Chapter 2: Schema.org: Why You're Behind If You're Not Using It
Editor's Note: This post was originally published on November 13th, 2011, on the The Moz Blog. Schema.org, which is approximately two years old now, includes vocabulary for health and medicine, technical publishing, genealogy, news articles, product offers, and external lists (to name a few) in addition to the examples Craig discusses. The full list of schema types is available at http://schema.org/docs/full.html.
If someone told you that there was a quick and easy way to improve the click-through rate of your search results with minimal effort, you'd stop in your tracks and give them your full attention. Yet, Schema.org and rich snippets are still horribly underutilized.
Since Google, Yahoo, and Bing officially introduced Schema.org in June (http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2011/06/introducing-schemaorg-search-engines.html), it's fair to say that the motivation to implement it has been mixed. However, it has already evolved a lot (Yandex, for example, has joined the initiative), and has added new stuff that people aren't paying attention to.
Here is the part where I try to persuade you that while there are a few downsides to using Schema.org, the upsides make it worth it.
Myth: Schema.org Markup Doesn't Get Rich Snippets!
A common objection I hear from people who are not using schema is that there's no point because Google don't use it for rich snippets. WRONG!
At one point, Google did not use schema for rich snippets. However, this is no longer true. Lots of websites in different markets are seeing the benefits of taking a leap of faith in the form of rich snippets.
The following are all examples of websites that currently use the Schema.org vocabulary:
Ecommerce (eBay)
TV Series (IMDb)
Movies (Rotten Tomatoes)
Events (Ticketmaster)
Recipes (iSaveurs)
As you can see, Schema.org markup is definitely being used by Google.
Schema.org Is Not a Language
Schema.org is a vocabulary, not a language in and of itself. Let me explain the difference, as there is still a lot of confusion in the SEO community.
There are various languages that do the job we're discussing:
• Microformats
• Microdata
• RDFa
When marking up any content on a page for rich snippets or similar (machine readable) reasons, both a language and a vocabulary are always used. See the following graphic, which shows an example of microdata being used with the Schema.org vocabulary.
When it comes to using languages and vocabulary to mark up content, it's the vocabulary part that the major search engines have agreed to standardize with Schema.org.
When Google originally announced that they were going to support the Schema.org vocabulary, they also dropped the bombshell that they supported only microdata language.
They also said that although they would continue to support the existing rich snippets markup, you should avoid mixing the formats together as doing so could confuse their parsers.
The fact that you couldn't mix Schema.org markup with microformats or RDFa annoyed a lot of people. Kavi Goel from Google later said this was a mistake and they would fix it (http://mz.cm/ZybF76.)
BREAKING NEWS—Two days ago, a pretty big announcement was made on the Schema.org blog (http://blog.schema.org/2011/11/using-rdfa-11-lite-with-schemaorg.html). There are plans in the pipeline for the Schema.org vocabulary to be compatible with the RDFa language, with support for using other vocabularies on the same page.
Editor's Note: Schema.org started officially supporting RDFa and RDa Lite 1.1, with support for using other vocabularies on the same page, in 2012. Although Google now states that they support microformats, RDFa, and microdata, microdata is their preferred format, and does not guarantee that it will show rich snippets in search results.
Five Underused Schema.org Applications
I personally believe Schema.org is the future, and if you've not already done so, you should implement it right now. Regardless of the type of website you have, there are ways you can use Schema.org markup, even if it's simply to define an article and the date it was published.
That said, there are cases where I think you can gain even more advantage by implementing it. Here are examples of the top five ways I think Schema.org should be used.
#1 Events
The Event schema lets you get really specific about what type of event you are describing. Right now, you can specify an event as any of the items shown in the following list.
• Festival
With the recent QDF update (Query Deserves Freshness algorithm—see http://www.copyblogger.com/query-deserves-freshness), it's important that you give Google as much information as possible. Events, by their very nature, are time sensitive, so using Schema.org to enforce event details is a good idea.
The Events schema is a pretty comprehensive vocabulary. You are able to mark up things like attendees, duration, performers, location, and start and end dates (see http://schema.org/Event).
#2 Jobs
I don't think I can describe how amazing the Job markup is, which was announced just last week on the Schema.org blog. Even more amazing is what was announced on the Google blog today (http://blog.schema.org/2011/11/schemaorg-support-for-job-postings.html). Google just launched a custom search engine that specifically looks for Schema.org Job markup, and is used to find veteran-committed job openings (http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/bringing-very-best-of-what-we-do-to.html). I would love to see search-related queries return results like this example.
#3 Reputation Management
This isn't groundbreaking news, so I'll make it quick. Use the Person schema (http://schema.org/Person) to make the best page online about the person in question. Not only can you mark up the basic facts about the person like their name and age, but you can mark up the tiny details such as what university they went to (alumniOf), what awards they have won (awards), where they work (worksFor), who their colleagues are (colleagues), and even the names of their family members (parents, siblings, spouse, relatedTo). This is an easy way to make a super-targeted page about a person that can be tested with Google's rich snippets tool. Look how much information Google is able to extract from my test page:
That is an amazing amount of information. Here is a preview of how the listing would look in the SERPs.
#4 News Sites
The recent QDF update reinforces how committed Google is to displaying fresh content. Schema.org has extended its vocabulary to include a section specifically for the news industry (http://schema.org/NewsArticle). This markup allows you to reference a particular page or column in the paper edition of a news public when appropriate to do so. The following image shows the recently added schema.
News sites should be using this to markup to tell the search engines what their content is about and when it was published.
#5 Ecommerce
I can't believe how many ecommerce websites I see without any markup at all. People spend so much time trying to rank higher that they forget to get the low hanging fruit in the SERPs. Rich snippets are an amazing way to increase click-through rates by drawing attention to your product listings. The following example shows how review stars make a search result for an eBay product stand out.
Wrap-Up
I hope I've managed to convince you that Schema.org is worth implementing right now.
There are already the benefits of rich snippets to be had, but this isn't just about rich snippets. It's about creating content that machines can understand and reference. There are already services that try to make use of this kind of information such as Silk (http://www.silkapp.com/?ref=DAipyl) and Apple's Siri (http://www.apple.com/ios/siri). Ensuring that you are ahead of your competitors can only be a good thing.