What is structured data?
Structured data is machine-readable markup in a page’s source, usually using the Schema.org vocabulary, that describes what the page contains: a product, an organisation, an article. Search engines use it for rich results; as a lever for citations in AI answers it is not supported by evidence.
Schema.org is a shared vocabulary founded by Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Yandex. With it a page can declare that a number is a price, a name is a company and a date is a publication date. Today it is usually embedded as JSON-LD.
For classic search results the benefit is documented: based on structured data, Google shows enhanced displays such as product prices, review stars or events, as long as the respective guidelines are met.
For AI answers the picture differs. Google’s documentation on AI features in Search states that no special Schema.org markup is needed to appear there. There is no controlled evidence that markup increases how often ChatGPT, Perplexity or AI Overviews cite a page. Anyone selling the opposite should show a measurement with a control group.
What it means for your website
Structured data remains worthwhile where Google offers a rich result for it and as a clean description of your own organisation. An audit should assess it separately from whether an AI cites the page. Missing markup is not a reason for missing mentions.
Related terms
Sources
Terms help you understand. Whether AI crawlers can reach your site is something you measure.
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