Episode 103: Helping Search Engines Understand Your Site Better with Schema

What was discussed?

Quote of the day: “A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work.” – Colin Powell

A long time ago, Schema.org brought some of the top search engines in the world together to create a method that would make it easier to identify important information on a website. At a high level, this means that there’s code placed in a certain way on your site that helps the search engines read your site better. By implementing this, search engines can better understand stuff like what your customers think of you, what it is that you do, what kind of payment you accept, and more.

If you’ve ever typed in a movie that you wanted to see, and there are times listed down in the search results, that’s Schema! If you’ve Googled a business and are shown stars by a listing (like a review of something), that’s also Schema.

How can you use Schema?

The first thing you should do is to make sure that you’re marking up your Schema with your local business information. You’ll want to make sure that you include that markup on your site. This will identify what your site is whenever you show up in the search engines. Add the ‘Same As property’ to your site as well. If you don’t already know this (and you probably do), citations are a large part of SEO. When you create citations, search engines might have a difficult time associating that citation with your site and some other properties that you might have.

The ‘Same As’ Schema makes this process a lot easier. This code tells the search engines that the business on your website is the same business as the one on your Facebook, Yelp, and Google Business Profile page. It tells them definitively that those sites are your property and that they’re all the same business. It helps search engines to better associate these relationships between the sites. Schema will help you show up better in the search engines (visually), and you can help the search engines understand your business much better. It’s recommended that you pick up Schema as very few companies use it (it’s becoming more and more common), and it can make a big difference!

For more information on Schema, check out the following links: Schema.org Generator For SEO (Microdata Generator) Schema Creator (WordPress Plugin) Why Your Local Business Schema Sucks and How To Make it Better (WhiteSpark Article)

If you need assistance with setting up Schema, contact us today so we can see if we’re a good fit for each other.

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