Yesterday, Google announced algorithm changes to Review Rich Results. There are three major changes done-
- Limited Pool of Schema Types to trigger Review Rich Results.
- LocalBusiness and Organization Schema Type will not allow self-serving reviews.
- Property names of the item being reviewed are required.
Review Rich Results have long been used by webmasters and SEO experts. They have played a vital role in influencing buyers and viewers. Rich Results are structured data used to convey key information to Search Engines. It helps Google understand the purpose of your website’s pages. Review Rich Results are schema structured data that Google uses to show stars, reviews, voters, or price range in SERP.
Limitations on Schema Types- The display of rich results have been limited to the following schema types. Any reviews besides these schema types will now support review snippets.
- schema.org/Book
- schema.org/Course
- schema.org/CreativeWorkSeason
- schema.org/CreativeWorkSeries
- schema.org/Episode
- schema.org/Event
- schema.org/Game
- schema.org/HowTo
- schema.org/LocalBusiness
- schema.org/MediaObject
- schema.org/Movie
- schema.org/MusicPlaylist
- schema.org/MusicRecording
- schema.org/Organization
- schema.org/Product
- schema.org/Recipe
- schema.org/SoftwareApplication
Self-Serving Reviews Not Allowed- “Self-Serving” means those reviews which are posted by you on your website in a markup or by a third party widget. These types of reviews will no longer be shown for LocalBusiness and Organization schema types. According to Google, “Self-Serving” reviews does not benefit users. Hence, review rich results will not be shown for the said schema type if you control the reviews yourself.
Product name is required- ‘name’ of the item is now required while reviewing. If you as a webmaster depend on plugins, including review plugins. You must check if the ‘name’ product is included in your plugins. Google has said nothing on will the absence of ‘name’ property cause absence of review rich results. It has only been said it is required for the time being.
