It is the goal of every online marketing company to get your business to the top of Google search. Studies have consistently shown that users are more likely to click on the first, then second, then third website before the click through rate drops off dramatically.
So the top of search engines is valuable real estate, and the more space you can fill, the better your results will be. That’s why the absolute best position you can be in is for your website to show up in search like this:
This takes up a lot of space. Target, in this example, is the first, second, third, and 4th link. They dominate the top of this search, and it makes them look more trustworthy, valuable, and desirable.
So of course, it is the goal of any company to try to emulate that. If you can show up with sub-links during a search, you’re going to get more hits and you’re going to get more business.
But while that’s an admirable goal, it’s not exactly possible.
To prevent one company from dominating in search engines, Google only provides sublinks when you search for a business name. Now, not every business gets sublinks even for a business name, and there are ways you can optimize that (more on that in a moment), but if you’re hoping to get sublinks for a search term, like “great content writer,” you’re going to end up disappointed unless your business name is literally “Great Copywriter.”
How to Still Dominate Search Engine Space
Still, that doesn’t mean that you cannot still try to have more than one link in Google Search. Google makes it difficult, but with the right SEO you can actually get more than one link for a specific search. Take a look at this search for “GFRG Ceilings” from one of our clients here at Great Leap Studios:
At the moment of this writing those questions are in between them, but they come and go. Most important is to notice that there are two links for this search, giving GC Products Inc. more real estate in Google search than their competitors. That’s an advantage that no other competitors of theirs have.
We did this by utilizing a lot of interlinking. When a page on the website mentioned GFRG ceilings, we linked to the GFRG ceilings page. But we also had pillar pages that were higher up in the search hierarchy. The result made it possible for us to get both pages to show up in search results for our primary keyword.
To me, this is more valuable than even the sublinks. That’s because sublinks show up when someone is already looking for your company, while this shows up naturally when the person may not yet have chosen a company.
What if Your Business Listing Doesn’t Have Sublinks?
As mentioned earlier, the only way to get sublinks is to search for your business name. You may find that you already have sublinks. But what if you don’t?
Google’s algorithm decides whether or not to have sublinks, so unfortunately only a minimal part of this is under your control. But there are a few things you can do to improve your odds.
- The first is to make sure that your menu makes logical sense. Google’s algorithm reads menu items, and it is more likely to give sublinks to top level menu items that it thinks have value.
- The second is to make sure that those menu items have pages. Some people like their top level menu items to be unclickable, but I personally do not recommend that because it doesn’t indicate a clear value. In fact, I believe these should be pillar pages that are extensive and detailed about the broader topic.
- Finally, sub menu items should link up to the top pages, to help indicate their authority within your website and make it clear that those are relevant to people searching for your services.
There isn’t really a trick that always works, but if you use the above strategy you are more likely to improve your odds. You’ll also want to make sure you’re clearly using your business name, as branding is also important for generating these links.
The more real estate you “own” in Google, the better your results will be. To help market your website and take over some of that real estate, contact Great Leap Studios today.
