Schema Markup: A Powerful Tool For SEO7 min read

Schema markup is a great way to help your website stand out from your SEO competitors. Here’s why you need schema: what it is, and how to use it.

Schema markup (Schema.org) is a form of microdata. Once added to a webpage, schema markup creates an enhanced description (otherwise known as a “rich snippet”), which appears in search results, adding additional descriptive information about its host web page.

The Schema project was first introduced at Schema.org back in 2011, as a means to better identify online resources and add clarity to the trillions of search results generated each day by the top search engines. Schema.org was a joint venture, created and developed by the largest search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing, Yandex).

In the years since, schema markup has become increasingly important as modern search engines employ new categorization strategies to interpret the context of each query, determining the quality of search results.

Schema can provide context to an otherwise ambiguous web page, enabling more accurate categorization by search engines. That makes your site easier to find, and more accessible to the right kind of visitors.

How Does Schema Markup Work?

Schema Markup is essentially a text “label” added within the web page code that contains pertinent information about that page, adding context and providing more information to search users and search engines, increasing Click Through Rate (CTR).

Where Did Schema Come From?

The four biggest search engine companies—Google, Bing, Yahoo, and Yandex—created Schema.org, although it is still a community-driven initiative.

Simple Schema

The HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) that makes up a web page is the basic code used by the web browser to interpret how to display webpage contents. Schema consists of additional add-on code designations that function within the existing html, and can Identify the web page author, the business or organization it represents, and many other specific bits of information for use on SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages), clarifying how those pages should be properly classified and categorized.

You can insert Schema markup into your website in a number of different ways. There are various user-friendly code generators and WordPress plugins to aid in the creation and implementation of website schema.

Does Schema Improve Your Search Rankings?

There is no evidence that microdata has a direct effect on organic search rankings, but rich snippets can make your web pages appear more prominently in SERPs of their particular category. Very few techniques in modern SEO will show immediate results, but schema can.

Adding Schema to Your Webpages

Although the code may appear complex, schema.org offers examples of how to use the various item types, enabling you to actually see what the rich data is meant to accomplish. If you’re not comfortable with coding, Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper is a tool that allows you to easily generate the proper code to tag your web pages.

Test The Rich Data On Your Pages

To aid you, every page on Schema.org provides examples of how to properly apply tags. You can validate your schema markup using the validation tool at schema.org. Another great resource from Google is Google’s Structured Data Testing Tool, which enables you to easily test the rich data on your site.

Schema Data Types You Should be Using

Business Markup

If your website primarily exists to support a business, you can improve your company’s website and increase its searchability by configuring the Organization and Breadcrumb schema types. You will be providing a variety of details by doing this, including your brand name, company address (if you have one), your official social media accounts, and your logo.

The structure of pages, product categories, and blog post categories is displayed using breadcrumbs.

The addition of a contactPoint section to your Organization markup is also advisable. Doing so will make it easier for people to find your organization when they search for your contact info.

Don’t put your organization’s specific business markup on every page of your website, however. It’s more efficient to only put it on the home page or the contact page.

Person Markup

If you have a personal website, use the schema Person markup, You can also use this if your business has individual pages for each of your team members.

Local Business Markup

If you’re a local business, implementing the LocalBusiness schema markup is a wise move, but be advised that local business rich snippets primarily pull data from your Google My Business listing, so you’ll want to be sure to create such a listing if you don’t already have one (also totally worth it).

Article Markup

If the web page in question is a particular type of article (blog, news article), you can use the NewsArticle or BlogPosting type instead of the more generic Article, to be even more specific. Other data you can provide includes headline and datepublished, wordcount, awards, and a brief description.

Rating/Review Markup

Rating rich snippets can be used to show consumer ratings, or to inject your own product review. But! You should always use genuine consumer feedback rather than just automatically giving all your products or services bogus 5-star ratings. The most frequently abused schema type is the rating/review markup. Some users automatically include this on every page of their site, in the mistaken belief that it will improve their search engine rankings, but Google has recognized that ploy and now penalizes your site for the use of such false tactics.

Product Markup

Product Schema is a powerful tool for online product listings, especially those used by eCommerce stores. It works best when deployed in conjunction with ratings/review schema, to provide more detailed info about specific products to potential customers on a page-by-page basis.

Video Markup

Using the video markup to specify when your content includes video will increase your chance of getting those video contents listed in Google’s Video tab as well as in their regular page content listing.

Event Markup

If you create particular events and list them on a webpage, you can add the event markup, which enables you to list many of the event’s specific details (time, place, duration) as well.

Recipe Markup

This is an absolute requirement for any cooking blog. You’ll want to make your recipe as simple for Google to interpret as possible. Recipe markup will help.

Specific Markup For Niche Industries

There are numerous extremely specialized industry-related markup types you can use. These can be extremely specific (and helpful), plus there’s a high probability that your competitors aren’t using them, particularly if you’re in local SEO.

These different types of industry markup include:

BookStore

BikeStore

HobbyShop

BookStore

BikeStore

HobbyShop

MensClothingStore

…even OfficeEquipmentStore.

There are many different industry markup types to choose from, representing numerous niche industries.

Conclusion

“Schema” and “Structured Data” may seem like scary technical terms. But they don’t need to be.

Schema is simply an amazing categorization aid that can be strategically used to improve your web pages and your website’s overall searchability. And the many tools and resources available for its use make it much easier to implement than it might appear at a glance.

Schema markup is a very useful tool, designed by the Search Engines themselves to aid their organizational effects and increase their overall efficiency. By taking advantage of that tool, you can help categorize your content and push your website to the top of your category.

Working directly with a tool created by the biggest internet searchers is an obvious way to get the results you want. And schema is a great way to do it.

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If you want to upgrade your marketing game and create a website that your customers will love, Sharp Innovations can help. We specialize in creating seamless websites, supporting e-commerce, and providing digital marketing services that take your business to the next level. If you’re ready to improve your online presence, contact us today.