Those involved in the world of SEO know that it’s an ever-changing landscape that requires you to seek out any potential advantage in order to improve site rankings. One alleged potential advantage according to many is structured data markup, or schema markup (also referred to as simply “schema”). But recently, a Google representative clarified that adding schema markup to your pages doesn’t necessarily impact your ranking on Google Search. If this is news to you, read on to learn about Google’s claims and schema markup’s true impact on site rankings.
Before we get into the claim that schema markup doesn’t impact search result rankings, it’s important to understand what schema markup is. Schema markup is “a code standard used to help search engines understand and categorize webpage content”. It’s the way that websites assist search engines in understanding their content, thereby helping the search engine show more relevant results to users.
In a thread on X (formerly known as Twitter) about how websites can still rank well despite violating schema markup guidelines, Danny Sullivan, who runs Google’s Search Liaison account, claims that schema markup does not boost website’s rankings on search. Specifically, “…if something is violating our schema guidelines, that has no impact on ranking because ... schema wasn't involved in the ranking in the first place. We look at other factors to determine rankings.” This assertion directly challenges the commonly-held belief that schema directly impacts a page’s position in the search results.
This isn’t a new claim; even back in 2019, we knew that there was no direct evidence that schema markup affected organic search rankings. But that doesn’t mean it’s not important, and it’s vital that marketers don’t mistake Sullivan’s advice as an absolute and total rejection of schema markup strategies.
Schema markup has no effect on page rankings. So, from an SEO perspective, why focus on it at all? Crucially, while Google claims that schema has no direct impact on rankings, Sullivan did clarify in the aforementioned thread that a lack of schema markup can cause a site to no longer be eligible for “schema enhancements” – likely referring to rich results.
Rich results are all the non-textual elements that appear on Google Search, such as images and carousels. These are impacted by the structured data your page contains. Rich results are a way to help your website stand out from the rest, which could increase CTR. While CTR also doesn’t directly impact SEO, it’s a valuable metric for understanding the optimization of your website.
So, does schema markup impact site rankings? No, not directly. But the takeaway here isn’t to completely shun schema markup. After all, it could indirectly increase CTR, which is one of the main objectives of SEO and improving site rankings, anyway!
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