Search has changed for travel and tourism. Travelers now see maps, carousels, videos, review boxes, AI summaries, and ticket widgets before they ever reach a traditional blue link. For tour and activity providers, that can feel like the ground is moving under your feet. You may be creating strong content and earning good reviews, yet your listings still blend into an overcrowded results page.
Schema Markup and Structured Data are sets of data that help influence SEO strategies to claim more visual real estate and improve how search engines understand your business. Instead of hoping Google figures out that your walking tour is a real world experience with real availability, you label it clearly in a language that search engines and AI systems can read at a glance.
In this guide, you will see what Schema Markup is, why it matters for tour and activity providers, which types are worth your time, and how to get started even if you are not a developer. The goal is not to turn you into a full-time technical SEO. The goal is to give you enough understanding to ask the right questions, set clear requirements, and recognize whether your structured data is working.
If you only have a few minutes between tours, here are the essentials.
Schema Markup is a standardized vocabulary that explains what is on your pages in a machine readable way.
Structured Data is the format that carries this information. Schema is the most common form of structured data used in SEO.
It does not raise rankings directly, but it makes you eligible for rich results and improves click-through rate.
For travel sites, correct Schema can increase CTR by around 30 percent or more when ratings, prices, and key details appear in the listing.
It is a foundation for Entity SEO and AI visibility, which matter more each year as Google and AI tools focus on entities rather than only keywords.
The highest impact types for tours are TouristTrip, TouristAttraction, LocalBusiness, Review or AggregateRating, Event, FAQPage, Place, and BreadcrumbList.
You can add Schema through JSON LD snippets, WordPress plugins, or enterprise tools. Whatever route you choose, you should always test it with Google’s Rich Results Test and the Schema.org Validator.
With that high level picture in mind, the rest of this article walks through the details in plain language.
Most tour and activity providers already have the raw ingredients that search engines want. You have tour descriptions, schedules, pricing, reviews, meeting points, photos, and local expertise. The problem is that this information is usually unstructured. It sits in long paragraphs, bullet lists, or tables that are designed for humans, not machines.
Schema Markup is the label maker for all of that information. It is a shared vocabulary, maintained at Schema.org, that describes things like:
A guided tour
A tourist attraction
A local business
An event
A review and rating
A place or region
When you apply Schema to a page, you tell search engines exactly what the page is about. A “Downtown food tour” page becomes a TouristTrip with a defined duration, price, meeting location, and itinerary. A “Things to do near X” guide becomes a set of TouristAttraction entities with coordinates, opening hours, and accessibility information.
This clarity matters because search engines no longer rely only on keywords. They try to understand entities, relationships, and context. Schema Markup provides that context in a compact and reliable way.
From a business perspective, the reason to care is simple. Pages with well structured Schema are eligible for enhanced search features and rich results. Those enhanced listings catch the eye in a crowded results page and give users more confidence to click. Over time, higher click through rates and better engagement support your organic visibility and help you stay visible in an environment where more answers are given directly on the results page.
Entity SEO is the idea that search engines focus on real world things rather than only matching strings of text. A landmark, a neighbourhood, a tour company, and a seasonal festival are all entities. Google, Bing, and AI systems like ChatGPT and Gemini use knowledge graphs to track these entities and how they connect.
Schema Markup plugs directly into that process in a few important ways.
When you mark up your business as a LocalBusiness with the correct name, address, coordinates, website, and review information, you help search engines match your site to your Google Business Profile and other citations. That gives you a more stable identity in local search, which is the foundation for showing up in map packs and location based queries.
If you also mark up your tours as TouristTrip entities, your events as Event, and your destination content as Place or TouristAttraction, you are creating a network of connected entities around your brand. That network makes it easier for search engines and AI systems to see your company as a trusted source for specific regions or experiences.
AI Overviews and other AI driven panels look for concise, well structured facts. If your pages provide structured data about duration, price range, age limits, or accessibility, those fields are easy for AI systems to pull into their summaries.
Without Schema, that same information might be buried in the middle of a paragraph. The AI would need to guess whether it applies to the current query, which reduces your chances of being included in a summary or knowledge panel.
More travellers now get at least part of their answer without clicking through to a website. They see ratings, prices, and short descriptions directly in search results or map listings.
Structured Data helps you stay present in that zero click environment. Even when a user does not immediately click, they still see your brand name, star rating, and a hint of what makes your tour unique. That repeated exposure supports brand recall, and many people later search specifically for the company they noticed earlier.
In other words, Schema Markup helps you be part of the conversation, even when the conversation is happening inside an AI powered result box.
