Looking at search results for your competitors and seeing these results with images, reviews and extra links in the search results? Welcome to the relatively new world of Schema.org based rich snippet markup, an HMTL5 based code which has been shown to provide a positive impact on search engine rankings and increase click through rates for your search engine result listings.
Most websites contain structured data, which is stored in databases, data that has become increasingly difficult for search engines to pull. On-page schema or rich snippet markup is a way to enable search engines to better understand the structured data contained within these web pages and in turn provide better search results to users.
Rich snippets are additional data displayed within your ad listing, providing a quick glance at what your page offers without forcing a click from uninterested web surfers. When done properly, the data provided by rich snippets can result in a positive increase in performance by delivering visitors who know exactly what to expect when visiting your page.
WHY SHOULD I USE RICH SNIPPETS?
So why should you use rich snippets? The use of rich snippets is becoming more common & helps increase your sites organic traffic by:
1. Make your listing stand out When your listings have rich snippets they will display photos, reviews, telephone numbers, email addresses, links and much more.
2. Help Search Engines Better Understand Your Content & Increase the Relevancy The more Google is able to understand about your website the better. When Google is able to better understand your description it increases the relevancy, which in turn helps your site show up in Google for your selected terms.
To learn HTML5 or more information on the types of Schema.org markups that are available, check out the tutorial in Googles support center. Visit the following tutorial on W3Schools.com for more information on HTML5, Rich Snippets & other useful tools.
The use of rich snippets will become more common in the near future. So why should you use rich snippets? Rich snippets will help increase organic traffic for your website, blog or other online endeavors.