Google Ads

Dynamic Sitelinks

Also called Automated sitelinks

Extra ad links Google writes itself from your site's pages when it predicts they will earn a better response.

Quick facts: Dynamic Sitelinks

Category
Google Ads
Also called
Automated sitelinks
Level
Intermediate
Affects
Ad size, click destinations, message control
Where to see it
Google Ads (Assets table, filtered to automated)
In this article4
  1. How dynamic sitelinks work
  2. Why dynamic sitelinks matter
  3. Where dynamic sitelinks go wrong
  4. How to act on it

These are links you did not write. Google reads your website, matches pages against what the person searched for, and adds the resulting links beneath your ad when it predicts they will improve the response. You are charged for a click on one exactly as you would be for a click on the headline.

The important rule is precedence: where your own eligible sitelinks exist, they are used instead. Google fills a gap rather than competing with your work. That single fact settles most arguments about whether to allow them, because the reliable way to stop seeing automated links is to supply better ones yourself.

They make an ad taller and give a searcher more than one way in, which matters most on accounts that never got round to building assets. For a small advertiser with a thin account, they can be the difference between a single-line ad and one that occupies real space on the page.

They also expose something useful about your site. The pages Google chooses to promote are the pages it believes answer the query, which is a free reading of how your site is understood from the outside. When those pages surprise you, the surprise is usually worth investigating.

The obvious risk is destination. Google can only pick from what exists, so a site carrying a careers page, an expired offer, a login screen or a thin category page may see paid traffic sent to it. Nobody chose that, and it will not show up unless somebody looks at the assets table.

The second is attribution of blame. A line that reads oddly in your ad is often assumed to be a copywriting mistake when it was generated automatically, and teams waste time editing ads that never contained it. The third is switching the whole type off in irritation without adding manual sitelinks, which leaves the ad smaller than it was before.

How to act on it

Write your own sitelinks first, at the right level, with descriptions that suit the campaign. Because manual assets take precedence, that is both the fix and the improvement — a sitelink asset you control will always describe your offer better than a line assembled from page titles.

Then audit what Google is still adding. Filter the assets table to the automated entries, read the destinations, and ask whether you would have paid for a click to each of them. If the pattern is consistently poor, turn the type off deliberately in the automated assets settings. And treat the exercise as feedback on the site as much as on the account, because tidy navigation and honest page titles are what these links are built from — the same groundwork that ongoing PPC management depends on.

Do and do not

Do

  • Write your own sitelinks, which take precedence over automated ones
  • Read the automated destinations before judging them
  • Fix weak page titles, since Google builds links from them

Do not

  • Switch the type off before adding manual sitelinks
  • Blame your copywriter for a line Google generated
  • Leave careers, login or expired pages eligible for ad traffic

Questions people ask about this

Do dynamic sitelinks cost extra?

No. A click on one is charged the same way as a click on the headline, so you are not paying a premium for the extra links. What you are paying for is a destination you did not choose, which is the real cost. If the pages Google picks cannot convert, the money is wasted at ordinary click prices rather than at higher ones.

Can I edit the text of a dynamic sitelink?

No. They are generated by Google from your website and query, and there is no field to rewrite them. The only meaningful controls are to add your own sitelinks, which take precedence when they are eligible, or to switch the automated type off at account level. Editing the website itself also changes what Google has to work with.

Should I turn them off?

Only after building your own. Turning them off in an account with no manual sitelinks makes the ads smaller and gives searchers fewer routes in. The sensible order is to write proper sitelinks first, then look at what Google is still adding, and disable the type only if the destinations it keeps choosing are ones you would not pay for.

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