1. Choose Your Schema Types
You need to learn which schema types you want to add to WordPress so you can choose a plugin that supports it. Below are common schema types, but you can see a more complete list here. Keep in mind, Google usually requires you to show the schema content on the page/post.
Review – there is no general “review” schema anymore. Instead, you have to review a software application (what I use), restaurant, movie, store, or another type of review schema. That’s why most schema plugins don’t have a simple “review” option anymore. In the technology (and WordPress) field, you’ll likely use software application instead. This shows review stars and is very helpful if you write a bad review since all the other affiliates will probably write a good one.
FAQ – adds “frequently asked questions” to your search results. Google can show up to 3 objective-based FAQs, but it’s up to them whether they show these (and which FAQs they show). Google has cracked down on FAQ schema, so make sure information in the FAQs are factual and not salesy. FAQs can also appear as featured snippets and meta descriptions. You can use Answer The Public to find question keywords and the Structured Content plugin which only supports FAQ schema. Or Rank Math Pro, Schema Pro, Yoast, and SEOPress support FAQs.
What is Schema Markup?
First, we should learn what is structured data – it is a standardized format for providing information about a page, which helps search engines better understand the page content.
Structured data, which is implemented with schema.org vocabulary, is called Schema markup, or just Schema.
In the past, there were other vocabularies used to create structured data but now they are all deprecated and Google only uses schema.org.
That’s why the terms “Schema markup” and “Structured data” are often used interchangeably.
Why you need it
There are two main advantages of using structured data.
First, it helps search engines better understand the page’s content and better match the page with the relevant search queries.
For example, if you add Schema to a restaurant website, it will help the restaurant appear in relevant local search results.
Second, it helps Google to display your page with enhanced search appearance elements in search results, also known as “rich snippets” or “rich results”.
How to create Schema markup
You can create Schema using three formats – JSON-LD, Microdata, and RDFa. Google recommends using JSON-LD format:
You can create it using either Google documentation or online tools. Let’s consider both methods.
Using Google documentation
The process includes two main steps:
- Find the necessary template.
- Modify the selected template to fit your page.
Let’s look at each step in more detail.
Find the necessary template in Google Documentation
Google supports many structured data types – Article, Local Business, Recipe, FAQ, Event, How-to, etc. The full list of supported types can be found here:
https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/structured-data/search-gallery
The good news is that you do not need to write code from scratch. You just need to find the necessary template on the above page and then click “Get Started”:
<script type=”application/ld+json”> { “@context”: “https://schema.org”, “@type”: “NewsArticle”, “mainEntityOfPage”: { “@type”: “WebPage”, “@id”: “https://google.com/article” }, “headline”: “Article headline”, “image”: [ “https://example.com/photos/1×1/photo.jpg”, “https://example.com/photos/4×3/photo.jpg”, “https://example.com/photos/16×9/photo.jpg” ], “datePublished”: “2015-02-05T08:00:00+08:00”, “dateModified”: “2015-02-05T09:20:00+08:00”, “author”: { “@type”: “Person”, “name”: “John Doe” }, “publisher”: { “@type”: “Organization”, “name”: “Google”, “logo”: { “@type”: “ImageObject”, “url”: “https://google.com/logo.jpg” } } } </script>