Strategies to Optimize Google Adwords Sitelinks for Great Conversions

Google AdWords sitelinks display additional links underneath a standard text ad, which can be used to drive clicks to deep content on your website.

Ad Sitelinks usually appear below text ads with a highly ranked click-through-ratio and quality score, targeting an online user who searches one of your keywords or your domain name.

Google AdWords sitelinks are great for promoting new offers, increasing traffic to high-converting content, and increasing visibility for areas of your site that are not easily accessed in organic searches.

Here is an example of a sitelink:

What are the tips for maximizing google adwords sitelinks conversions ?

Google Adwords Sitelinks  Tip #1: Optimization

Sitelinks are good for increasing your ad’s value while in top position, which can increase the ad’s click-through-ratio greatly, however, increasing CTR significantly without increasing conversions is not recommended especially if you already rank highly organically.

The key to an effective sitelink strategy is increasing the conversion rate with an increase in CTR, especially if the boost in conversion rate makes your paid search creatives more effective than organic search results.

Google Adwords Sitelinks  Tip #2:  Selecting Your Creatives

Text ads must have higher-than-average CTR, a quality score, and high rank to display an Ad sitelink therefore, branded campaigns are ideal for your first sitelink conversion test.

Ad Sitelink settings must be done at the campaign level to allow all creatives in your enabled campaign to be eligible to serve sitelinks.

Once a campaign is selected, drill in and navigate to the campaign’s Ad Extensions tab in AdWords and select “Sitelinks Extensions”.

Use up to 4 sitelinks per campaign for best results because this is the most important part.

Google Adwords Sitelinks  Tip #3:  Create Themes Based On User Behavior

Once you have selected a campaign, Determine your sitelink themes once you select a campaign. To guide you, ask the following:

• What are your website’s top converting pages?

• What are the top onsite search terms for this segment?

• What is the second click in this segment’s click path?

• What are the top categories browsed per session?

These questions will help you narrow down effective sitelink themes.

Google Adwords Sitelinks  Tip #4:  Effective Sitelink Text

To figure out how to best message your theme in a given sitelink, run a creative test . Create a test ad group from keywords relevant to the sitelink’s theme and then test different headlines for CTR and conversion rate.

Once your test creatives produce statistically significant conversions, pick the headline which met the parameters of high CTR and exceptional conversion rate and use it as sitelink theme.

Google Adwords Sitelinks  Tip #5:  Sitelink Performance Tracking

Sitelink performance must be tracked to successfully optimize for conversion rates. Track CTR performance at the campaign level so that you can get information to enable you to split your sitelink ad into a different campaign.

Conversions can be tracked at the sitelink level by adding a unique tracking parameter to your sitelink URL; Google Analytics, appending “&utm_content=sitelink1” to your sitelink’s URL allows you to report on conversions generated by the corresponding sitelink.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #6:  Adapting Google Adwords Sitelinks  To Recent Google Changes

Google recently updated the way that we serve sitelinks, callouts and structured snippets in ads.

To understand this change, it is best to understand what sitelinks are for, which is to get people online where they want to go as quickly as possible. Sitelinks are used to prequalify a visitor to your website.

Here is how to adapt your sitelinks to recent Google changes:

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #7: Verify That There More Clicks On Your Google Adwords  Sitelinks

You should get more clicks via sitelinks. It may not be a lot as some advertisers but there should be an impact however small.

Segment reports by Click Type to better understand how many clicks are generated by your sitelinks and how much you need for sitelink maintenance.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #8: Point Google Adwords  Sitelink Clicks To The Right Website Pages

Sitelink clicks are more qualified and valuable therefore, your landing pages should be optimized for sitelinks.

To get this right, use campaign drafts and experiments to find the right page and then use Google Optimize to r refine that page further.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #9: Use Plenty Of  Google Adwords Sitelinks

Ensure that you have 8 to 10 active sitelinks per campaign. The order is picked automatically and the ones displayed depend on the current context and other factors.

The swipeable carousel enables more sitelinks to be displayed with each ad unit assembled for each auction. The auction-time signals determine which of the pages are most useful.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #10: Write Sitelinks That Easy To Use And Are Interactive

Find out if your customers would click on the links you have been supplying them with. Focus on the text you are using, the same way you do with your ads.

If you have better sitelinks, people will find it easier to interact with your website; finding what they want on the site should be a speedy affair. Take them to pages on your website where you know people convert.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #11: Do Not Forget To Maintain

As much as sitelinks require very little maintenance, you must check on them regularly. Keep an eye on the following metric:

Impressions: If impressions for a given sitelink are low there must be  a reason why Google is passing it over. Editing the link and give it another whirl.

Click-Through- Rate: A high CTR means success with your link description text and if low it means your copy isn’t impressing viewers- make it more appealing.

Conversion rate: A high conversion rate is great. However, if it is low, give extra attention to the page you are pointing visitors to and find out if it accurately represents your link text to give searchers the appropriate expectations.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #12: Don’t Use  Account Level-Sitelinks

Google released account-level sitelinks to give advertisers the opportunity to create just a single set of sitelinks to be used across the board.

This will reduce the barrier to usage to boost sitelink adoption which is so beneficial to ad CTR.

The fastest and easiest route is rarely the best route; you are better off investing to create your sitelinks on the campaign or ad group level which will allow you to customize the sitelinks to directly reflect the theme that your audience is looking for.

Google Adwords Sitelinks Tip #13: Do Not Assume That Your Google Adwords Sitelinks Will Be Displayed

Do not assume that since you have created your sitelink extensions it is a shoe-in for them to be displayed alongside your ads.

You must keep in mind that sitelinks extensions are displayed at Google’s discretion.

You virtually have no say on what is displayed and what is ignored. Google uses a formula which targets the “best options” based on user needs and contexts.

So, work on your content so that your ads appear in top positions; sitelinks extensions displayed decrease as your position falls. If your ad ranks poorly, you increase the chances of your sitelinks extensions never being displayed alongside your ads for visitors to click on.

Conclusion

People are now more likely than ever to click on your sitelinks which can be optimized for conversion by researching customer behavior, creating relevant promotional themes, and using your best performing creative headlines to point users to converting content.

Google says that sitelinks can increase CTR up to 30%. While big increases in click volume are significant, the real benefit begins when you are able to sustain or increase conversion rate and increase revenue and profit.