There are dozens of Schema types in the full vocabulary, but you do not need them all. For most tour and activity providers, a focused set creates most of the value. Think of these as your core toolkit.
Here is a quick comparison to orient you before we look at each one in more detail.
| Schema Type | Best use case | Key fields to include | Typical impact |
|---|---|---|---|
| TouristTrip | Guided tours and itineraries | Duration, stops, price, amenities, target audience | Higher CTR, richer listings, better AI visibility |
| TouristAttraction | Landmarks, points of interest, highlights | Geo coordinates, hours, amenities, images | More appearances for attraction related searches |
| LocalBusiness | Main office, meeting point, storefront | Name, hours, address, geo, reviews, contact | Stronger local SEO and map visibility |
| Event | Seasonal tours, festivals, limited runs | Start and end dates, location, ticket info | Inclusion in event carousels and time sensitive queries |
| Review & AggregateRating | Testimonials and review summaries | Rating value, review count, author or source | Star ratings in search results and higher CTR |
| Place + AdministrativeArea | Cities, regions, neighbourhoods | Geo detail, relationships between areas | Clearer geographic relevance for destination pages |
| FAQPage | Question based content and help sections | Question and answer pairs | Eligibility for Q and A related results |
| BreadcrumbList | Site navigation and structure | Position of a page in the hierarchy | Cleaner SERP appearance with breadcrumb paths |
Each of these types supports a specific piece of your search footprint. Together, they describe who you are, what you offer, where you operate, and how travellers experience your services.
If you run guided tours, TouristTrip should be near the top of your implementation list. It allows you to label a page as a specific trip with its own itinerary, pricing, and duration.
A simple TouristTrip implementation can include:
Tour name
Short description
Duration in ISO format (for example, PT3H for three hours)
Price and currency
Included amenities
Target audience (families, food lovers, adventure travellers)
Itinerary stops, which can reference TouristAttraction entities
When this information is structured, search engines can show richer snippets that display pricing, duration, and sometimes other details. That helps your listing stand out among generic results that only show a title and meta description.
Many tour businesses build content around the attractions and landmarks they visit. A walking tour might highlight murals, historic buildings, or viewpoints. A boat tour might pass under a famous bridge or stop at an island.
By marking these as TouristAttraction entities, you tell search engines that these are notable points of interest. Key fields include geo coordinates, opening hours, images, and accessibility information.
This level of detail makes it easier for search engines to connect your content to popular attraction queries. When someone searches for a specific landmark plus the word “tour,” your pages have a better chance to appear because the engine already understands how your tour relates to that place.
Even if you do not keep regular walk in hours, your company still operates in a physical area. LocalBusiness markup describes your name, address, phone, website, coordinates, hours, and sometimes departments or service areas.
This data helps search engines tie your website to your map listings and third party profiles. It reduces confusion when similar business names exist in different cities, and it supports consistency when you update your hours or contact information.
For many operators, LocalBusiness markup is the base that supports all other structured data. Once your core entity is clear, it is easier to connect individual tours, events, and attractions to the correct business.
If you host special tours during holidays, festivals, or peak seasons, Event markup is a valuable complement to TouristTrip. Event markup emphasizes dates, times, and ticketing information.
Search engines often use this information to populate event carousels and “what is happening this weekend” style queries. For operators in busy destinations, that can bring a surge of highly targeted visitors who are ready to book something specific for a given date.
Travelers rely heavily on reviews when choosing tours and activities. Schema lets you pull some of that social proof directly into your search listings.
By marking up individual reviews or using AggregateRating to represent your average score and review count, you make your pages eligible for star ratings and rating snippets in search.
Seeing a 4.8 rating with 200 reviews directly below your link can have a powerful effect on click through rate. It also filters out visitors who are only looking for the cheapest option, since the rating reminds them that they are choosing a quality experience, not just a low price.
FAQPage markup is designed for pages that answer a list of common questions. Many tour operators already have FAQ sections on their sites. Applying FAQPage markup helps search engines understand that these are structured question and answer pairs.
This can support visibility in “People also ask” features and other question driven results. It also helps AI systems identify your content as a clean source when users ask specific practical questions, like “Do I need to bring ID” or “What should I wear.”
BreadcrumbList markup supports navigation by explaining where a page sits in your site hierarchy. When Google displays breadcrumb paths instead of long URLs, users get a better sense of context. They can tell at a glance whether the page is a general region overview, a specific tour, or a blog article.
You do not need to become a developer to understand what Schema looks like. A short example can go a long way in helping you brief your team or agency.
