divider

Use Rich Snippets to Enhance your Search Results

Services: Law Firm Website Design . SEO . Internet Marketing . Law Firm Marketing Guide . Content Marketing . PPC

Why Use Rich Snippets?

You can take advantage of rich snippets and help your website stand out in the search engine results page (SERP).

If you were searching on Google for a great recipe for Chicken Parmesan, which link would you be more likely to choose?

rich-snippets-serp

If you are like most people, you would choose the first option. The eye-catching picture, rating, reviews, and a preparation time grabs the user’s attention more than the second option. The first link is using microdata to show a “rich” snippet and the second link is showing a normal snippet.

By enhancing your snippet you can distinguish your website from the others. The microdata informs the search engines of extra information about your website and it is displayed in the snippet area. Most of the time this leads to an increase in your click-thru rate because your visitor already knows what to expect on the page.

Listed below are the types of rich snippets that Google supports:

Rich Snippet Recipe Example

To the average user, this looks like a normal web page.

rich-snippets-web-page

However, there is microdata embedded in the HTML code that is only detectable by search engines. The microdata does not affect the appearance of the actual webpage.

You can view the source code on this page and see the microdata for yourself.

For the purpose of this example, I removed any CSS markup from the code so you can focus on the microdata.

 <html>
 <div itemtype="http://schema.org/Recipe">
 <h1 itemprop="name">Chicken Parmesan</h1>
 <img itemprop="image" alt="Picture of Chicken Parmesan Recipe" 
 src="http://img.foodnetwork.com/FOOD/2008/10/28/top10_chicken
 parmesan_s4x3_med.jpg" width="160" height="120" />
 <dd><meta itemprop="totalTime" content="PT1H5M" />1 hr 5 min</dd>
 </div>
 </html>

The microdata allows the search engine to display the following in the rich snippet preview:

  • itemtype=”http://schema.org/Recipe” informs the search engine what type of rich snippet this going to be, in this case it is a recipe
  • itemprop=”name” is used for the name of the recipe
  • itemprop=”image” is used for the thumbnail image of the recipe
  • itemprop=”totalTime” content=”PT1H5M” is used for the total time to prepare the recipe

Google requires three specific attributes in order for your recipe to show up as a rich snippet in the SERP.

  • name
  • image
  • totalTime

I encourage you to take a look at the full hierarchy of schemas. This link is provided by schema.org who is working to create standardized microdata code that is supported by all the major search engines.

Test your Code and See a Preview

Once you have added the microdata, you can test it to make sure you did it correctly. Google has provided us with a structured data testing tool that will allow you to preview what your web page will look like in the SERP.


Related Posts

Ready to Take Your Website to the Next Level? Great Ideas & Results Only a Phone Call Away

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.

Let's get started.

One Response to Use Rich Snippets to Enhance your Search Results

  1. dean
    1:07 pm on November 13th, 2013

    There is also the new Article schema format. I wonder how granular semantic search will get? For lawyers if you could add case studies accolades and such it would lead to an interesting user experience. Hmm sounds like a good blog topic maybe I’ll write 😉

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*