Double Six
The goal of SEO is to get to the top of the search engine results pages (SERPs) for any specific keyword phrase. As Google accounts for the lion’s share of the market (about 65% at the moment), most efforts are expended in trying to rank at the top of Google’s SERPs.
In the past, capturing the number one spot was the only game in town. Since then we saw “indented listings”, which were coverted for a while due the the fact that if you had a top ranking, you could get a second, indented, listing quite easily and more than double your traffic for that keyword. Indented listings fell by the wayside as Google evolved… and now, behold, the power of SITELINKS and BRANDLINKS!
When Google thinks you’re searching for a specific website, it may return “sitelinks” for that particular website. They look like this…
Google Sitelinks
But, Sitelinks aren’t the only games in town… there are also “brandlinks”, used when Google thinks you’re searching for a specific brand, in which case it may return several pages from the chosen website as full listings in the results. Here’s an example for Hitwise…
Google BrandLinks
But… wait for it… websites can get an immensely powerful combination of Sitelinks and Brandlinks. For example… Amazon and Nike…
Google Amazon SERP
Google Nike SERP
OK, I can hear the wailing from here, “but I’m not Amazon or Nike… how does this apply to me”?
Well, you don’t have to be Amazon or Nike to benefit from the sitelinks and brandlinks combo. Check out the results for this search…
Google PHPBB SERP
Through branding itself around “PHPBB Hacks”, that one website has no less than TWELVE links to it before the next website gets a look in!
So, the message here is to become the 500lb gorilla for any niche where you run a website. As you build a brand around the name of the website (note, the domain name exactly matches the search phrase) you’ll increase your chances for both sitelinks, brandlinks and the massive 12-link combo!
Very nice. Valuable post.
Seem like most of the time I am stuggleing to get 1 link above the fold on the first page
Hey what theme are you useing here. I realy like it, easy to read and very clean.
Hi Chris. I use the default Twenty Ten theme from Wordress.
Hi Neil,
This is a great concept. I’d love to see your comments regarding promoting a brand over promoting a link. For example, is it as easy as just using your brand name for the anchor text and what other ways do you promote a brand over a link? What if your an affiliate rather than the brand owner?
Thanks
Ray
Hi Ray,
An affiliate would have to brand themselves separate from the merchants they promote… so “Fitness Reviews” instead of “[Merchant Name] Reviews”
Hi Neil
Judging by the lack of ‘How’ info, I’d say you’ve got a product coming explaining that exact process.
Thanks for the examples.
Looks like I’ll need to do some RE.
Thanks for the heads-up
Kind regards
Ian
PS Yes. I do read your emails, they’re among very few these days that I do read. Your relationship management with your list could be a product in and of itself and is an example of how it should be done for all aspiring marketers.
Kind regards
Ian
Hi Ian,
Thanks for your kind words about my emails. I don’t have any plans for a product on this topic. The lack of “how to” information is for two reasons… 1: the blog post was only intended to be a quick, “this is interesting, take a look” and 2: getting sitelinks and brandlinks will require a lot of work to build authority and I can’t see people being interested in a product that says, “get GREAT links and write GREAT content for a website on an EXACT match domain with lots of monthly searches”. Finding such a domain available to buy and free from trademark concerns would be hard. The only other option is to create a brand and website around an invented phrase… which would likely require a marketing budget.
Having said that, people do seem to want to know more, so I’ll do some research and a follow-up post.
Neil.
Hi Neil
My comment regarding a forthcoming product, is born out of the frequency with which this tactic is used these days as the pre-amble to a launch process. Please excuse the cynicism out of which the comment originated, but it’s not difficult to understand why such cynicism becomes prevalent.
You’re right of course in your comment that it will take considerable work to generate the kind of ranking that would generate the results shown in your examples.
Thanks again for the heads-up.
Kind regards
Ian
So you need to have the exact domain name of the search phrase?
Or What else can we do to get Double listings and Links like in your example?
Thanks
Hi Jorge,
I need to do more research but, yes, it would be due to having the exact match domain name and building substantial authority for the website.
So are you also saying, aswell as a site domain and/or company name, we should also have multiple website domains (to include search phrases) – I have tried this in the past, and whilst it worked succesfully on Yahoo (and still does), it didn’t seem to trick Google into giving me an additional first page link, am I doing something wrong?
I don’t think Google can be tricked into awarding sitelinks and brandlinks. It’s based on authority and getting authority for multiple sites would be very hard. It’s probably a better idea to concentrate totally on one site and build authority for it.
I don’t understand how to have these links pointing to my website?
Hi Russ, I’ll do a follow-up on the strategies needed… after I’ve done more research to be sure of my findings.
Thanks for the great information.
Hi Neil and Linda,
As usual top information.
I am in the procees of building this web. (shown above)
Thankyou for sharing your hard gained knowledge.
How’s the baby going. Must be about 2yo now.
