Quick Tip: What Marketers Need to Know About Webpage Architecture

Marketers and writers may not always be fluent in HTML or the nitty-gritty of the coding that creates the pages of company websites and blogs, but there are few basics we need to understand in order to guide designers and coders in creating a strong search presence.

Do you know the difference between a meta description, microdata, schema and rich snippets?

You should.

In a nutshell:

• Metadescriptions provide search engines with a set of information to be displayed in search results. You write the specific text, in limited characters, that you want searchers to see. Unfortunately, however, sometimes search enginees bypass that description to highlight other parts of your page that fit the keywords being searched.

• Microdata is a form of structured data that works with HTML to categorize and index the content on your page, allowing for even more detailed information to be presented based on the search parameters.

• Schema.org is a joint project of Google, Yahoo!, Bing and Yandex to create a standard vocabulary for microdata tags.

• Rich snippets are the information-packed lines shown in search results, which are heavily influenced by the use of microdata.

All of these are part of the coding of the web page, but should be created in collaboration between writers and coders in order to give your webpage the most relevant and attractive results.

Our advice: All marketing writers who work with website copy and design should have a basic understanding of these to help guide webpage development.

Need to know more details and specifics so you can work with your designers and coders? Download our Microdata, Schema and Rich Snippets Cheat Sheet. You’ll be able to give guidance like an SEO pro.