I’ve been looking at small business websites in Idaho since 2017, and the schema situation is worse than you’d think. Half the sites have no structured data at all. The other half have auto-generated schema from a plugin that’s either wrong or incomplete. When ChatGPT or Perplexity cite a source, they’re pulling from schema markup first, visible text second. If your schema says you’re in San Francisco when you’re actually in Meridian, or if it claims you sell products you stopped carrying in 2019, AI will cite the wrong information. This post walks through the three schema types that actually matter for getting cited, the fields you can’t skip, and the mistakes I see on every third audit.
What schema markup does a small business actually need?
You need three types: LocalBusiness schema, FAQPage schema, and Article schema. That’s it. Everything else is optional.
LocalBusiness schema tells AI where you are, what you do, when you’re open, and how to contact you. It’s the foundational layer. Without it, AI doesn’t know if you’re a plumber in Boise or a law firm in Twin Falls.
FAQPage schema turns your FAQ sections into extractable answer blocks. When someone asks Perplexity “how much does a roof replacement cost in Idaho,” and your FAQ has that question with a real answer, FAQPage schema makes you cite-worthy.
Article schema marks up blog posts so AI knows the author, publish date, and topic. It signals credibility. A post with proper Article schema gets cited more than the same post without it.
I don’t bother with Product schema unless you’re selling physical goods with SKUs. I don’t use Organization schema separately if LocalBusiness already covers it. I don’t touch Event schema unless events are your primary business model. Most small businesses overthink this. Three schema types, implemented correctly, beats twelve schema types implemented poorly.
What fields in LocalBusiness schema actually get used by AI?
LocalBusiness schema has about forty possible fields. AI engines care about eight of them.
Name, Your actual business name. Not your DBA plus tagline. If you’re “Mountain View Accounting” on your door, use “Mountain View Accounting” in schema. Don’t add “- Trusted CPA in Boise” to the name field.
Address, Full street address, city, state, ZIP. This must match your Google Business Profile exactly. If GBP says “123 Main St” and your schema says “123 Main Street,” AI sees a conflict and trusts neither.
Telephone, One primary phone number. Format doesn’t matter much, but I use (208) 555-1234 for consistency. Don’t list multiple numbers in the telephone field. Pick one.
OpeningHours, Days and times in the format “Mo-Fr 09:00-17:00”. If you’re closed Sundays, don’t list Sunday. I see sites that copy-paste hours from five years ago. When AI cites your business and says you’re open Saturday when you’re not, you get annoyed phone calls.
Geo (latitude/longitude), Optional but helpful for service area businesses. If you serve Ada County but your office is in Garden City, geo coordinates clarify where you’re physically based.
ServiceArea, Critical if you don’t serve walk-in customers. A roofing company in Nampa that serves Canyon County, Ada County, and Gem County should list all three. AI uses this to match “roofers near Caldwell” queries.
PriceRange, Use $ to $$$$ or write “Free consultation” or “Starting at $150/hour.” Vague is fine. Specific is better.
URL, Your homepage. Not your contact page. AI uses this as the citation link.
I’ve tested schema with and without image, logo, founder, foundingDate, areaServed as text, sameAs (social links). They don’t noticeably change citation frequency. Focus on the eight fields above before adding anything else.
How does FAQPage schema get your content cited?
FAQPage schema is the fastest way to get cited by AI because it’s structured exactly how answer engines want to consume information. You ask a question, you provide an answer, you mark it up so machines can extract it cleanly.
Here’s the pattern that works. On your service pages, add a FAQ section at the bottom. Four to six questions. Each question should be something a customer actually asks. “How much does X cost in Boise?” “Do I need a permit for Y in Idaho?” “How long does Z take?”
The answers need to be direct. Start with a number, a yes/no, or a one-sentence summary. Then add two or three sentences of context. Avoid throat-clearing. Don’t start with “Well, it depends on many factors.” Start with “Most residential HVAC installs in Boise cost $4,500 to $8,200.”
I’ve seen ChatGPT cite FAQ answers word-for-word when the schema is present. Without schema, the same FAQ section gets ignored because AI has to parse HTML structure and guess where the answer starts and ends.
FAQPage schema uses the Question and Answer types. Each question gets a name property. Each answer gets a text property. The text can be 200-300 words if needed, but the first sentence is what gets extracted most often.
One mistake I see constantly: businesses add FAQPage schema to a dedicated /faq page that ranks for nothing and gets no traffic. Put FAQ sections on your service pages. “Roof Replacement Boise” + FAQ section + FAQPage schema = citation magnet. Generic FAQ page with twenty questions about your return policy = waste of time.
