What is schema markup?

Schema markup refers to the code or semantic vocabulary of tags that indicate the meaning of your data and not only what it says. This code language helps Google crawlers and bots to understand what your content is about efficiently.
It is put on the website so that search engines provide informative results to the website users in the form of snippets that lie right beneath the page title.
The addition of schema markups in your HTML coding helps you to enhance the display of your web pages on SERP.
Schema markup is recognised by various search engines like Bing, Yahoo!, Google and Yandex. There is no evidence that schema markup affects the display positioning result much, but it increases the visualisation of your website.

How vital is schema markup?

Schema markup is primarily essential in the era of “Hummingbird” and “RankBird”. As of now, there has been no direct relation of rich schema marking with the ranking of a page, but there is evidence of increased click-through rates (CTR).
However, rich snippets also help in a prominent display of your webpages on Google’s SERPs. Proper implementation of schema markup only enhances the user experience, which automatically decreases the bounce rate and increases organic engagement.
Structured data has more understandability and efficiency, so many studies suggest that it works best for the website containing several subpages. Schema markup done efficiently will generate positive results for one’s business in the long run.

How to make rich schema markups?

Align them according to Google’s guidelines

Google is continually evolving and bringing new algorithms for deciding the rank of a particular website on its browser. So, it becomes mandatory to follow all the updated guidelines declared by Google. Your schema markup should align with Google’s guidelines to make sure you avoid any spamming which may harm the ranking of your website.

Always test your schema markup

Google has this fantastic automated tool where you can check schema markup before going live. Use the structured data testing tool instead of playing the guess games about the schema markup. The testing becomes critically essential before making your website live as it will protect you from getting penalised.

Choose the perfect schema markup

Structured data can mark up several items and products that include event, organisation, person and creative event. Don’t go for any markup schema; try to have thorough knowledge about which type which benefits your niche the most.

Depending on this, you can choose from the following schema markups and for your reference we are showcasing how Techies Infotech in Melbourne has helped various clients to boost their SEO using schema markup:

Organisation schema markup

This type of markup is advantageous for enhancing the visibility of an organisation at Google’s SERP. It is the method of structuring the information that includes the company’s official name, logo, contact info, and social profiles.

Breadcrumbs markup

The markup lists all specific path links that land on the current page. This is the best markup schema for enabling the users to view your location, and also it helps to reduce the bounce rate of the website.

Article schema markup

This schema markup helps to increase the readability and understandability. The article schema markup is the structured microdata for displaying the crisp description of blog posts and news.

Local business schema markup

Such schema markups are beneficial for the local companies and organisations. One must be very particular while displaying this piece of content to bring more and more local users to your business. The information must include the company name, logo, address, timings, features and contact info.

Also, showcasing some other examples of schema markup are:

Schema product and offer markup

As the name suggests, the schema markup involves the crisp but exact user engaging information related to a particular product and offer. The product information includes status, price, name, and offers as well

Person schema markup

Such markup schema displays the structured data of an individual personality, including his/her name, birth date, education & family info, and address.

Video schema markup

Adding video schema markup is the best possible solution to let Google crawlers and bots know about the video updation. Since it is difficult for the bots to index the video content, it becomes critically important to put video schema markup.

Event schema markup

This markup includes information related to the event that can be a seminar, concert, lecture delivering or webinars. The markup information consists of the date, event price, and location.

How to implement rich schema markup?

Here’s is a list of steps to follow for implementing rich schema markup:

• To start with, use Google’s Structured data markup helper.
• From the drop down list of categories, choose the appropriate category that is suitable for displaying your data markup.
• Paste the URL of the page you want to markup and click start tagging. This will end you landing on a page providing the next phase workspace for the markup process. Your webpage will be seen on the left side and data items on the right pane.
• Highlight the required elements that you want to markup and select an appropriate component from the tooltip. This adds the selected item in the “Data Items” on the right pane.
• You can highlight and select the items multiple times to markup other items.
• The next step is to click “CREATE HTML” on top of my data items where you will get HTML of your page with appropriate microdata.
• The last step is to add the schema markup to your webpage. To do so, you need your source code or CMS and add the highlighted snippets to the required sections in the code. Refer to the yellow markers on HTML source code with microdata markup to find the schema markup. Else, you can download the automatically-generated HTML file by clicking the “Download” action.

Check the appearance of your page with added schema markup using the structured data testing tool. Also, you can preview and inspect every added markup element and the content by pasting the HTML code in the structured data testing bar.

Wrap up

Schema markup has considerably become a vital SEO innovation that will last in trend for longer. For every business, whether small scale or large, schema markup can do miracles as they act as a catalyst for boosting the existing SEO practices. Proper usage of schema markup will give you a leg up on your competition.

Being a proficient SEO company in Melbourne, we work seamlessly and have gained expertise in how to structure your data using schema markup.

Choosing the right schema markup is not the way of enhancing your visibility, but proper implementation and testing will pave the way to fruitful results from the website.