Entities · Glossary
What is an entity?
In search, an entity is a uniquely identifiable thing (a person, organization, place, product or concept) that a search engine stores along with its attributes and its relationships to other entities.
Written by Noor KhanWhy Entity matters
Entities let search engines understand meaning instead of matching words. 'Jaguar' the animal and Jaguar the car brand are different entities; knowing which one a page is about decides who it ranks for.
How Entity works
- Search engines extract entities from text, links and structured data.
- Each entity has attributes (founder, location, price, symptoms) and relations to other entities.
- Well-known entities are stored in knowledge bases such as Google's Knowledge Graph.
How to apply it
- Name the main entity of each page clearly and early.
- Cover the attributes people expect for that entity.
- Use structured data and sameAs links to connect your brand to its profiles.
Example
A page about 'Ozempic' is about a specific drug entity with attributes such as manufacturer, active ingredient (semaglutide), uses and side effects.
Common mistake
Assuming an entity is just a keyword. Entities are things with properties; keywords are strings of text that may refer to several entities.
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