Martin Splitt stated that it is possible to have more data. However, there are limitations to adding structured data beyond the Google recommendations.
Schema.org & Google's Structured Data Recommendations
This podcast's relevant portion began when Lizzi Sassman, a tech writer for the Search Relations group, noticed that Schema.org's structured data documentation was more extensive than what is available on Google's developer support pages.
Google's recommendations for structured data only use a small fraction of the structured data available at Schema.org.
The structured-data ecosystem is bigger than Google. There are many uses for structured information beyond what Google recommends. According to Google's podcast, Google could use some non recommended structured data, not on the Google recommended list.
These are the founding companies of Schema.org
Google
Microsoft
Yahoo
Yandex
There are many contributors from Drupal and others in the larger web community.
Schema.org's structured data vocabulary and Schema.org are far more than what Google recommends and have a lot of non recommended structured data.
Ryan Levering is a Google software engineer. He agreed that Schema.org has a much wider vocabulary than Google uses.
Levering observed,
“So it is just a way to express information. So it’s very expansive, and it has to account for all of the different use cases that could be used for it.”
Lizzi Sassman, a Search Relations tech writer, noted the limitless possibilities of Schema.org.
“And the application of those things could be limitless or like other people can then use this to then say, ‘We need this type of information to do this thing.’ Or that’s the Google aspect – this is what we can do with it if we know this information.”
Google's Use Of Structured Data
Next, they noted that the recommendations on Google's developer pages were limited in scope. However, Google may use structured data to go beyond its recommendations.
It is important to remember that Google's structured data recommendations help publishers get rich results. They make it easier for Google to determine which images and data should be displayed in rich results.
The next topic the Googler discussed was using structured data to assist Google in determining what a page's content is.
This use goes beyond what Google recommends to show rich results. John Mueller has previously mentioned this. However, this extra use of structured data has not been officially documented. It's almost like this: you can benefit from it if you know it.
Martin Splitt, a Developer Advocate at Google, asked:
“… But is structured data more useful than what we use to search for, like rich results?”
Levering replied that Google could use non recommended structured data.
Ryan Levering:
“We could potentially use that at Google. I never advise people not to put structured data on their website if it makes sense.
We also have some information that helps us understand the page’s content. Sometimes the data that you have put on it can be used to help with that. This is a very ML-like process. We look at the text and then the other elements related to the page.
It is only one signal in the overall calculation. That can be used to help us clarify the purpose of the page. It is therefore useful, but only in an implicit sense span.”
Non Recommended Structured Data Can Be an Additional Signal
Lizzi Sassman stated that Google could use additional structured data to understand a website's content better. Ryan Levering noticed that they could figure out a website's content without it.
It may be more difficult to determine what a page is all about in some cases.
Levering observed:
“It isn’t easy to communicate that we find this useful in our reporting, and it’s a complex calculation.
However, if it is difficult to detect, we can use it as an additional signal. It’s often on the edges that we find this stuff useful.”
Martin Splitt noted how useful it was to add additional data to clarify the purpose of a page.
Splitt commented:
“It is always better to add more information to clarify the page’s content.”
Implementing Structured Data
Martin Splitt's comments include a caveat: everything in structured data must be visible on the page, and Google considers it spam if the structured data content does not match what's on the page.
