If It Looks Like Google Sitelinks Have Expanded, It’s Just Your Imagination

Despite what you may see in Google’s search results these days, the search engine tells us that, no, there’s been no expansion of Sitelinks recently. We’ve received emails here at Search Engine Land HQ and seen tweets asking about the appearance of Sitelinks on sub-pages that previously didn’t have them. We’ve also seen them show […]

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Google Logo - StockDespite what you may see in Google’s search results these days, the search engine tells us that, no, there’s been no expansion of Sitelinks recently.

We’ve received emails here at Search Engine Land HQ and seen tweets asking about the appearance of Sitelinks on sub-pages that previously didn’t have them. We’ve also seen them show up on our own Google searches, like one I recently did for “Quora logo.”

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Sitelinks are also showing on searches like “danny sullivan twitter,” “elisabeth osmeloski twitter” and “matt mcgee twitter.”

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It’s not new for Sitelinks to show up on sub-pages; that’s been happening for some time now. But based on the emails and tweets we’ve seen, some of our readers think they’re showing up on more sub-pages than before. A Google spokesperson tells us that this is “not new behavior,” but that Google does regularly tweak how many Sitelinks show up in search results.

It’s not new behavior. Sitelinks have never been restricted to top level domain pages – sitelinks will appear when our algorithms think a particular site is a highly relevant result for a query. We’re constantly experimenting and updating data that sitelinks use, so you may be seeing more, or less, sitelinks appear for pages.

So, if you’re thinking Google has expanded Sitelinks to more “deep” pages, Google says not so.


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Matt McGee
Contributor
Matt McGee joined Third Door Media as a writer/reporter/editor in September 2008. He served as Editor-In-Chief from January 2013 until his departure in July 2017. He can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee.

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