Google Adding More Context to Structured Data Issues in Search Console

Google updated the reporting of many structured data errors in Search Console to include the name of the containing element. This revision will provide more insights into invalid markup. Read this post to learn more.

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To take some of the guesswork out of fixing invalid markup, Google updated all structured data reports in Search Console to provide more context about errors. According to Google’s Twitter announcement on March 28, 2022, the update rolled out to Search Console on March 29, 2022.

Google also posted a note in its Search Console Help Center providing more details on how this will visually affect open and closed issues:

“Search Console changed the naming pattern of many structured data issues to include the name of the containing element in the issue name. As a result, we are closing all affected issues and opening the equivalent issues with the new naming pattern. You will not see any change in the number of affected entities on your site as a result of this, but you will see the changes in your issue history. We have suppressed any email notifications for this change. We hope you find the new issue naming schema useful.“

What Is Structured Data?

In layman’s terms, structured data is a common way of providing Google information about a page and its content using the schema.org vocabulary. Structured data offers many benefits, such as:

• Helping Google’s crawlers more accurately understand and categorize content.
• Offering users more relevant search results.
• Possibilities for an enhanced appearance in search engine results.

Are you curious about what structured data is and why you should add it to your site? You can learn more here.

What is the Structured Data Report Update About?

The goal of the structured data report update is to help you identify structured data issues more effectively. Here is Google’s example/explanation:

“… if a website doesn’t provide the name of the author in Review snippet markup, Search Console currently reports an error named Missing field “name”. Starting today, that error will be named Missing field “name” (in “author”). The more detailed context in parenthesis can help you find the issues more easily in your structured data.“

Even if you haven’t changed your structured data markup, Google said you will encounter the following scenarios:

• All open issues that refer to nested properties will be automatically closed.
• New issues will be opened with more context about what’s missing. You will not receive email notifications for these.

Final Thoughts: Why Do You Care?

To summarize, there is no reason to panic, given that this is just a name change impacting how errors are reported. There are no changes to how errors are detected.

Our Justia Elevate websites leverage years of legal marketing and SEO experience to deliver high-quality websites designed to bring you more clients. Our professionals keep up with Google’s updates and ensure all structured data for our clients’ websites  is technically sound and thoroughly prepared.

Watch this Justia Webinar playlist on YouTube to gain insights about Google Search Console.

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