Boost Your Clicks With AdWords Sitelink Extensions

If your goal is acquisition, Google’s pay per click AdWords platform has proved for many to be a viable way to increase leads or sales for your business and, depending on your keyword and bids, can be cost-effective. However, if you’re not in the PPC know, then you may not be aware that Google is now allowing up to eight sitelink extensions in paid search ads AND they are interactive, tappable scrolling buttons on mobile devices (vs. text links on desktop). What does that mean for you? Quite simply, Google is giving your more opportunity to catch your target audience’s attention with strong, relevant calls to action or other enticing keywords that are clickable; whereby, you can drive traffic to a targeted page. These extra descriptives can help increase your clickthrough rate, and possibly conversion rate. Now, some marketers don’t take advantage of this. But I say if you don’t, you’re leaving opportunity on the table! What You Should Know Including a Sitelink in Your Ad. When you’re creating a new ad, you’ll see prompts to add a new sitelink extension. If you have an existing campaign, but you didn’t take advantage of this feature, you can go back and add it under “All Campaigns,” select the ad you’d like to add the sitelink to, then select “+Extensions” and “+New Sitelink.” Types of Extensions. Here are some top extensions to help drive traffic or clicks: Teasers and Call-Outs. This would be a unique selling proposition that makes you stand out from your competition. Some may include call outs like "free shipping," "100% guaranteed," "special offer,"’ "free report" and similar. These sitelinks would then link to a promotional page that speaks more to the teaser and has a goal of getting a conversion. This would be your physical address if you’re driving traffic to a physical location. This can then link to a directions/map page on your website. Phone Number. This would be if you have the Google "click to call" feature driving traffic to a phone number. Testimonials or Reviews. Some advertisers would put a strong excerpt from a testimonial page or "5 stars" review here, then link to the full reviews page. Call to Action. Another popular tactic is to include calls to action that may answer a question the prospect is looking for, or help them find a solution. Such as "call now," "get a quote," "request appointment," "order now," "customer favorites," "top sellers," "special trial offer," "on sale now," etc. Sale and Promotion Extensions. Where you can actually have things like "25% off your entire order" or "last chance sale," where you can even enter the dates the sale is running in the ad! Combining Lead-gen and Sale in One Ad. Using sitelinks can be a great way to kill two birds with one stone. In your one ad, you can have different sitelinks for different goals. One sitelink term may say something like "free report" and the other may say "top sellers." One links to a squeeze page to collect an email address (lead generation). The other goes to a sales page to a product going directly for a sale. Tracking your sitelink performance is easy. When in your AdWords dashboard, just look for clickthrough rate performance under "Acquisition," "All Traffic," "Ad Words" and "Sitelinks." It’s that easy. According to Google, the mere presence of sitelink extensions may boost clickthrough rate on average by 10 to 20 percent, and for branded terms, 20 to 50 percent. So what are you waiting for?! As part of your online marketing mix, if you have a percentage of your time and budget allocated to pay per click (PPC), then testing sitelink extensions in your ad is a MUST. Good luck.

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Boost Your Clicks With AdWords Sitelink Extensions

Wendy Montes de Oca

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Wendy Montes de Oca