Structured Data

What is structured data?

Structured data refers to any set of data that is organized in a predefined schema, typically making it easy to process and query. In the context of web pages, it involves specific formatting applied to HTML to help search engines understand the content of a page. This data is often in the form of schema markup, which annotates the content of a page, giving it structure that search engines can interpret consistently.

What is an example of structured data?

An example of structured data on a web page is schema markup that defines articles, events, products, and people. For instance, on a product page, the structured data can label the title, description, price, availability, and review ratings of a product, which helps search engines display this information directly in search results.

What is structured data vs unstructured data?

Structured data is highly organized and formatted so that it can be easily read by computer algorithms, whereas unstructured data does not have a pre-defined data model or is not organized in a pre-defined manner. Unstructured data includes formats such as email messages, word processing documents, videos, audio files, social media posts, and more, which typically require more processing to extract usable information.

What are the three types of structured data?

In the realm of web development, the three main types of structured data markup are:

1. Microdata: An HTML specification used to nest structured data within HTML content. It integrates directly into the HTML code of a page.
2. RDFa: Short for Resource Description Framework in Attributes, RDFa is a specification for attributes to express structured data in any markup language.
3. JSON-LD: JavaScript Object Notation for Linked Data is a method of encoding linked data using JSON. It is recommended by Google due to its ease of implementation and the ability to place the entire script in the head of a page.

Which is not an example of structured data?

Anything that doesn't conform to a structured data format such as free-form text, blog posts without markup, images and videos without associated metadata or markup is not considered structured data. For example, a long-form article on a webpage without any schema markup such as headings, lists, or tables that define and categorize the content elements would be a form of unstructured data. Unstructured data lacks the organization and metadata that make structured data so valuable for search engine algorithms and for organizing information in databases.