Would you like to see your site on the first page of Google? We know how important it is to appear in the top positions of search engines. You can achieve top positions organically, and a specialized SEO agency like SmartLinks will help you achieve the best results.
Discover our tips to boost the SEO of your pages through Schema markers.
What is Schema? Schema Markup is a type of data structuring in code added to a website to help search engines better understand the content. This way, the content is presented in an advanced format. This structure results from a collaboration between Google, Bing, Yandex, and Yahoo! to provide the best possible results when a user searches for something. Adding Schema Markup to a website’s HTML improves how its pages are displayed in SERPs and enhances the rich snippets presented below the page title. The microdata found in Schema.org is used to promote structured data schemes on the internet, web pages, email messages, and others. When this microdata code is added to a page, it creates an enhanced description of the page. On the other hand, the search engine easily identifies the page’s content, improves its position in search engine results, and makes it appear in top positions.
Types of Schema Markers There are distinct types of Schema markers that can be applied to creative content, events, health, organizations, people, places, products, ratings, actions, etc. For a better understanding, we have gathered some information about the main markers:
Organizations The corporate page scheme can use a logo, institutional link, description, contacts, social media links, and site navigation scheme. These elements are essential for better indexing and consequently for a better position in search rankings. For example, Apple added Schema to organize development data.
ALT TEXT: Example of Schema Organizations with indexing structure.
Videos A page with embedded or hosted video content can leverage the video scheme. Google, as well as any other search engine, displays web pages with video rich snippets. YouTube videos are an excellent example of how Schema works. From the search results for “video SEO,” which one would you choose first? The thumbnail video in the search results can boost the number of clicks; we recommend testing.
ALT TEXT: SEO video search on YouTube with Schema Markup.
People The people markup scheme can be used to influence Knowledge Graph results about an individual. This scheme is often used on pages of public figures, requiring elements such as name, description, images, and quotes. Let’s look at the example of Steve Jobs:
ALT TEXT: Schema applied to individuals with biographical data, photographs, and a list of related questions.
Reviews This type of scheme uses star ratings. At first, almost any page could get star ratings. That is why Google started observing and controlling pages that received stars in their rich snippets to ensure the representativeness of pages with star markup. By earning stars, pages can get more clicks. This is because reviews and ratings use real customer feedback, helping validate the elements in question and contribute to the page’s authority. Ratings are assigned on a numerical scale (usually from 1 to 5) and can be applied to diverse content such as books, courses, events, instructions, companies, movies, products, recipes, or apps. If you want to apply this Schema to your company, check Google’s rules for this type of markup.
Events The event markup scheme can be used on pages that organize events, festivals, and ticket sales, to generate event-rich snippets. Adding event markup schemes makes it easier to discover the page and consequently the event. For this purpose, promote the event or artist’s name, add an image, schedule, and use other Google products, such as Google Maps, to facilitate the event’s location.
ALT TEXT: Event schema with filters by date, location, category, and audience.
Articles Refers to the schema markup of editorial content pages: articles, news, blogs, and others. The content can be optimized by presenting descriptive text, title, publication date, images, and videos that help perceive creative works and bibliographic resources. Using these elements can generate more clicks. An example is IMDb’s site, with an extensive list of movies and series, including links to actors, directors, episode lists, videos, reviews, and much more.
ALT TEXT: Schema with articles about movies and series.
Products This is the advantageous schema type on e-commerce pages. The required properties are essentially the product name, price, rating, and image. These elements directly influence the page’s ranking in search results; we recommend their use.
ALT TEXT: Product search in Schema with name, price, rating, and image.
Recipes Name, description, preparation time, rating, image, or image carousel are examples that help structure data and position the recipe page in search engine results. We suggest using Schema to make your recipe stand out!
ALT TEXT: Recipe search using Schema, including image, source, rating, and execution time.
Schema Markup Formats
The Schema.org vocabulary can be used with various encodings, including RDFa, Microdata, and JSON-LD. These vocabularies cover entities, relationships between entities, and actions and can be easily expanded through a well-documented extension model. Sharing a common vocabulary among webmasters and developers in choosing a scheme and obtaining maximum benefit for their efforts. We will analyse each of these markup formats that allow data to be structured in a way that is understandable for machines and facilitates interpretation and processing by computers.
RDFa (Resource Description Framework in Attributes) Description: RDFa is an extension of HTML, allowing semantic information to be incorporated directly into web pages. Operation: Information is incorporated into HTML tags through specific attributes, indicating relationships between resources on the page. Example: <p vocab=”http://schema.org/” typeof=”Person”>Name: <span property=”name”>João</span></p>
Microdata Description: Microdata is an effortless way to incorporate semantics into web pages, using HTML attributes to mark specific information. Operation: It uses specific HTML attributes, such as itemscope, itemtype, and itemprop, to identify entities and properties. Example: <p itemscope itemtype=”http://schema.org/Person”>Name: <span itemprop=”name”>Maria</span></p>
JSON-LD (JSON Linked Data) Description: JSON-LD is a way to structure data using JSON to represent information and Linked Data to create connections between this data. Operation: Information is organized in a JSON block and can be incorporated directly into the page’s body or referenced externally. Example: jsonCopy code
<script type=”application/ld+json”> { “@context”: “http://schema.org”, “@type”: “Person”, “name”: “Carlos” } </script>
Each of these approaches offers a separate way to express structured data on the web, being useful for search engines and other applications that aim to understand page content more accurately. More than 10 million sites use Schema.org to mark their web pages and email messages. Many applications from major search engines already use these vocabularies to provide richer and more extensible experiences.
Why Use Schema on Your Website In addition to better structuring your website’s pages, Schema enables better positioning compared to the competition. It’s just a matter of unawareness, but only a small percentage of pages.
Get ahead of the game and improve your page’s position without wasting another click! Consult a digital marketing agency specialising in SEO and optimise your data vs. results.
Glossary
SEO – Acronym for Search Engine Optimisation. It encompasses a set of techniques aimed at achieving the best organic positioning for pages and websites, such as quality content, the use of specific keywords, optimised images and a good user experience.
SERP – stands for Search Engine Results Page. This is the page that Google and other search engines display with the results of the user’s query. It includes links to the most relevant pages and additional information or images. They may display paid adverts at the top, followed by organic results further down.
Snippet – An organic search result displayed prominently, above all other results, due to its relevance. It is considered Google’s “position zero”. This search response can be copied and pasted directly from the SERP.
HTML – stands for Hypertext Markup Language.) It is a basic building block that defines the meaning and structure of web content.
Article updated in January 2024.
