How do i get search engines to do this to my site

Devro · January 31st, 2008, 04:44 PM

Sorry i couldnt come up with a better title but i really have no idea what to call this. Im also sorry if this is in the wrong section but im new to web development and not sure.

Anyway i would like to know why a search engine does this to certain results.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...e+Search&meta=

The top result for RMXP.org for example has sublinks underneath it relevant to certain sections of their board. I run a forum but i want all the specific areas of the board shown from google in this same way. Is there something special i need to do?

Any help or information regarding this will be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance
- Devro

BTW: First post so hi everyone ^_^ ;;

Aso · January 31st, 2008, 05:13 PM

These are known as sitelinks. Google decides whether sitelinks would be beneficial to your site, and when they are relevant to the search term.

BTW Welcome to the forums!

Devro · January 31st, 2008, 05:21 PM

Thanks for the information aso, it makes more sense to me now but ...

Quote:

We only show sitelinks for results when we think they'll be useful to the user. If the structure of your site doesn't allow our algorithms to find good sitelinks, or we don't think that the sitelinks for your site are relevant for the user's query, we won't show them.

This is saying that it depends on what i searched for, but as you know all i did was type in RMXP.org so why did the sitelinks appear? Also do you know if Invision Power Board is sitelink friendly?

Thanks

Aso · January 31st, 2008, 05:27 PM

The sitelinks appear when Google thinks the search term best targeted your site (I have only ever seen sitelinks when the result was number 1).

For example, this search still has RMXP.org in the SERPs but no sitelinks see?

Quote:

Also do you know if Invision Power Board is sitelink friendly?

TBH, I have no idea of how you would calculate that. Sitelinks are another secret Google algoritm that you really don't have that much control over.

At best, have 5 or 6 distinct sections of your site that are linked to on every page (i.e your main navigation).

Devro · January 31st, 2008, 05:36 PM

Wow thanks mate you've really helped me alot ^_^ Im going to go away and do just that, navigation links on every page. My site is already number 1 on google so maybe this is the thing im missing.

Thanks

BTW: Cheers for the quick response and warm welcome, im going to keep coming here

Aso · January 31st, 2008, 05:38 PM

No problem

But like I say, no guarantees. Google will continue to mystify...

alexgeek · January 31st, 2008, 05:43 PM

I've found most of the time this will only happen to sites that google loves and get tonnes of traffic.

Aso · January 31st, 2008, 05:45 PM

Funny. I always had that feeling too. But Google would never do that

iceshards · February 2nd, 2008, 07:49 PM

Actually the Google sitelinks algorithm is still on progress... That's why some site don't display sitelinks....

simonb · February 3rd, 2008, 05:07 AM

i can get 2 links top sort of
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=the+net+is+dying

spinal007 · February 3rd, 2008, 06:31 AM

Late to the thread by I'll give you my 2 cents anyway...

Sitelinks are not just based on 'how much traffic you get', they are based on the most popular '2nd steps' within your site. It's about how the user behaves (where they go) after finding your site through that specific phrase...

Devro · February 3rd, 2008, 07:33 AM

So like even if you get a few unique hits a day and they decide 70% of the time to hit a sublink, google will make a site link to that place?

alexgeek · February 3rd, 2008, 09:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by simonb

i can get 2 links top sort of
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=the+net+is+dying

Simon those are not sitelinks, they are just two normal links to your site.
Try this search for vbulletin, you see those links under the first result? Download, documentation etc.?

Devro · February 3rd, 2008, 08:15 PM

So does anyone know whether this occurs for any site thats not a top result? Also does anyone know how many hits you would need to get one, or indeed the percentage of people visiting links on your site needed to gain them?

I know now its got nothing to do with anything i do, im just curious lol ^_^

outsourceteam · February 5th, 2008, 04:29 PM

Yes, this sitelinks are the links that seemed helpful to the users... Since the algorithm for this sitelinks is not in full functional....

spinal007 · February 6th, 2008, 06:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Devro

So like even if you get a few unique hits a day and they decide 70% of the time to hit a sublink, google will make a site link to that place?

Google's robots will only do this for very high-traffic websites. VERY high-traffic.

simonb · February 6th, 2008, 12:01 PM

When i was posting lots of content on my blog google was there every other day, thats stopped now lol

spinal007 · February 16th, 2008, 11:28 AM

Turns out you don't need that much traffic anymore:
http://www.google.com/search?q=pinesandneedles&
http://www.google.com/search?q=buyatree&
http://www.google.com/search?q=xmasdirect&
...none of which are within the top 100,000 websites in the world.

Google is improving and it looks like these site links will rely less on how much traffic you have and more on the way your users behave.

Aso · February 16th, 2008, 02:28 PM

spinal007, are those results supposed to have sitelinks? Because I can't see them

unitedcraig · February 16th, 2008, 08:40 PM

aren't these you sites diego?