What is Schema and How it Affects Voice Search and SEO
Times are rapidly changing, and this is particularly true for the ever-evolving search landscape. Recent top search trends, the use of schemas, and the utilisation of voice search are all impacting the online market. Search is gradually transforming from being text-oriented and keyword-focused to being voice-driven and natural language-integrated. Even the emergence of mobile and screenless devices is changing search and search behaviour.
Brands and marketers need to keep up with changing times and take advantage of emerging marketing opportunities today. Given the use of mobile devices and voice search, they should employ the right strategies and solutions. One way to getting the prime placement in search engines entails understanding and involving schemas.
In the following section, we’ll see how Schema can drive voice search and boost SEO performance.
What to know about Schema
The full specifications of the Schema can be found at the Schema.org site. But before you visit the site, you have to know what Schema is. So what exactly is Schema?
Simply put, a schema is a collection of metadata that describes the relationships between objects and information in a database. In the search landscape, it refers to the data markup that helps search engines understand the context of your website content. It consists of a set of types arranged in a hierarchy, and each type is associated with a set of properties. To break it down, here’s the core of its vocabulary:
- 614 different types.
- 905 properties.
- 114 enumeration values.
There are plenty of types, properties, and values used in Schema’s vocabulary. Therefore, you have to understand which can be leveraged with the content you might want to publish.
What the Impact of Schema is
The Schema has a huge impact on SEO and voice search devices, such as Google Home, Cortana, Alexa, and Siri. For SEO purposes, its impact is usually seen in rich snippets, featured snippets, and Position 0 rankings. For marketers, the goal is to use a wide array of encoding, which can include RDFa, microdata, and JSON-LD as the most common format. This is because Schema organises and structures information on the website to relate entities to each other. These entities include people, places, and things.
How to Test and Measure Schema Deployment
Testing and measuring your schema deployment are important. You can utilize Google’s Structured Data Testing Tool to see if you’ve implemented the markup correctly. This tool will assess the markup you’ve employed and signal any potential errors or warnings. The goal is to ensure that you can get the full benefit of implementing the schemas. To gauge the success, you have to look for the following:
- Incremental impressions
- Position movement
- Incremental organic sessions
- Incremental organic-driven leads
- Incremental organic-driven conversions
- Deploying Schema requires development resources
Understanding and involving Schema means taking advantage of search opportunities. It’s about putting your brand in the right position amid the competitive search landscape. In the end, you’ll be surprised as to how the use of Schema can impact your brand by driving voice search and enhancing SEO performance.
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