Structured identity

structured · Identity · weight 30 of 145

What we check

Structured data is a small block of JSON-LD in a page’s head that tells machines, in a fixed vocabulary (schema.org), what the page is about. We look on your home page for an identity in it: an Organization, LocalBusiness, Person, WebSite, SoftwareApplication, Product, Brand, Blog, or similar. That identity should have an @id (a permanent address for it) and a sameAs list (your profiles elsewhere). Each is half the home page’s score. No JSON-LD at all scores 0; JSON-LD that describes something other than an identity scores 0.3.

If the home page declares several identities, we judge the first that isn’t just a WebSite or Blog — usually the organization, person, or product behind the site.

We also look at the pages we sample. A page passes if its JSON-LD declares an identity or points back to the home page’s by its @id (as isPartOf, publisher, author, or about). JSON-LD of any other kind counts half; none counts nothing. The @id and sameAs are only expected on the home page. The score is the average across the home page and the sampled pages.

Why it matters

An AI assistant reading your home page has to guess what you are from the words on it. Structured data removes the guess: it says this is a company, this is its name, this is its address on the web, and these are its profiles elsewhere. That’s the difference between “a page that mentions Example” and “Example, the company, at example.com.”

The sameAs links matter most. They’re how a machine connects your site to your LinkedIn page, your GitHub, or your Wikidata item, and treats them as one thing. Without them, each is a separate stranger.

How to pass

1. Add a JSON-LD block to your home page’s head that names what you are, with an @id and your profiles:

   <script type="application/ld+json">
   {
     "@context": "https://schema.org",
     "@type": "Organization",
     "@id": "https://example.com/#org",
     "name": "Example",
     "url": "https://example.com/",
     "logo": "https://example.com/logo.png",
     "sameAs": [
       "https://www.linkedin.com/company/example/",
       "https://github.com/example"
     ]
   }
   </script>

2. Use the type that fits: Person for a personal site, SoftwareApplication or Product for a product, LocalBusiness for a shop or studio.
3. On every other page, add JSON-LD that points back to that @id, so each page says whose it is. The graph rule shows how.

Back to the rules