Is this misuse of scheme data?
-
A directory list page that uses the individual business page review data.
Instead of the scheme markup indicating the a particular business page has a review, the page that lists all of the businesses gets the review instead.
This means the list page can get hundreds of reviews which could potentially affect its SERPs.
A competitor is doing this now.
Is this an abuse of the system?
Should it be reported?
How does on report this kind of this?
-
Thanks for the insighful responses.
I need to clarify one point.
They are not aggregating reviews from around the web. Instead they have business profiles which include reviews. Instead of the business' profile page using the mark up, the directory page that lists each of the businesses uses the mark up.
So if there are 50 businesses in a category with 1 review each, the category page shows up in SERPs with 50 reviews.
This would affect CTRs as you pointed out.
Is this considered manipulation?
-
Does the directory page show ratings and reviews (or review snippits) that are viewable by visitors to the page? If so, wrapping those elements in schema.org (or other structure schemes that correctly tag the structured data) does not feel like abuse.
The follow-up questions becomes, does that site have the right to show the reviews/ratings they are showing? This is a somewhat grey area at the moment. Google themselves, used to frequently summarize reviews from other sites without those sites permission (http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/21/google-places-stops-stealing-reviews/) and when they did so, they certainly did wrap the reviews in structured data tags. The IP owner usually wants Google (and other media) to promote its site, and is usually happy for them to use small snippits of their content to do so (that's the whole premise of Google Search). Where the grey area comes in, is when the "promotional" or "editorial" use starts to compete with the original content owners use-case (as happened when Yelp reviews were showing up on Google Plus Places pages).
At the very least, you could use google to see who else has the same reviews as the directory page you are competing with, and then see if one of those sites is the intellectual property owner, and if they want to assert their rights.
So in summary, I don't think using schema.org is abuse (if the data marked up, is in fact accurately tagged), but the site does need to have the rights to the review content they are using.
-
Hi there
First of all, it should be remembered that the schema markup itself will not effect rankings - it is not a ranking factor. However, it will most likely effect click through rate - and so any gaming of the system would be seen as manipulative.
I think what you have described does exactly that - it manipulates the rich snippet in Google search by aggregating reviews of hundreds of other websites to pass off as its own. Pretty clear cut and shouldn't be happening.
Google's algorithmic detection of this appears to be lacking at the moment, but they do have a rich snippet spam reporting tool, which you can find here, which allows you to report anything that you think is spammy.
Hope this helps.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Will google merge structured data from two pages if they have the same canonical?
Will google merge structured data from two pages if they have the same canonical? The crawler should be able to get to the tab through an ahref. The tab in question is "Cast & Crew." Thank you in advance for any insight! szmOmj8.jpg uM8qUfi.jpg
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | catbur0 -
Why do sites w/o structured data beat me for rich snippets?
I can't figure this out. For a number of search terms that I compete for, there are competitors that rank below me, but their pages are featured in a rich snippet. I wanted to see what kind of structured data these sites are providing, thinking maybe there's something I can learn. But when I run these URLs through Google's Structured Data Testing Tool, it tells me these pages contain no structured data! So how is it that Google think's my page is more relevant (I rank higher) and I have structured data, but Google chooses to feature a different page? Does anyone have ideas on how I can snag these rich snippets for myself?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AlexLenhoff0 -
Pull multiple link data for multiple pages at once?
Hi guys, I was wondering if there is a tool or way to pull link data for a list of URLs/Pages at once to one single file with ahrefs or majestic. I know scrapebox can do this with OSE, but looking for a way to do this with the other backlink databases. Any ideas? Cheers. Hi guys, I was wondering if there is a tool or way to pull link data for a list of URLs/Pages at once to one single file with ahrefs or majestic. I know scrapebox can do this with OSE, but looking for a way to do this with the other backlink databases. Any ideas? Cheers.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jayoliverwright0 -
Google User Click Data and Metrics
Assuming that Google is using click data from users to calculate rankings (bounce rate, time on site, task completion, etc.) where does Google get the data, especially from browsers that aren't Chrome?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AMHC0 -
Structured Data + Meta Descriptions
Hey All, Was just looking through some google pages on best practices for meta descriptions and came across this little tidbit. "Include clearly tagged facts in the description. The meta description doesn't just have to be in sentence format; it's also a great place to include structured data about the page. For example, news or blog postings can list the author, date of publication, or byline information. This can give potential visitors very relevant information that might not be displayed in the snippet otherwise. Similarly, product pages might have the key bits of information—price, age, manufacturer—scattered throughout a page. A good meta description can bring all this data together. For example, the following meta description provides detailed information about a book. " This is the first time I have seen suggested use of structured data in meta descriptions. Does this totally replace a regular meta description or will it work in conjunction with the regular meta description? If I provide both structured data and text, will the SERP display text and the structured data the way it was previously displayed? Or will the 150 -160 character limit take precedence and just cut off all info after that?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Whebb0 -
Open Data and SEO - Government sources
Hi Everyone, Does anyone know of a connection between open data and SEO? I think this is a very interesting topic to explore. Lots of governments are jumping on this trend and it seems like Google and other search engines would be interested in this kind of authoritative source. Here are some examples - USA OPEN Data examples Palo Alto, California USA: paloalto.opendata.junar.com Cupertino, California USA: cupertino.opendata.junar.com San Jose California USA: data.sanjoseca.gov Other international Open Data examples Chile: recursos.datos.gob.cl Bahía Blanca, Argentina: http://bahiablanca.opendata.junar.com/dashboards/7844/medio-ambiente/ Lima, Perú lima.datosabiertos.pe
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Carla_Dawson0 -
Using a 302 re-direct from http://www to https://www to secure customer data
My website sends Customers from a http://www.mysite.com/features page to a https://www.mysite.com/register page which is an account sign-up form using a 302 re-direct. Any page that collects customer data has an authenticated SSL certificate to protect any data on the site. Is this 302 the most appropriate way of doing this as the weekly crawl picks it up as being bad practise? Is there a better alternative?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ubique0 -
Google's Structured Data Testing Tool? No Data
I'm stumped as to why some of the pages on my website return no data from Google's Structured Data Testing Tool while other pages work fine and return the appropriate data. My home page http://www.parkseo.net returns no data while many inner pages do. http://www.parkseo.net Returns No Data http://www.parkseo.net/citation-submission.html Does Return Data. I have racked my brains out trying to figure out why some pages return data and others don't. Any help on this issue would be greatly appricated. Cheers!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | YMD
Gary Downey0