One SERP Result, Two Different Link Destinations?

[1000Bulbs]

Because my vocabulary isn't up to par, it may be easier for you to skip ahead to the image I've attached.

One of my web pages shows up in the Google SERP like this. It has the blue "title" link that goes to one page (URL A), and under that, there is a green "breadcrumb" link that goes to a different page (URL B).

Any idea why this is happening and how it can be fixed?

Thanks in advance,

Benjamin

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[DougRoberts]

Aha! These are your breadcrumb links. Normally the URL isn't clickable, but in some cases Google will extract the breadcrumb from your page and present it under the title. (Check the breadcrumb of the ranking page and see if it matches)

They've been doing this for a while. See this article from 2009:

http://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2009/11/new-site-hierarchies-display-in-search.html

[1000Bulbs]

That makes sense. The breadcrumbs on the website do not show the current page. They only provide a link to the previous page.

For example, if the page was for "Green Nalgene Bottles" and it was a subcategory of home --> water bottles --> Nalgene, the breadcrumb would read "home > water bottles > Nalgene." It sounds like it should read "home > water bottles > Nalgene > green."

Obviously, that's confusing Google. Is it against best practices in general?

[DougRoberts]

I'd go with making your categories/subcategories as meaningful as possible to real people.

When the breadcrumbs are displayed it can potentially provide searchers with more context (hey, these guys do all kinds of bottles!) so may be more appealing and may give the searcher more confidence...

(If the result isn't exactly what I was looking for, but your breadcrumb suggests you might have more on offer...)

In the real world I'm not sure how much impact this actually has on your average searcher...

So best practice - try and keep your categories short and meaningful and don't create more categories than you need.

I wouldn't worry about going as granular as "green!"

[1000Bulbs]

Thanks, Doug, but I only meant that as an example (there's a green Nalgene bottle on my desk).

I guess what I was asking is whether or not breadcrumbs should show the category at hand and not just the category that precedes it. Looks to me like Google is voting yes.

Anyway, I think I'll call this question "answered." Thanks again for your help!

[DougRoberts]

I was only using the same example! I don't even know what green Nalgene is! (Sounds like a cleaning product to me!)

The only thing you can do is be aware of google's actions and do what you can to make the best of it!

Good luck!