Schema Markup
Schema markup is structured data code added to your website that helps search engines understand your content better, enabling rich results like star ratings, FAQ dropdowns, and event listings in search results.
Schema markup (also called structured data) is a standardized vocabulary of tags you can add to your HTML to help search engines interpret the meaning of your content. It uses the Schema.org vocabulary, a collaborative project supported by Google, Bing, Yahoo, and Yandex.
For example, instead of just seeing text that says "$49.99," a search engine can understand that this is the price of a specific product, available at a specific store, with a specific star rating. Common schema types include Organization, LocalBusiness, Product, Review, FAQ, HowTo, Event, Recipe, Article, and BreadcrumbList. Each schema type has specific properties that describe different attributes.
In practice
- A recipe website added Recipe schema markup to all their recipes, resulting in rich results showing cooking time, calories, and star ratings, which increased organic clicks by 35%
- A local dentist implemented LocalBusiness and Review schema, causing their star rating to appear in Google search results, which doubled their click-through rate
- An event venue added Event schema to their upcoming shows page, and their events started appearing in Google's dedicated events search feature
- A FAQ page with FAQPage schema earned expandable FAQ results in Google, occupying significantly more SERP real estate and pushing competitors below the fold
Not sure how this applies to you?
A senior engineer walks your site, your search presence and the way enquiries reach you, then writes down the three things worth fixing first. You keep the document either way.