Here is a simplified TouristTrip example in JSON LD format. A real implementation would likely include more fields, but this shows the basic structure.
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "TouristTrip",
"name": "Downtown Asheville Food Tour",
"description": "A guided tasting tour featuring local restaurants and historic landmarks.",
"image": "https://example.com/tour.jpg",
"touristType": "Food lovers",
"itinerary": [
{
"@type": "TouristAttraction",
"name": "Pack Square",
"geo": {
"@type": "GeoCoordinates",
"latitude": "35.5951",
"longitude": "-82.5515"
}
}
],
"offers": {
"@type": "Offer",
"price": "75",
"priceCurrency": "USD"
},
"duration": "PT3H"
}You can use similar patterns for LocalBusiness, Event, or Review markup. The key is to keep the information accurate and in sync with what users see on the page.
There are three main ways tour and activity providers usually implement structured data. The right choice depends on your platform, your team, and how many pages you manage.
Developers can paste JSON LD scripts into the head of your pages or inject them through a template. This approach gives you full control and works on most platforms, including custom sites and many hosted website builders.
The advantage is flexibility. You can tailor the markup precisely to your needs. The trade off is that updates require someone comfortable editing code.
If your site runs on WordPress, Schema focused plugins take much of the heavy lifting off your plate. Tools like Yoast SEO, RankMath, Schema Pro, and similar plugins offer built in support for common types such as LocalBusiness, Article, FAQPage, and more.
You still need to configure them thoughtfully. For example, you should make sure that the business name, address, and logo are correct, and that the right page types are mapped to the right Schema types. Once configured, these plugins can scale across dozens or hundreds of pages.
Larger travel brands, online travel agencies, or operators with many tours sometimes use specialist platforms that manage Schema at scale. These tools connect with your CMS or booking system, then generate and update structured data automatically when prices, availability, or tour descriptions change.
Even if you are not ready for a full platform, it is useful to know they exist. As your offering grows, automation becomes important. You do not want to hand edit Schema every time you add a new time slot.
Publishing Schema is not a one time project. It needs to be tested up front and reviewed on a regular schedule.
Before launch, you can use:
Google’s Rich Results Test to check eligibility for enhanced results.
The Schema.org Validator to confirm that the syntax is valid and fields are mapped correctly.
If you make changes to your tours, events, or location details, your structured data should be updated at the same time. Many operators find that a quarterly audit works well, with extra checks before peak seasons.
When you test your structured data, look for:
Errors that block rich results entirely.
Warnings that suggest missing recommended fields.
Mismatches between what the markup says and what the page displays.
Catching these issues early keeps your site eligible for enhanced visibility instead of silently falling out of rich result features.
Structured Data is the overall concept of organizing information in a consistent, machine readable way. Schema Markup is a specific vocabulary for that structured data, defined at Schema.org and widely used by search engines. You can think of Structured Data as the container and Schema as the language you use inside that container.
Schema itself is not treated as a traditional ranking factor. The benefit comes from richer listings, better understanding of your content, and higher click through rates. Those elements support organic performance over time, but you should not expect Schema alone to move you from page three to the top spot.
Most operators get the strongest early results from LocalBusiness, TouristTrip, Review or AggregateRating, and FAQPage. Once those are in place, you can layer on TouristAttraction, Event, Place, and BreadcrumbList to deepen your presence.
AI systems draw from many sources, including unstructured content, but Schema offers a clean, reliable feed of facts. When your site exposes key details in structured form, it is easier for AI tools to include your information in summaries, comparisons, and itineraries.
If your markup has serious errors, search engines may ignore it or mark it as ineligible for rich results. This is why using the Rich Results Test and other validators is so important. Fixing errors early helps you avoid losing visibility without realizing it.
Schema Markup and Structured Data have become a core part of modern search for travel and tourism. They do not replace strong content, good reviews, or a smooth booking experience. Instead, they help all of that hard work show up more clearly where travelers are looking.
If you take nothing else from this guide, keep these points in mind:
Schema Markup explains your tours, attractions, and business to search engines in a precise way.
It supports Entity SEO, AI visibility, and rich results that improve click through rates.
A focused set of Schema types covers most needs for tour and activity providers.
JSON LD, plugins, or specialist tools can all work, as long as you test and maintain the markup.
Regular validation keeps your structured data in good shape as your offerings change.
Structured Data may feel technical at first glance, but it is ultimately about communication. You already know your experiences inside and out. Schema gives you a way to share that knowledge with the systems that decide what travelers see when they start planning their next adventure.