Outside of the myriad of reasons a certain rich result might reduce CTR, it’s important to determine if those rich results are properly serving the intent of your page.
If you want to be eligible for a rich result as soon as possible, the best approach would be to test your Schema Markup during the implementation stage – before Google picks up on your new enhancements.
Your Schema Markup must be reflective of the content on your page to be effective.
Authoring your markup is just the beginning. You need to add it properly to your page and make sure search engines can crawl it for it to take effect.
This is one of the many ways you can link entities on a page to other entities on your site.
In the example above from data-driven decisions, introducing How-to content and markup on a single page, let alone a large volume of pages, could be a daunting task. Starting with a smaller volume of pages might be the best way forward to limit the resources required from Content or Development teams.Sometimes, the ultimate insight from comparing your Schema Markup to that of your competitors is that you’re on the right track. This then allows space for other SEO initiatives to potentially bridge that performance gap.
Review Performance and Make Data-Driven Decisions
The key element in that definition above is to implement the appropriate structured data, as each rich result has different requirements. Google’s documentation on Recipe rich results, for example, is essentially a cheat sheet for content ideas and it is worthwhile to review these types of resources to identify missed content opportunities.
Schema Markup, also known as structured data, is a code you can add to your site to help search engines better understand the content and entities on your website.
Though Google has also changed where and when FAQ rich results will be awarded, FAQ demonstrated another common opportunity where including a single question and answer would show as a valid enhancement. However, Google would only award this rich result to pages where a minimum of two questions and answers were included.
By working with Schema App, you have access to a dedicated Customer Success Manager who can provide you with the expertise and help you manage your Schema Markup from strategy to results. That way, you can stay current with all the industry trends and Google changes, and receive timely content recommendations to stand out in search.
There can be a variety of reasons why you might see an overall decline in CTR with certain rich results. For example, is the price of your product outside of most buyers’ budgets? This will allow a user to self-assess and decide whether to click through to your page or not, suggesting a potentially lower volume of clicks.
Nonetheless, when Google makes changes to rich results, it provides an opportunity for you to improve your content for a more enhanced experience in search.
For a converting page, generating clicks might be your top priority. This presents the opportunity to pivot your rich result strategy and targeting. If the price of your product is too high, consider focusing solely on product reviews.
By neglecting your markup and not aligning it with your content, you’re likely to miss opportunities to provide more context to Google to better align with user intent. What’s worse, is that you could also be sending mixed signals to Google which may impact performance.
On top of achieving rich results, semantic Schema Markup can help you prepare for the advent of Google’s Generative Search Experience, which makes a focus on managing your Schema Markup all the more necessary.
Even though you might have started off your Schema Markup journey authoring markup based on the content on your page, you can also use it as a content opportunity to identify missing content on your page that would make you eligible for a rich result.
Keep Up With Google and Schema.org Documentation Changes
To ensure that it provides the appropriate semantic value, you should author your Schema Markup to support the intent of the page. This will require choosing the most appropriate schema Type and utilizing the associated properties within that schema Type.
This includes identifying net new properties or links to external entities that were not previously considered. Additionally, it can help you discover new rich result opportunities by comparing content.
The good news is that Google provides feedback through triggered emails from Search Console. These emails identify errors or warnings with your structured data that impact rich result eligibility. But why wait for Google to notify you?
For example, are you detailing a service your organization offers? If so, you can utilize Service markup to identify where and when this service is available through the areaServed and hoursAvailable properties.
Once you’ve added the markup to your page, run your page through those same resources again to identify any initial speed issues or crawlability issues that might impact the benefits offered by Schema Markup.
Request indexing on your priority pages
At Schema App, we overcome the issue of content not aligning with markup through our Schema App Highlighter tool. With our Highlighter, users can create a Schema Markup template for similar pages. The markup will then map dynamically to certain elements on the page. Therefore, any changes you make to your content will automatically be reflected in the markup.
Need support strategizing, deploying and managing your Schema Markup? Get in touch with our team today to learn about our solution.
However, Schema Markup is not a one-and-done strategy. As with any SEO initiative, the circumstances around what makes good Schema Markup are constantly changing. Therefore, it is necessary to manage the markup on your site on an ongoing basis to ensure it remains accurate and healthy.
After authoring your markup and gaining access to the JSON-LD, you can paste that code into Google’s Rich Result Test and the Schema.org Validator to ensure your markup is accurate when you deploy it. This proactive approach ensures you don’t miss any opportunities to stand out in search.
You can link entities on your page to other entities on your site to explain the relationship between both entities.
Maintaining an awareness of these changes and utilizing the most current Schema.org properties helps organizations win in search by having a more enhanced appearance and richer markup compared to competitors.
Look for Opportunities to be More Semantic
Alternatively, you can get creative with How-to rich results to demonstrate how that product can help users accomplish a particular task.
As you build expertise working with Schema Markup, you can provide further context to your entities by linking to resources like Wikipedia, Wikidata or Google’s own Knowledge Graph. We often use properties such as areaServed, sameAs and knowsAbout to help increase the search engine’s understanding of all the entities mentioned on our customers’ sites – including external entities like cities or other well-known brand names.
