Schema for Good: Using Structured Data to Win AI Overview Citations

How AI Is Transforming Online Visibility

In a world where online visibility directly impacts engagement, reputation and conversions, being seen at the right moment matters more than ever. And increasingly, those moments happen inside AI Overviews, the new AI-generated summaries that sit right at the top of Google's search results.

So the key question is: how do you ensure Google's AI is quoting your organisation and not someone else?

The answer lies in a simple but powerful tool: structured data, also known as schema.

What Schema Actually Does (and Why AI Relies on It)

Schema is a way of labelling your website content so search engines and AI tools can understand it with complete clarity. While humans see beautifully designed pages, schema supplies machines with clear, factual data.

For example:

• An Event page becomes a recognised event with a date, time, location and booking link.
• A Product page clearly identifies pricing, availability and reviews.
• An FAQ page becomes a trusted list of direct answers.

This matters because AI Overviews prioritise reliable, structured information. When you use schema, you're effectively giving Google a verified, machine-readable version of your key content, making it far more likely that your website will appear as the authoritative source in AI-generated answers.

In other words, schema tells AI, "This is the definitive information, use us!"

Why Umbraco Makes Schema Easy for Marketing Teams

One of the major benefits of building websites on Umbraco CMS is how straightforward it becomes to add, manage and automate structured data, without disrupting your content workflow or relying on development support every time.

Here's how Umbraco helps:

1. Global organisation schema

We can configure your core business information, like name, logo, social profiles, contact details once at a global level. Umbraco then outputs this consistently across your site, ensuring search engines always receive trusted, unified information.

2. Script areas built into every site

All the websites we build include optional script blocks that can be shown on individual pages or inherited across child pages. This gives you full control over adding custom schema where it makes sense, without editing theme files or writing complex code.

3. Schema-ready document types

Umbraco's flexible content models allow us to "bake in" schema to specific components or page types.

For example:

• Event pages can automatically output Event schema
• FAQs can automatically generate FAQ page schema
• Product pages can generate Product schema

Your editors simply fill in the usual fields and Umbraco handles the technical output behind the scenes.

4. Future-proofing for AI-driven search

As AI Overviews become a standard part of search results, Umbraco gives you the flexibility to adapt your structured data quickly, ensuring your organisation stays visible and competitive.

Where to Start: High-Impact Schema Types for Most Websites

You don't need to use every schema type, just the ones that help users and search engines understand your content. Good starting points include:

• Organisation schema
  Helps AI recognise your organisation as a trusted source.
• FAQ / How To schema
  Ideal for support content, guides and "how do I...?" pages that AI tools often summarise.
• Event schema
  Useful for webinars, product launches, workshops and company events.
• Product or Service schema
  Clear, structured information about what you offer increases both visibility and trust.

Bringing It All Together

Structured data isn't a niche technical add-on, it's one of the simplest, highest-impact ways to help AI understand your content and elevate your organisation in search results.

And with Umbraco, your website is already set up to use schema effectively, whether you're adding it manually in script areas or baking it into templates and components.

Investing a little time into structured data now can help ensure your website is the one being cited, surfaced and trusted in the new AI-powered search landscape.

Put simply: schema helps your website work harder and get the visibility it deserves.

Want to find out more?

Looking to understand a little more about scheme and how it can help your website? Let's talk.