Structured data is an important aspect of SEO that can improve click-through rates, conversion rates, and bring in more traffic to your website. As an often misunderstood part of SEO, many people are left wondering if it will improve their rankings. But is structured data a Google ranking factor?
The short answer is no, structured data alone is not a direct Google ranking factor. Google has stated that schema markup does not directly improve rankings. However, structured data does help search engines better understand your content, which can help you appear for relevant queries. This doesn’t make it a Google ranking factor, but a great tool to utilise to improve optimisations.
Read on to find out more about structured data, Google ranking factors, why structured data is important, and what types of structured data are available.
Jump to:
- What Is Structured Data in SEO?
- What Is Considered to Be a Google Ranking Factor?
- How Important Is Structured Data for SEO?
- Why Structured Data Still Matters in AI-Driven Search
- Types of Structured Data
What Is Structured Data in SEO?
Google describes structured data as “a standardised format for providing information about a page and classifying the page content”. While Google and other search engines are extremely sophisticated, they’ll still sometimes need help with understanding page content. That’s where structured data and schema markup comes in. Providing a distinct explanation of your page and what’s offered on it through the use of a set list of data points will ensure that everything is understood.
Though structured data is not a direct Google ranking factor, it can help you rank faster on search engines because it makes pages easier to crawl. Aside from this, it can also provide rich results in SERPs (search engine results pages) and improve click-through rate and conversion rates.
Structured data can also allow search engines to add extra features called rich results to how your website appears in SERPs (search engine results pages). If you’ve ever seen an image or rating next to a search engine result, this is what we call rich results. Though Google does not guarantee that your structured data will show up in search results, even if your page is marked up correctly, you’ve given Google all the information it needs to add these features through your structured data.
What is Considered to Be a Google Ranking Factor?
Is structured data a Google ranking factor? No, so what is?
While the full extent of ranking factors that Google considers is not publicly known, what we do know is that there are hundreds of ranking factors that can influence Google’s decision on where to rank your page.
These can include niche specific factors such as the freshness of the content when searching for news related topics. They can also include off-page factors like backlinks or the site’s consistency with your social media profiles.
While it’s impossible to discuss every ranking factor, here’s our 7 most important Google ranking factors for SEO:
- High quality, relevant content
- Site speed
- User friendliness
- Mobile optimisation
- Page security
- Link building
- Reviews
For more information about these ranking factors and more, read our guide on Google Ranking Factors and How They Impact SEO.
How Important Is Structured Data for SEO?
While structured data isn’t one of these ranking factors, it can still help your overall SEO performance. The use of schema markup has several direct and indirect benefits, including:
- Improved Click-Through Rate -Using structured data to let Google serve rich results can make a huge difference to your click-through rate (CTR). This means that you’ll get more traffic, and it will also provide more trust to new users by showing your reviews or other information about you.
- Pre-click information – Rich results provide useful information before a user clicks. Features such as review ratings, product information, FAQs, business details, and event information can make a listing more appealing and informative.
- Support additional SERP features – Structured data can provide the additional context to allow your page to rank in other SERP features, such as AI overviews, People Also Ask, shopping results and media panels.
- Reduced misinformation – Structured data will also allow you to control the information that’s understood on your site and how it’s defined. This doesn’t mean that you should lie about your company in your structured data, but the opposite.
By clearly defining entities, services, products, and organisational information, structured data reduces the likelihood of search engines misinterpreting your content. This clearer understanding can support visibility across Google’s search features and improve the way your content is represented.
Find out how to add schema markup to your website in our blog: How To Add Schema To a Website.
Why Structured Data Still Matters in AI-Driven Search
As search engines continue to introduce AI-powered search experiences, helping systems accurately understand content is becoming increasingly important.
Structured data provides explicit, machine-readable information about your website’s products, services, organisation, reviews, and other key entities. This helps reduce ambiguity and supports a clearer understanding of what your content is about.
Without structured data, your site and its content are vulnerable to potentially damaging misinterpretation from LLMs, like incorrect product descriptions, opening times, or location data.
While schema markup is not a direct ranking factor, it remains an important SEO best practice because it can support LLMs’ understanding of your content.
Whether users encounter your content through traditional search results, rich results, or AI-powered experiences, structured data helps provide consistent and reliable information about your business and content.For more information about the relationship between schema markups and LLMs, read our blog: Schema Markup and Structured Data for LLM Visibility.
Types of Structured Data
There are hundreds of types of schema and schema properties, so we won’t be listing them all here. Depending on your website and what you’re looking to achieve, the types that you use can vary. Here we’ve listed the schema that’s most often used by SEO professionals.
- Product schema: Crucial for ecommerce sites, this will allow Google to understand your product offerings and list them directly in the popular products section.
- Local Business Schema: Local business schema will show Google that you’re an organisation targeting the local area, such as a business with a physical shop. This will allow Google to serve a local business pack in SERPs to make you stand out from the rest.
- Organisation Schema: Similarly to local business schema, this will allow Google to understand what your business and brand is. It will also help Google connect your socials with your website and serve contact details in SERPs.
- Service Schema: Service schema is used for the same purpose as product schema, however it’s designed for services that aren’t a physical product, such as cleaning services. This will provide information about the service itself.
- FAQ Schema: FAQ schema is used to identify frequently asked questions and their answers on a page. Implementing FAQ schema can help search engines understand your content and the topics you cover. It also provides a structured way to answer common user queries and reinforce topical relevance across your website.
Within all of these examples, there are multiple options for different schema properties. These properties mean that you can also add extra rich results such as reviews to your schema.
Improve Your Rankings With Wildcat Digital
At Wildcat Digital, our team of technical SEO experts can create the perfect structured data to allow Google to understand your site and serve a range of rich results. We don’t focus solely on this, though. We optimise our campaign strategy based on what your site requires. After all, your site is unique, so your SEO strategy should be unique too.
Get in touch with a member of our friendly team or visit our SEO page for more information.
