How to improve your website SEO using Schema Markup - Beginners Guide

1
How to improve your website SEO using Schema
Markup Beginners Guide to Structured Data 2021
Tip Visit my blog post to watch free video
content to help you with this article
https//www.dcpweb.co.uk/blog/how-to-improve-your-
website-seo-using-schema- markup-beginners-guide
Schema markup is code that can be added to your
website pages which helps search engines to
understand the type of content on your website
pages and better represent it on the (SERPs)
search engine results page. Throughout this
article, I will aim to show you how schema markup
(structured data) can improve your website SEO
and why you should make it a part of your SEO
strategy.
2
Table of Content

1. What are rich search results?
2. What is schema markup?
3. Why is schema important?
4. How to use schema markup on your website
5. Go to the Google Structured Data Markup Helper
   website
6. Select a data type
7. Paste in the website page URL you want to markup
8. A new page will load the Google structured markup
   tool
9. Select content on your page to add to mark up
   fields
10. Populate the "name" tag field
11. Populate the "Author" tag field
12. Populate the "Date Published tag field
13. Populate the "Image" tag field
14. Populate the "Article Section" tag field
15. Populate the "Article Body" tag field
16. Populate the "URL" tag field
17. Populate the "Publisher" tag field
18. Create HTML
19. Structured data as JSON-LD markup

3

• What are rich search results?
• Rich results are experiences that can appear on
  Google search as carousels, images, video
  content, company information, FAQs and other
  content types.
• The main goal of rich results in to enhance a
  search engine user's experience by displaying
  more useful information in a search result.
• Example Recipe markup includes data like time to
  prepare the dish, ingredients, user reviews and
  recipe images.
• When you add Recipe markup to your page, you are
  telling the search engines
• The recipe takes 45 minutes to prepare
• This is the list of ingredients required
• Here is a picture of the dish
• here are some user reviews

4
Example Recipe Rich Results
As you can see in the above image, not all the
results returned are the same. The listings that
stand out the most have review stars. The star
ratings are part of the schema markup implemented
on the website recipe page. You can view more
information about recipe snippet cards here
https//developers.google.com/search/docs/data-typ
es/recipe Rich search results tend to have a
higher click through rate as they are displayed
at the very top of Google search results.
5
Standard search engine result typically only
includes a title, URL, and meta description. A
rich snippet in a search result page might
include additional useful information as shown in
the above example recipe cards, the video snippet
example below and the event snippet example
below. You may have searched for a "how to task"
in Google search and a rich result is returned.
YouTube often returns rich results for relevant
video content which helps to answer a user's
search query. Below you can see an example of a
YouTube rich result returned for a video I
created on my YouTube channel. Example YouTube
Rich Result
A Google featured snippet (Rich Result) can
greatly improve the visibility of content on your
website and also external sites like YouTube and
Facebook. This is a link to the example video
that is shown above which I uploaded to my
YouTube channel https//youtu.be/L5uVTEItvHo
6
Stats for the example YouTube video
As you can see, having a rich snippet (Rich
Result) for your content can greatly improve
exposure, click through ratios and visitor
traffic. Note you can also add Video Schema
Markup to embedded YouTube videos on your blog
posts. This can apply to content on your website
and external content share on other web
platforms. One of the main goals of rich search
results is to create a standardised markup
(format) to highlight key information about a
website page, which then allows a search engine
to understand more accurately what that page
contains or its purpose. What is schema
markup? Using structured data (schemas) allows
Google and other search engines to target your
page content more accurately and serve that page
content to fulfil a user's search query. After
all, the main goal of all search engines is to
serve a user the most relevant content for a
given keyword search phrase to improve user
experience.
7

• Rich results are generated from specific code
  added to your website pages. There are 3 main
  types of code formats that can be used to add
  structured data to your website
• Microdata
• RDFa
• JSON-LD
• Schemas are used to markup the content of a web
  page in ways that can be easily understood by
  major search engines like Microsoft, Google,
  Yandex and Yahoo.
• Schema markup helps machines like Alexa
  understand what kind of thing a piece of content
  is about.
• You can view more information about Schemas here
  https//schema.org/
• Structured data (Schema markup) is a standardised
  markup format for providing key information about
  a specified page and categorising the page
  content.
• For example, on an event page the structured data
  may contain the
• Event name
• Start date and time
• End date and time

8
Example Google search results for festival keyword
9

• In the above image, you can see the results
  returned by Google search engine for the keyword
  Festival.
• Google is displaying search results from
  different websites, in the above example you can
  see
• The festival event name
• The date
• The address
• The location
• An image / Logo
• The most important thing to note is the all the
  listings are consistent. They all contain the
  same structured data.
• A few important notes
• Google returned search results based on my
  location.
• I was logged into my Google account when I did
  the search so Google already knows my location.
• Google can also use your IP address for the GEO
  location.
• There are options at the top of the results to
  view Today, Tomorrow, This Week, This Weekend
  etc...
• The is an option at the bottom of the results to
  search for more results.

