Documentation of our extension is now publically available

I’m happy to inform you that finally our extension documentation “Markup for Autos” has  been published on the schema.org site: https://schema.org/docs/automotive.html.

We are sure that it will help us and our clients in adding the advanced markup to their automotive sites and will make them much better visible to both search engines and other agents.

Mirek

Toyota Motor Europe use of schema.org and auto.schema.org vocabularies

Toyota Motor Europe (TME), led in the area of Semantic SEO by MakoLab SA and Hepp Research GmbH, has implemented elements of schema.org core and auto.schema.org extension vocabularies in their websites across Europe.

The scope of the vocabularies use

In particular, TME’s Models and Specification Pages (e.g. Main2) there is schema.org markup targeting the display of Google Rich Snippets (price/reviews).

As an example of the use, let us see the use of the type vehicleConfigurationin the following construct:

(…)
   "@type": [ "Car", "ProductModel"],
    "name": "Toyota AYGO x Hatchback 5-dørs 1.0 VVT-i (69 hk) 5-trins manuelt",
    "description": " ",
    "image": "https://images.toyota-europe.com/dk/ag/width/1200/exterior-right-front.jpg",
    "vehicleConfiguration": "AYGO 5-dørs hatchback 1.0 VVT-i x",
    "vehicleEngine": {
                       "@type": "EngineSpecification",
                       "name": "1.0 VVT-i (69 hk)"
                     },
(…)

While the use of auto.schema.org seems to be quite modest in its scope, the size of the set of URLs that contain elements of the markup is impressive: our post-implementation assessment shows that objects of type Car are in almost 7000 URLs from the entire TME web landscape – already indexed by Google!

What are the effects of the markup?

So far, the fundamental effect of the markup will be to feed Google’s Knowledge Graph. For example, we can already see that Google is looking for this data as per example of the Knowledge Panel:

It is expected and highly anticipated, that the manufacturer’s websites with Schema.org markup will be very trustworthy source of information for Google, and the data in the Knowledge Panel will be coming from this source.

However, as the life of the markup has just started, we suspect that the data marked up with Schema might be used for example in Tabular Search Results or so called “Direct Answers”:

Today we can see that the data comes from various websites’ content (for example from Wikipedia, manufacturer’s websites and other), but we suspect they might be soon based to a higher extent on the most reliable data which is the structured markup embedded into the pages of the manufacturer website.

It also worth noticing that the use of schema.org in the TME pages brings Google Rich Snippets to life:

Conclusion

Despite using a small part of the schema.org and automotive extension vocabularies in the TME websites the early results are quite promising and show the impact of the schema.org markup on the Customer Search Experience related to the manufacturer.

“Markup for Autos” – the documentation for auto.schema.org extension

Dear All,

I’m happy to inform you that we have created a documentation for our extension. The document entitled “Markup for Autos” is available for review or comments at:

http://sdo-auto-fix.appspot.com/docs/automotive.html

The “shape” and the content of the document was inspired by similar documents placed on the schema.org site Markup for Banks and Financial Institutions” document in particular.

We would be very happy if you could visit the https://github.com/schemaorg/issues/1677

We are working with schema.org team to have this document published on the production schema.org site.

Cheers
Mirek

The report from II GAO Community Conference Call.

Hello All,

We have collected and cleaned all the materials from our last week call.
The slides from the call: http://ml.ms/gao_cc2

The Call log is here: https://www.w3.org/community/gao/ii-community-conference-call-the-call-log/

Cheers
Mirek

The call details …

9 AM PDT (California), 12 PM EDT (New York), 6 PM CET (Paris) time.

GoTo Meeting:

https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/822884949

 2.  Use your microphone and speakers (VoIP) – a headset is recommended.  Or, call in using your telephone.

Austria: +43 1 2530 22500
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Access Code: 822-884-949

Audio PIN: Shown after joining the meeting

 Meeting ID: 822-884-949

Agenda for tomorrow’s call

Dear All,

The main theme of our call has not changed and is:

How to accelerate the adoption of auto.schema.org in the Automotive Industry Digital Platforms

However, after some discussions I had with some people, I propose to modify a bit the agenda (Point 5):

1. The status of schema.org and automotive schema.org extensions
2. Key message – building TRUST of clients in automotive DATA through auto.schema.org
3. Plan for the adoption of auto.schema.org to automotive Digital Platforms:
   
   1. Implementation guidelines
   2. Consulting services
   3. Post-implementation follow-ups
4. Additional quick benefits from auto.schema.org data consumption:
   
   1. New kind of analytics – presentation of a POC with GA
   2. Enhanced search over the data space for automotive websites – the presentation of the idea
5. Future extension of auto.schema.org terms – first draft (see our Wiki at: https://www.w3.org/community/gao/wiki/Main_Page)
6. Discussion

“See” you all tomorrow at:

9 AM PDT (California), 12 PM EDT (New York), 6 PM CET (Paris) time.

GTM link is here: https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/822884949

Mirek

The II conference call – Wednesday, April 27 – 12 EDT

Dear All,

Thanks for those who added their votes over the weekend. I can now fully confirm the call date & time:

April 27 – Wednesday
9 AM PDT (California), 12 PM EDT (New York), 6 PM CET (Paris) time

I will send GotoMeeting call details tomorrow.
We all strongly count on everybody’s participation and fruitful discussion.

Initial proposal for date & time for the call is …

The day: Wednesday, April 27 (next week)
The time: 9 AM PDT (California), 12 PM EDT (New York), 6 PM CET (Paris)

As this selection was based on quite small number of answers so I’m not closing the survey yet (http://ml.ms/gao_call) and it will stay active for the coming weekend.

Mirek

Conference call day & time choice …

Dear All,

Please go to http://ml.ms/gao_call and choose the right day & time for you.
So far we did not get too many answers 🙂
We still have time, but it is always better to plan it all earlier 🙂

Cheers
Mirek

Agenda for the Community Conference Call

The call main theme:
How to accelerate the adoption of auto.schema.org in the Automotive Industry Digital Platforms

1. The status of schema.org and automotive schema.org extensions
2. Key message – building TRUST of clients in automotive DATA through auto.schema.org
3. Plan for the adoption of auto.schema.org to automotive Digital Platforms:
   
   1. Implementation guidelines
   2. Consulting services
   3. Post-implementation follow-ups
4. Additional quick benefits from auto.schema.org data consumption:
   
   1. New kind of analytics – presentation of a POC with GA
   2. Enhanced search over the data space for automotive websites – the presentation of the idea
5. Future of GAO Ontology – new ideas 
6. Discussion

 Estimated Time – 90 minutes