How to Get Google Sitelinks
by Jonathan Hochman
http://www.hochmanconsultants.com/articles/sitelinks.shtml
What are Google Sitelinks?
In 2005 Google started experimenting with an enhanced listing
in their natural search results that can increase a site's visibility and
reputation, and provide more traffic. For
a long time we didn't know what to call these deluxe listings, but now
we do. On September 7, 2006, Google's sitemap guru, Vanessa Fox, wrote
a blog entry titled
Information
about Sitelinks. She explained that Sitelinks are generated automatically,
and that Sitelinks are designed to provide searchers with more valuable
search results. Fox also said that Google will be expanding the Sitelinks
program. Since then we've been getting many questions from webmaster interested
to know how they can get a Sitelinks listing.
Here's an example of a Sitelinks listing. On a Google search for the keyword "IntelliTrack," beneath
the main search result, we see links to various areas of the IntelliTrack
web site. This would help a searcher in two ways: they can get a better understanding
of what the site is about before they visit, and they can take a shortcut
from Google to the topic that interests them.:
Only the best sites seem to
get Sitelinks. Virtually all of the webmasters I've spoken with feel that
Sitelinks enhance a web site's visibility and reputation.
Google Doesn't Say How to Get Sitelinks
The workings of many Google algorithms, including Sitelinks, are kept secret
to discourage people from manipulating the rankings, but we can still look
at examples and try to understand where Sitelinks come from.
I've worked on a number of sites with Sitelinks, and these sites are similar
in the following ways:
- Site ranks first for the keyword(s) that generate the Sitelinks listing
- Easily spiderable, structured navigation
- Fairly high natural search traffic
- High click through rates from the search results page
- Useful outbound links
- Inbound links from high quality sites
- Site age is several years or older
These factors may, or may not, be exactly what Google uses to trigger Sitelinks.
Nevertheless, everything on this list is desirable for a web marketing program,
so using the list to guide our strategy will probably help our sites become
more effective in any case.
What Signals Does Google Use for the Sitelinks
Algorithm?
Again, we do not know for sure, but we can deduce some of the signals by
looking at Google's Webmaster Guidelines and by studying the Google Search
Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Google's Webmaster
Guidelines say, in the first
item under design and content guidelines, "Make
a site with a clear hierarchy and text links." That's good
advice for several reasons. A clear navigation hierarchy is good for visitors
and helps search engines understand the topic of each page. Google can't
create sitelinks if it can't fix the meaning of the sub-pages, either by
analysis or by observing visitor behavior.
We know that Google search results pages (SERPs) contain
links with tracking info, and that many users have Google accounts, so Google
can watch their behavior over time. Google isn't expending resources
to do all this tracking without reason. We can safely assume that Google
will somehow use all that data to improve their search results, and possibly
to deliver new features like Sitelinks.
If I were Google, I'd be very interested
to know which search results have above-average click through rates for particular
keywords. I'd also like to know if searchers were happy with my search
results. If too many searchers choose a listing and then return to the
SERP, that could indicate a poor quality search result. All this information
is collected automatically, providing a scalable way to identify search
spam, and the opposite, search "gems." A search gem with significant
search volume would be the ideal candidates for a Sitelinks listing.
Things We Can Do to Improve the Odds of Getting Sitelinks
While we can only make educated guesses, we may as well do things that are
also good for Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and user experience. Even
if our guesses are off, we won't be wasting effort with these
recommendations:
- Create structured navigation using HTML features like unordered lists
(UL) and text links. Use CSS to style menus with the desired appearance.
Lists can be displayed horizontally or vertically, and be any size
or color. We can add background images, colors and border to
create the appearance of a box or button. All this can be done with text
links.
- Organize navigation to present a smallish number of logical destinations
that visitors will choose frequently. Don't overwhelm the visitor
with too many choices on the main menu. If necessary, add second
level menu items using CSS
hover menus.
- Brand the web site with a unique name. If the name is too
generic, no matter what we do, the click through rates on natural search
may not be very good, because the user will have too many choices on the
SERP for similarly named sites. Google probably won't give Sitelinks to
a site that is just average for a particular search term. We want to be
the overwhelming first choice.
- Add really useful titles and META descriptions to the site, especially
the home page, to improve click through rates from the SERP. Make sure
the meta information is accurate to avoid misleading searchers. We don't
want people to bounce off the site because it fails to meet their expectations.
- Make the site really useful.
Even if the site's information is not exactly what the visitor wants, if
we provide useful outbound links throughout the site, the visitor may browse
to another site rather than returning to the SERP. (See my
article,
Don't Be a Link Miser.)
Remember, Google can tell if a searcher bounces back to the SERP, and that's
probably not a good thing for a site's reputation.
Sitelinks Versus Spam
Even unsophisticated
web users recognize Sitelinks, and most of them feel that they signify an
important site. Sitelinks sites are the opposite of search spam, and thus,
Sitelinks are highly desirable for the savvy webmaster.
Latest News about Sitelinks
On December 21, 2006, the US Patent and Trademark Office published a patent
application by Google that describes the process of selecting internal links
to display within the search results. A good overview of this patent is presented
in William Slawski's article, Google’s
Listings of Internal Site Links for Top Search Results. What Google applies
for in the patent may or may not be what they actually use in practice. The
article tends to confirm my suspicions that user behavior plays an important
role in selecting Sitelinks.
About the Author
After graduating from Yale with two degrees in Computer Science, Jonathan
Hochman set up his own consulting company in 1990. He has been an Internet
marketer since 1994. To send feedback, please visit http://www.hochmanconsultants.com/.
For additional information, please contact Hochman Consultants.