10
Google detailed view of a specific festival
11
The detailed view as suggests contains specific
information about this event. The "key" here is
that all the events will contain the same or
similarly structured data detailed view. Rich
snippets (RIch Results) often display in Google
search results at position zero. A rich result
will normally display above all other Google
search listings, this also means if you create
high-quality content then you can achieve a page
1 Google search result without having to compete
with other pages 1 search results. Rich snippets
can be displayed on both desktop search results
and mobile search results.
12
Example mobile rich result for a blog post
13

• In the mobile view example above is the rich
  result is for a blog post I created here 30
  essential tips for improving your web design in
  2021
• Below you can see an example of the rich result
  from Google desktop view.
• Example desktop rich result for a blog post

14
Below you can see the schema markup in JSON-LD
format for the above blog post.
ltscript type"application/ldjson"gt "_at_context"
"http//schema.org", "_at_type" "Article",
"mainEntityOfPage" "_at_type" "WebPage", "_at_id"
"https//dcpweb.co.uk/blog" , "headline" "30
essential tips for improving your web design in
2021", "author" "_at_type" "Person", "name"
"Pankaj Shah" , "datePublished"
"2021-03-23", "dateModified" "2021-03-23", "imag
e" "https//www.dcpweb.co.uk/userfiles/ckeditor/
blog/essential-tips-for-improving-
your-website-design/30-essential-tips-for-improvin
g-your-website-design-in-2021.jpg", "articleSectio
n" "Website Design", "articleBody" "How to
improve my business website? - This is probably
one of the most frequent questions I am asked by
my web development clients. It is not a simple
question to answer as every client website
project is different, but there are some common
aspects of web design which all business can take
advantage of.", "url" "https//www.dcpweb.co.uk/
blog/30-essential-tips-for-improving-your-web-desi
gn", "publisher" "_at_type" "Organization",
"name" "DCP Web Designers", "url"
"http//www.dcpweb.co.uk", "logo" "_at_type"
"ImageObject", "url" "https//www.dcpweb.co.uk/us
erfiles/ckeditor/dcp-web-designers-logo/dcp-
logo-01.jpg" lt/scriptgt
15
Important Note It is not a requirement to create
structured data (schema markup) like above in
order for your website content to appear in
Google search results as a rich result. The goal
of creating the schema markup is to give Google
more specific information about the content on
your website page. If your website pages already
have a good structure then Google can generate a
rich result without the need of adding schema
markup. The advantage of using schema markup is
you can tell Google more specific information
about the content on your website page and
provide additional metadata like your
organisation name, organisation logo, date the
articles for created, date the article was
modified, a specific image for the article and
much more. There is the potential to improve
your search engine rankings if you implement
structured data (schema markup) on your website,
however, adding markup does not mean that Google
or other search engines will show your content as
a rich snippet. The most important factor is the
actual content on your website pages. Here is an
example explanation from Schema.org Most
webmasters are familiar with HTML tags on their
pages. Usually, HTML tags tell the browser how to
display the information included in the tag. For
example, lth1gtAvatarlt/h1gt tells the browser to
display the text string "Avatar" in a heading 1
format. However, the HTML tag doesn't give any
information about what that text string
means"Avatar" could refer to the hugely
successful 3D movie, or it could refer to a type
of profile pictureand this can make it more
difficult for search engines to intelligently
display relevant content to a user.
16
As you can see in the above image, the Schema
project was Founded by Google, Microsoft, Yahoo
and Yandex. These are the biggest search engines
on the planet working together which is rather
surprising! The main reason why these search
engines are working together is simple, data
needs to be structured in a specific way to allow
search engines to interpret the content on a
website page. If all the major search engines
decided to use different structures then the web
developers are business owners would have to work
extra hard to markup content differently for each
search engine. Thank god the "big boys" can play
together sometimes )

• See how my company can build an amazing website
  for your business.
• Custom web design.
• Secure and fast website solution.
• Full management training.
• Take control of your website.
• SEO optimisation.
• Reliable web hosting and emails.

