When we decide to look for a recipe on the internet and make a Google search, instantaneously we see results that inform us which ingredients we will have to use as well as the preparation and cooking time, right?
Well, last week Google announced a little change recipe websites will need to follow. Although it will not impact users’ experience that much, it will be very important for the page owners to improve their SEO.
Are you interested in knowing what this change is? So, keep reading this article about Google’s recipe structured data!
First of all, what is structured data?
In order for Google to understand the purpose of every content published on a website, they must be well structured. Therefore, we can define the concept of structured data as the way in which a web page informs and classifies its contents.
For example: after making a Google search about a recipe, the user will be able to find important information in the results. Let’s see an example below.
As you can see, the SERP immediately shows us some of the ingredients and the preparation time of each recipe. This is because those sites use structured data.
How did Google’s recipe structured data work before?
Everytime someone had to publish a new recipe on a website, they had to specify the cook time and the prep time.
Cook time is related to the necessary time to complete the cooking. On the other hand, the prep time means how many minutes or hours a person will take to combine all the ingredients before cooking.
But, this time range can vary from one person to another, right? Some people with more experience can prepare the food very quickly, while a newbie will need more time.
Well, now it has changed, at least on Google.
What changes in Google’s recipe structured data now?
Google removed from their guidance a time range for the cook time and prep time properties. It means that, from now on, using min and max as elements to specify a range of time is not allowed anymore because Google will only support the total time for both: cook and prep.
So, all the recipe websites that inform those time ranges will have to update this information to make Google understand it.
Let’s see an example with a search for “fried chicken”.
Can you see how those websites are already informing the total time instead of cook time and prep time? This is what every recipe page owner will have to do to obtain or keep good visibility and positions on Google.
A piece of information Google is omitting (but everyone must follow)
Google’s changelog documentation says that only cook time and prep time have changed, but, actually, the total time has changed too.
Although the documentation doesn’t mention the websites need to stop using min and max in place of the total time, it’s highly recommended to do that.
This is the screenshot extracted from the new documentation.
As you can see, there is nothing about using min or max in the recipes. However, considering Google has made this change to avoid time range in the recipes, it will be better using an exact total time instead.
How must the structured data be updated?
Many recipe websites are built on WordPress and use plugins to structure their data.
So, every dev or content creator will have to update those plugins to the most recent version and check if they’ve already applied this change.
Now that you know what has changed in Google’s recipe structured data, stick with us to know what else is happening in the SEO universe. Check this article about SEO trends for 2022 and start improving your results!
