STRUCTURED DATA · SEO GLOSSARY

Structured Data

Machine-readable annotations added to HTML — usually JSON-LD — that explicitly describe what a page is about to search engines and AI systems.

Definition

Structured data is code added to a webpage that explicitly describes its content in a machine-readable format. The dominant standard is JSON-LD (JavaScript Object Notation for Linked Data), placed in a `<script type="application/ld+json">` tag in the page head. Schema.org defines the vocabulary: types like `Article`, `FAQPage`, `Product`, `LocalBusiness`, `HowTo`, and `BreadcrumbList` tell search engines and AI systems the meaning and relationships of content — not just what words appear on the page.

Why it matters for SEO

Structured data enables rich results in Google SERPs: star ratings, FAQ dropdowns, recipe cards, event listings, and breadcrumbs. These increase SERP real estate and click-through rate. For GEO, structured data is a major citation signal — `FAQPage` and `HowTo` schema tell AI systems that a page directly answers questions or provides step-by-step instructions, making it more likely to be retrieved and cited in AI-generated answers.

How DeepSEOAnalysis checks this

The audit validates all JSON-LD on every crawled page. It checks for required properties on each schema type, detects competing duplicate schema from theme and plugin conflicts (common on WordPress), and flags missing schema types on pages where the content warrants it (FAQ sections without `FAQPage`, product pages without `Product`). The schema generator produces copy-paste JSON-LD for common types.