What does Article schema do for blog posts?
Article schema tells AI that a page is editorial content, not a sales page. It signals trust. When Perplexity weighs two sources that both answer a query, the one with Article schema and a clear author attribution gets cited first.
The required fields are simpler than LocalBusiness. You need headline (your H1), datePublished (ISO format: 2025-01-15), dateModified (update this when you revise the post), author (a Person or Organization), and publisher (your business).
I also include image (your featured image) and description (same as meta description). These aren’t required but they show up in some AI citation cards.
The author field matters more than it used to. I write all BMG posts myself, so the author is “Dwight Davis” with a sameAs link to my LinkedIn. If you have multiple writers, use real names and real profiles. Don’t use “Admin” or “Marketing Team.” AI trusts attributed content more than anonymous content.
One thing I’ve tested: dateModified affects citation freshness. If I update a post from 2023 with new data in 2025 and change the dateModified timestamp, AI starts treating it as current information. If I don’t update the timestamp, AI sometimes cites it as outdated even if the content is fresh.
Most WordPress themes auto-generate Article schema if you’re using Yoast or Rank Math. Check it anyway. I’ve audited sites where the plugin was adding Article schema to the homepage, the contact page, and every service page. That’s wrong. Article schema goes on blog posts and guides. Not on commercial pages.
What are the most common schema mistakes on Idaho small business sites?
I see the same six mistakes on almost every audit.
Conflicting NAP data. The website footer says one address, the contact page says another, the schema says a third. AI doesn’t cite businesses it can’t verify. Pick one version of your name, address, and phone number. Use it everywhere.
Wrong business type. LocalBusiness is the generic type. If you’re a restaurant, use Restaurant. If you’re a dentist, use Dentist. If you’re a law firm, use LegalService or Attorney. The more specific the type, the better AI understands your relevance to queries. I see accounting firms using ProfessionalService when they should use AccountingService. Small difference, but specificity helps.
Service area confusion. You’re a Boise-based contractor who works in five counties. Your schema lists your office address but no serviceArea property. AI thinks you only serve Garden City because that’s where your office is. Add serviceArea with every city or county you serve.
Broken opening hours. Your schema says you’re open Monday to Friday 9 to 5, but you added Saturday hours six months ago and never updated the schema. Or worse, you’re closed Wednesdays and the schema doesn’t reflect it.
Multiple conflicting schemas. You’re running Yoast and also a separate local SEO plugin and also some custom schema your developer added in 2019. Now you have three LocalBusiness schemas on the homepage with different data. Google’s Rich Results Test shows errors. AI ignores all of it.
No schema at all. This is still the most common issue. Half the small business sites I see in Idaho have zero structured data. No LocalBusiness, no FAQPage, no Article markup. You’re invisible to answer engines.
Fix these six things before you worry about advanced schema types. A clean LocalBusiness schema with accurate data beats a complicated setup with errors.
How do I test if my schema is working?
Use two tools: Google’s Rich Results Test and Schema.org’s validator. Both are free. Both catch different problems.
Rich Results Test (search.google.com/test/rich-results) checks if Google can parse your schema. Paste in your URL. It shows you what schema types it found, what fields are populated, and what errors exist. If it says “LocalBusiness detected” and shows your name, address, and phone with no errors, you’re good.
Common errors it catches: missing required fields, incorrect formatting (like using “9am-5pm” instead of “09:00-17:00” for opening hours), invalid URLs, mismatched data types.
Schema.org’s validator (validator.schema.org) is pickier. It checks if your markup follows the official spec. Sometimes Rich Results Test gives you a pass but the validator flags warnings. Pay attention to warnings about recommended fields. If it says “address is recommended,” add the address even if Google doesn’t require it.
I run both tests after making schema changes. I also run them on competitor sites to see what they’re doing. If a Boise HVAC company is ranking well and getting cited often, I check their schema. Usually they have clean LocalBusiness markup and FAQPage schema on every service page.
One trick: test your schema in incognito mode or a different browser. Sometimes caching makes you think schema is live when it’s not. I’ve pushed schema updates that didn’t actually deploy because of a CDN cache issue. Testing in incognito caught it.
After you verify the schema is error-free, give it two weeks. AI citation changes don’t happen instantly. Google needs to recrawl your site. ChatGPT and Perplexity need to reindex. Check back in fourteen days and search for queries your site should answer. See if you’re getting cited. If not, the schema is probably fine but your content needs work.