The term is broader than schema markup, though in SEO conversation the two get used interchangeably. Structured data covers any agreed format that labels meaning rather than appearance, including the older microdata and RDFa syntaxes, Open Graph tags used by social platforms, and feed formats. What they share is that a machine can parse the values without guessing. Google documents which structured data types it supports for rich results and ignores the rest, but unsupported types are not harmful and can still describe your content to other systems.
For a contractor, clinic or firm the useful set is small and worth getting right. Organization or LocalBusiness on the site level, Service on each service page, FAQPage where you have genuine questions and answers, BreadcrumbList for navigation, and Article on real content pieces. Keep the values accurate and matched to what is on the page, and update them when your hours or phone change, because stale structured data quietly tells search engines wrong facts about you. Most content management systems handle this with a plugin or a template field.
Send the site over. We will tell you what is broken, what you could rank for, and whether AI search knows you exist. No charge and no pitch deck.
