A bot is simply an application that autonomously carries out tasks that it has been programmed to perform. Usually, they’ll perform a single function. For instance, chatbots are used on websites and on social media to support custom service teams with common questions.
In SEO, search engine crawler bots – sometimes called spider bots – are considered important. They explore webpages automatically and intermittently to fetch and index content, helping search engines determine how and where to rank webpages. Much of the work of an SEO specialist is to appeal to these bots.
Bots can also take malicious or criminal forms. These are used to attack websites in what are called DDOS (Distributed Denial Of Service) attacks, designed to temporarily overwhelm websites with traffic.