Kind regards,
Joe (Australia. formally Shropshire)
Hi Joe, thanks for your kind words. The baby? He’s almost 11.
Thank you..really informative!!
Blimey. Thanks Neil.
Hey Neil,
As I wander through my email and ponder the overwhelming amount of information available on any given subject, on any given day, I feel this very strong urge to just click on Select All, and Delete! With IM competition being what it is, there must be a special branch of Psychiatry devoted strictly to casualties of information overwhelm!
All the best,
Jon
Hi Jon,
Yes, it’s very important to be original and helpful in Internet Marketing nowadays… which many marketers totally overlook and wonder why no-one reads their emails! Hence I’m trying to produce more original work to inspire discussions and help people.
12-link combo – that’s quite a goal.
But worth the effort for a phrase that gets a lot of searches I’d expect. Can you imagine the traffic?
A great piece of information Neil, thanks for sending me the link
You’re welcome Lyn. Thanks for commenting.
“but I’m not Amazon or Nike… how does this apply to me”
Right!
For YEARS, 3 of us docs have shared the front 2 pages of
Google (in regularly changing proportion) for the term:
“Dr.Mani”
http://www.google.com/search?q=Dr.Mani
This is GOLD:
“note, the domain name exactly matches the search phrase”
Thanks for sharing, Neil. I’m adding it to future plans
All success
Dr.Mani
Thanks Mani. I’ll drop you an email today about our latest JV.
Indeed, the combination of Sitelinks and Brandlinks will get top rankings for a search phrase as pointed out by you.
But, it would great if you would devote another post to discuss the strategies and methodologies that we should adopt to get this sort of a result.
Cheers
Raj
Hi Raj,
Good idea… I’ll do more research and expand on the strategies required.
Thank you, Neil.
That’s so cool – I’m rushing off to change the arrangement of my keywords for all my sites. I’m on page 2 for certain keywords and will be interested to see if my sites edge up to page 1 and even feature in the first five on page 1 as a result of the changes!
Thanks, again.
Magda
Good luck, Magda.
Powerful information in this post Neil thank you. Affiliate Marketing just got another little bit harder as well, it would seem?
Hi Sean… yes, there are some very interesting changes happening at Google right now, with big implications for affiliate marketers. After doing some tests, I think I understand what’s going on, and how affiliates can adapt…
Neil.
Hi Neil,
Thanks for the email and post; I had noticed this phenomina (not sure if thats spelt correctly) before but didnt spell out the detail to myself as you have done.
I checked out your example of phpbb hacks and you can see they have “authority” for that key word(s) (split as “phpbb hacks” or “phpbbhacks”). the site has 46K entries in google with the site: command so even though its not Nike or Amazon its clearly had a huge amount of effort to get that size.
I did a quick check for my own site with the search “petefinnigan” or “pete finnigan” and i too get brandlinks and sitelinks (12 in all the same as Nike, Amazon, phpbb hacks) so yes you dont need to be Amazon or Nike, I have done it.
My own site has 2860 pages in google with the site: command; so not trivial work but not too bad, its not 900K for Nike or 46K for phpbbhacks
But I think overall the whole thing is absolutely about “brand”. I trade on my name, my company is my name and my site is my name and google has recognised this. Clearly Amazon and Nike do the same at a completely different scale. How does google pick up that my name is my brand? i dont know other than backlinks; maybe citations for people? I have written 3 books and been mentioned or referenced in 10-15 other books; i even wrote for the forward for two other books. I have written many papers, presentations? – i dont know but if you find out please let us know.
I also note that the links stops at 12, i have found a few more searches and no one exceeds 12 that i can find – i didnt spend long looking though…:-)
Nice post Neil,
cheers
Pete
Great additional info, Pete, thanks.
Hi Neil
Right, I still read your emails, I’ve read the post and all the comments.
(nice to see a comment from Dr. Mani – too many children looking for heart operations so I hope his cause is going well)
Still working on my first website, backlinks, putting videos together etc…………
So I somewhat feel like the only sober person at the party!
Branding like Nike and Amazon?
Needs large marketing budget – not very relevant to me at the moment then!
Hi Graham. I’m not sure about needing a large marketing budget, although that would no doubt help.
Did you see Pete’s comment?
Thanks for this excellent SEO Heads-Up Neil – enlightening insight as per usual
Neil,
I agree it would be great if you did a research on this topic, especially keeping in mind this closely intersects with the theme of a leadership. So, we wait impatiently for the results of your researches in this extremely interesting area.
Hi,
We sell many different products. Would it beneficial for me to buy multiple domain names -with different names relevant to the products we sell, all pointing to the one site? Does google not like that kind of thing or do you think it would help.
Thanks
It used to be a good idea, but now you have to worry about technical details like not having the same domain registration information and the same hosting details. However, the biggest issue is trying to create enough unique, valuable content for your main site and “satellite” sites. With Google only wanting to see great content, I don’t think having satellite sites works well anymore, either to drive traffic or build authority.
Neil.