Google has today made it easier than ever to get new bigger and better Google Sitelinks for your ads, which help people find information deeper in your site so they can get to where they want to go faster.
Previously it was already possible to specify clickable anchor text for all of your Google Sitelinks. And with today’s update, AdWords is going even further by enabling you to designate specific text for your Google Sitelink descriptions from within your AdWords account. This will enable more granular control over the descriptions that display when your Google sitelink is shown to searchers.
What Do Google Sitelink Ads Look Like?
We’re glad you asked. Here’s what the new super-sized Google Sitelinks ad look like:
These huge new sitelinks are like the AdWords equivalent of the T-Rex Burger!
Google says that ads containing the new, larger Google Sitelinks with additional detail generate significantly higher click-through rates and were deemed to be more relevant and useful versus the same ad containing traditional 2- and 3-line Sitelinks.
[MORE: Google AdWords Ad Extensions Cheat Sheet]
New Huge Google Sitelinks Only Available in Enhanced Campaigns
The new Google Sitelink format containing extended descriptions is available only in enhanced campaigns. This provides a tempting incentive to search marketers who still haven’t upgraded to EC’s, just one month ahead of the auto-upgrade deadline of July 22.
All upgraded campaigns have the option of adding extra text to your sitelinks – to enable google sitelinks, just fill out both lines of the “Description” field when creating a new sitelink or editing an existing sitelink. It’s like turning your ad into 5 ads!
As expected, Google disclaims that your ads won’t always show Google Sitelinks, and when they do, the format that appears could vary.
Comparing the Benefits of Google Sitelinks and Google Sitelinks From AdWords
It used to be that sitelinks ads generated from Google AdWords extension were very different from sitelinks generated from Google Search. Google Search generated sitelinks were out of a website owner’s control – you could not will Google to put it on every page of your website, nor could you select the descriptions you wanted to show up in the individual site links that show up. While it was possible to communicate which sitelinks you would like Google to remove or edit where you think Google is drawing the description text to change sitelink descriptions, it was very much like experimenting with a black box.
The new Google Sitelink ads now follow the same design and format as the natural Google site links that Google will occasionally showcase in an organic search results page. Sure, one’s got a white background color and the other one is a slight beige, but the level of control advertisers now have over what they think is most important on their website has significantly increased compared to the past. The old Google Sitelink ad did not allow you to add site link descriptions.
Adobe using the old sitelink ads
As a result of lacking ad text descriptions, the sitelink headings had to be descriptive. Any good ad copywriter would tell you that the headline and sub headlines should draw in a user’s attention, and now the playing field has changed between organic Google sitelinks and paid Google sitelinks. Paid Google sitelinks are better in that they give marketers more control with the same amount of exposure on the SERPS. For any websites where Google refuses to generate an organic Google sitelink, AdWords Google Sitelinks are undisputedly the best alternative. For websites that already have sitelinks, having two sitelinks doubles your dominance and control over your brand messaging.
Google Sitelink Policy
The core guidelines and tips for sitelink extensions remain the same with the new larger ad format:
- Google site links cannot violate the duplicate sitelink URL policy
- Site link text cannot use keyword insertion
- Site link text cannot be the same as other sitelinks in the same ad group/campaign or the main ad that’s serving
- Site links show up in groupings of 2 and 4 at a time
Have you upgraded to Enhanced Campaigns yet? Do you plan to try out the new T-Rex sitelinks?
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