Why structured data matters more than your website copy
When ChatGPT or Perplexity evaluates a local business, it doesn't read your homepage the way a human does. It looks for machine-readable signals: structured data embedded in your page's , clean entity definitions, and consistent metadata.
A business with zero JSON-LD markup is essentially invisible to an AI parser · even if its website copy is excellent and its Google Maps listing has 200 reviews.
In Klaréo's scan data, businesses with complete LocalBusiness schema appear in AI engine results 3.2× more often than businesses without any schema.
The minimum viable schema for a Swiss SME
Every Swiss SME website should have this in :
json{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "LocalBusiness",
"name": "Your Business Name GmbH",
"url": "https://your-website.ch",
"telephone": "+41 XX XXX XX XX",
"email": "hello@your-website.ch",
"description": "One sentence description mentioning your service, city, and a key differentiator.",
"address": {
"@type": "PostalAddress",
"streetAddress": "Musterstrasse 42",
"addressLocality": "Zürich",
"postalCode": "8001",
"addressCountry": "CH"
},
"geo": {
"@type": "GeoCoordinates",
"latitude": 47.3769,
"longitude": 8.5417
},
"openingHoursSpecification": [
{
"@type": "OpeningHoursSpecification",
"dayOfWeek": ["Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday","Friday"],
"opens": "08:00",
"closes": "18:00"
}
],
"priceRange": "CHF XX–XXX"
}Service-specific type extensions
The base LocalBusiness type is a good start, but AI engines give more weight to businesses that declare their specific type. Use the most specific type that fits:
| Business type | Schema `@type` |
|---|---|
| Dental practice | `["LocalBusiness", "Dentist"]` |
| General medical | `["LocalBusiness", "Physician"]` |
| Restaurant | `["LocalBusiness", "Restaurant"]` |
| Hotel | `["LocalBusiness", "Hotel"]` |
| Fiduciary / accounting | `["LocalBusiness", "AccountingService"]` |
| Law firm | `["LocalBusiness", "LegalService"]` |
Adding your Google Maps rating
If you have a Google Maps listing, add your aggregate rating. AI engines use this as a trust signal:
json"aggregateRating": {
"@type": "AggregateRating",
"ratingValue": "4.8",
"reviewCount": "134",
"bestRating": "5"
}Keep the reviewCount accurate and update it periodically. AI engines cross-reference this with what they see on Google Maps.
The description field · the most underestimated fix
Most businesses write a generic description like "Professional dental practice in Zürich." This is useless to an AI engine trying to match against a specific query.
Instead, write a description that covers:
- →Your specific service
- →Your location (city and district/neighbourhood if relevant)
- →One differentiator that matches common query intent ("new patients welcome", "anxiety patients", "French-speaking")
- →One specific treatment or product keyword
Bad: "Professional dental practice in Zürich."
Good: "Zahnarztpraxis in Zürich-Altstadt · Allgemeine Zahnheilkunde, Bleaching und Angstpatienten. Neue Patienten willkommen. Termine online buchbar."
Where to put it
Paste the JSON-LD inside a