office, for profit, that offers products and services in exchange for a financial consideration. A company can be organized in different ways (individuals, partnerships, cooperatives), have different sizes (from small family businesses to large corporations) and have different objectives, missions and values.

Strategic management:

It is thus defined to all the processes oriented to the planning, development and supervision of tactics destined to guarantee the performance and survival of the company in the long term.

Headhunter:

It is a professional who is dedicated to the search for new talents or specific qualified personnel for a certain area. After conducting an exhaustive study, it is the headhunter who addresses the candidates he has previously selected, without the need for them to be in the job search process.

Lead:

In marketing, a lead is equivalent to a “contact”. More precisely, it designates all those users who have left their name and email on a landing page and are, therefore, now in the company’s database. The objective of every company is to get a lead to advance through the purchase funnel, that is, not to stay in contact and become a customer.

Transformational Leadership:

It is a type of proactive business leadership, which seeks a transformation in the company through new ideas and establishing new methods, which are based on the importance of the worker as a person and the promotion of relationships between the members of the company.

Marketing:

This is the name given to all the strategies, tactics and activities aimed at promoting and improving the commercial results of a certain brand, product or service.

Market:

It is the social, political and, above all, economic framework in which a company develops its activities. The market is constantly subject to fluctuations in macroeconomic variables, but also to the decisions made by consumers and the competition.

Budget:

It is the organization of the economic resources of a company and their allocation to the different items in order to meet the objectives set within a specified period of time. Budgeting is essential for short-term and long-term planning.

Productivity:

Not to be confused with the term efficiency. Productivity is the direct relationship between the volume of production of the company and the resources invested.

Target audiences:

The target audience refers to the market segment to which a certain marketing strategy or campaign is directed. Correctly identifying the target audience and impacting them with effective and appropriate messages is key to creating in potential customers the desires and needs that move them to purchase the product.

Corporate social responsibility:

It is a term that refers to business ethics and refers to the obligation of companies to contribute to social, cultural and economic development and to promote respect for the environment in the areas where they operate.

Stakeholders:

Also called “interest groups”, they are all those individuals or groups likely to be affected in any way by the activities of a company. Thus, the stakeholders of a company could be customers, creditors, employees, managers or a certain community or social sector. 

Start-Up:

It is a recently created company that seeks to implement a new idea or a new profitable business model. The start-up has a limited life, but high possibilities for development. It is a term that is used mainly to designate new companies in the field of information technology.