Have you ever heard of SEO’s discussing structured data, but you’re not entirely sure of what it is or it’s worth to your SEO campaign? Fortunately for you, we’re here to clear up a few of the misconceptions about structured data and to provide you with new information on how and why it is so important to your campaign. From John Mueller’s direct advice to the competitiveness of organic search, we’re diving into the depths of structured data to show you just how important it really is.
What Is Structured Data?
First of all, we’ll take you back to the very basics. Structured data is an aid for search engines and web crawlers to have a better understanding of what your page’s content is actually about. Structured data is added to a page’s HMTL mark up and search engines will then utilize this information to produce clear and easy to understand rich snippets of information. While structured data is not an official ranking factor, it can help sites to rank in one way or another, by helping search engines to understand the relevancy of your page to a particular search term. The easier this is for search engines, typically the higher you are likely to rank.
More people than ever before are utilizing structured data, which is no surprise considering the huge amount of options that are already in place (with more still to come!). Structured data is also becoming more important in a world where voice search is becoming a major influencer. Structuring the data for your search result can help to improve the accuracy of a voice bot’s results.
Benefits Of Schema
There have been a number of case studies that have shown how great schema data can really be, but what the true benefits of this exciting addition to your site?
Higher CTR – Rich snippets help to attract the attention of the audience and as a result, you are likely to see improvements in the number of people who click on your site. A meta description can often not provide readers with enough information, particularly if this has been dynamically generated. Rich snippets can provide you with an opportunity to really showcase what your page is about in order to entice more traffic.
Increased Conversions – Rich snippets can offer a number of listings and reviews, and if these are positive, you could see the number of conversions grow. In addition, your visitors will already know what they are looking for and structured data can provide them with even more of an insight into your business so they know that what they need is there and that you have also been rated highly for offering what they’re looking for.
Increase Number Of Featured Snippets – If you really want to show off your site (because quite frankly, who doesn’t?), then featured snippets are what you should aim for. While you are not guaranteed to gain a featured snippet by integrating structured data, there have been instances of sites integrating this and seeing featured snippets as a result. This is also important in the world of voice search due to the fact that results are generally pulled from featured snippets to use as a verbal answer.
Is It Possible To Use Too Much Structured Data?
So now you know what structured data is and all of its benefits, you’re probably looking forward to getting started and optimizing your search results listings. But wait – is it possible to use too much-structured data? The short answer is yes.
It is possible to receive a manual action from using spammy techniques when integrating structured data. Structured data is becoming hugely important in the world of SEO, to the point where integrating this should no longer be considered optional – but don’t make it spammy!