17
Why is schema important? Schema markup
(structured data) allows you to tell the search
engines more about your business and what type of
content can be found on different pages on your
website(s). Here is a list of the most common
types of schema markup
Structure Data Type Notes Additional Documentation
Local Business Business details displayed in the Google knowledge panel, including open hours, ratings, directions, and actions to book appointments or order items. Click Here
Article News, sports, or blog article displayed with Top stories carousel and rich result features, such as headline text and larger-than-thumbnail images. Click Here
Book Book actions that enable users to buy the book that they find directly from Search results. Click Here
Breadcrumb Rich results that display in a sequential list or gallery from a single site. This feature must be combined with one of the following features Recipe, Course, Restaurant, Movie. Click Here
Course Educational courses that appear in a provider-specific list. Courses can include the course title, provider, and a short description. Click Here
Critic review A snippet from a longer review article that a single editor has created, curated, or compiled for a publisher. Critic reviews can be about Book, Movie, and Local business. Click Here
Dataset Large data sets that appear in Google Dataset Search. Click Here
Employer Aggregate Rating An evaluation of a hiring organization compiled from many users that are displayed in the job search experience on Google. Click Here
Event An interactive rich result that shows a list of organized events, such as concerts or art festivals, that people may attend at a particular time and place. Click Here
Fact Check A summarized version of a credible site's evaluation of a claim made by others. Click Here
FAQ A Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) page contains a list of questions and answers pertaining to a particular topic. Click Here
18
Home Activities An interactive rich result where people can discover online activities that they can do from home. Click Here
How-to A How-to walks users through a set of steps to successfully complete a task, featuring video, images, and text. Click Here
Image License In Google Images, the Licensable badge tells people that license information is available for the image, and provides a link to the license in the Image Viewer, which offers more detail on how someone can use the image. Click Here
Job Posting An interactive rich result that allows job seekers to find a job. The job search experience on Google can feature your logo, reviews, ratings, and job details. Click Here
Job Training (beta) An interactive rich result that helps job seekers and prospective students find a job training program. Click Here
Logo Your organization's logo in search results and Google knowledge panel. Click Here
Math solvers Help students, teachers, and others with math problems by adding structured data to indicate the type of math problems and step-by-step walkthroughs for specific math problems. Click Here
Movie The movie carousel helps users explore lists of movies on Google Search (for example, "best movies of 2019"). You can provide details about the movies, such as the title of each movie, director information, and images. Click Here
Estimated salary Salary estimate information, such as salary ranges and region-based salary averages for job types, displayed in the job search experience on Google. Click Here
Podcast Enable your podcast to appear in Google Search with a playable link, or in other Google Podcasts platforms such as the Google Podcasts app, Google Assistant, and more. Click Here
Practice problems Help students, teachers, and parents with education by adding structured data to your practice problems in math and science subjects. Click Here
Product Information about a product, including price, availability, and review ratings. Click Here
QA QA Pages are web pages that contain data in a question and answer format, which is one question followed by its answers. Click Here
19
Recipe Recipes that display as an individual rich result or part of a host carousel. Click Here
Review snippet A short excerpt of a review or a rating from a review website, usually an average of the combined rating scores from reviewers. A review snippet can be about Book, Recipe, Movie, Product, Software App, and Local business. Click Here
Sitelinks Search box A search box that is scoped to your website when it appears as a search result. Click Here
Software App (beta) Information about a software app, including rating information, a description of the app, and a link to the app. Click Here
Speakable Allow search engines and other applications to identify news content to read aloud on Google Assistant- enabled devices using text-to-speech (TTS). Click Here
Subscription and paywalled content Indicate paywalled content on your site to help Google differentiate paywalled content from the practice of cloaking, which violates our guidelines. Click Here
Video Video information in search results, with the option to play the video, specify video segments, and live-stream content. Click Here

• The above are some of the most common markup
  types, but there are hundreds of more structured
  data types.
• You can use Schema.org to search for specific
  structured data types (schema types).
• The schemas are a set of 'types', each associated
  with a set of properties. The types are arranged
  in a hierarchy.
• The vocabulary currently consists of 779 Types,
  1390 Properties 15 Datatypes, 81 Enumerations and
  437 Enumeration members.
• Schema.org also gives you the ability to browse
  the full hierarchy list of types.
• It should be noted that using schema markup could
  potentially improve your website search engine
  rankings.

20
How to use schema markup on your website For
basic schema markup, you can use the Google
Structured Data Markup Helper Tool. 1. Go to the
Google Structured Data Markup Helper website