Entity SEO leverages natural language processing (NLP) and knowledge graphs to create content relevance and semantic understanding for search engines.

Entity SEO has changed the landscape of search engine optimisation in recent times – especially since the introduction of Google’s NLP and knowledge graph. It’s no longer just a game of picking the right keywords and adding them to your content. Search engines, especially Google, now focus on understanding topics, meanings, and relationships between different things – also known as entities.

In this article, we will explain in more detail what entities are and how they relate to keywords. We’ll also cover how Google’s Knowledge Graph and Natural Language Processing (NLP) work, why entity research should be included in keyword research and how to integrate schema markup and AI into content planning – all whilst keeping it natural and readable.

By the end, you should have a good understanding of how Entity SEO fits into a modern content strategy.

Let’s begin.

What’s The Difference Between Keywords & Entities?

A keyword is a word or phrase people type into a search engine, usually chosen based on volume and intent. For example, if someone searches for “best coffee shops in Melbourne,” Google looks for content that matches those words.

An entity, on the other hand, is more than just a word – it’s something Google recognises as an object, idea or ‘thing’. A coffee shop is an entity because it is a type of business. Melbourne is an entity because it is a city with specific locations. Best coffee is more than just a phrase – it connects to reviews, rankings and user preferences via relevancy within the knowledge graph.

Why Entity Research Should Be Part Of Keyword Research

Traditional keyword research is an essential part of search engine optimisation (SEO), helping you identify popular search terms that users frequently type into search engines. However, while it reveals which keywords are commonly searched, it does not provide insight into the deeper relationships between topics, concepts, and entities. This limitation can make it challenging to build a content creation strategy that goes beyond individual keywords and taps into the broader thematic relevance that search engines increasingly prioritise.

By integrating relevant entities – such as people, places, brands, concepts, and industry-specific terms – into your keyword research, you create a more comprehensive and interconnected content approach. This method not only helps your content rank for a wider variety of search queries but also strengthens your website’s topical authority. When multiple pages and posts within your site work together as part of a well-structured content network, search engines recognise your site as an authoritative source on the subject matter.

As a result, your website stands a better chance of outperforming competitors by signaling expertise, trustworthiness, and depth of knowledge.

What Is Topical Authority?

As we know, the real key to publishing successful content is establishing ‘topical authority’ – and entities are the perfect way to achieve this. When combined with user friendly site URL structure, thoughtful schema markup and clever internal linking, you can connect all content from a topic together into a giant network of useful information for search engines to interpret and evaluate.

You’re website shouldn’t be composed of singular pages and posts, all struggling to keep their head above water.

Pages and posts should be interconnected, with cornerstone content and a balanced mix of informational, navigational, transactional, and commercial content interwoven with a variety of relevant entities. When strategically linked into content clusters, this structure strengthens topical authority and improves search visibility.

Not only this, but entity research can also strengthen your SEO strategy by making your content more relevant to search engines and increasing your chances of appearing in featured snippets and knowledge panels.

For example, instead of only writing about the best restaurants in Sydney, entity research would encourage you to include related topics like types of restaurant cuisine, popular locations, and user preferences such as dietary restrictions.

By covering these types of related entities and keywords, your content is more likely to rank for a wider range of searches, and contribute heavily towards generating authority over competitors with a relevant network of pages and posts that work together as one.

What Is Google’s Knowledge Graph & NLP?

Google’s Knowledge Graph is like a giant web that links different entities together. It allows search engines to understand relationships instead of just listing results based on keywords.

For example, if you search for Shakespeare, Google knows that he is a person who wrote plays and sonnets, and that he is linked to Stratford-upon-Avon in the UK.

(Notice how I’ve highlighted the entities there? I could’ve just said Shakespeare is an entity, but instead I’ve mentioned relevant places and industry specific terms to give that relevance for search engines)

This is where Natural Language Processing (NLP) comes in. NLP helps Google understand the meaning behind searches and sentences. It allows Google to recognise synonyms, identify the intent behind searches, and understand how entities relate to each other.

Useful APIs For Entity SEO

Google’s NLP API takes any block of text and breaks it down into entities (people, places, brands, products, etc.), categories (technology, business, science, etc.), and sentiment (positive, neutral, or negative). This API can be accessed using JSON requests, allowing businesses and developers to integrate Google’s language analysis into their own software.

A simple request to the API returns a structured breakdown of a given text. This data includes:

Entity Recognition

Identifies named entities such as people, places, organisations, and concepts.

Salience Score

Measures how important each entity is in relation to the entire text.

Category Classification

Assigns the text to a broad category such as “Health & Fitness” or “Finance”.

Sentiment Analysis

Determines the emotional tone of the text.

Using Google’s NLP Tools

Google provides Natural Language Processing (NLP) tools that help you understand how it sees and processes content. These tools break down text to identify key entities, categories, relationships, and sentiment, giving insights into how well your content aligns with Google’s understanding of topics.

Two of the most useful tools for this are:

Google’s NLP API

A tool that allows developers to analyse text and extract information about entities, categories, and sentiment.

Google Search Console

Provides data on how Google interprets and ranks your content, showing which search queries bring traffic and how users interact with your site.

How Google NLP API Can Be Used for SEO

For those with web development experience, Google’s NLP API can be integrated into a custom SEO tool to analyse and improve content. Here’s how it can be leveraged:

1. Checking If Google Recognises Your Entities

By running your website content through the API, you can see which entities Google identifies and associates with your content. If key topics or brands are missing or misclassified, you can adjust your content to reinforce those entities more clearly.

For example, if your article is about “digital marketing,” but Google categorises it under “General Business,” it may not be specific enough. Adding clearer references to marketing platforms, strategies, and tools can improve its classification.

2. Optimising Internal Linking & Content Clusters

Google’s NLP API reveals connections between entities, helping with internal linking and content clusters. If you see that Google identifies related topics, you can create pillar pages and supporting content to strengthen topical relevance.

For instance, if you have a blog post on “email marketing strategies,” and Google’s NLP recognises “customer retention” as an entity, you could create additional content about customer retention and link the two pages together.

3. Improving Content Structure & Readability

By analysing the salience scores of entities in your content, you can tell which topics stand out and which ones get lost. If an important entity like “SEO strategy” has a low salience score, it might need more context, examples, or structured data to emphasise its importance.

Similarly, the sentiment analysis feature helps brands refine tone and messaging. If product descriptions are flagged as neutral or negative, they may lack persuasive language and need rewriting.

4. Using NLP API For Schema Markup Generation

Once you understand which entities Google associates with your content, you can create better schema markup. For example:

• If Google’s NLP API recognises “Melbourne” as a key location in your content, you can add LocalBusiness schema to reinforce the connection.
• If it identifies “SEO tools” as an entity, you can structure SoftwareApplication schema to highlight product details.

Automating schema markup using data from the NLP API can help ensure accuracy and relevance, leading to better search visibility.

5. Automating Keyword & Entity Research

Instead of manually researching which entities to target, businesses can use Google’s NLP API to scan competitor content and extract commonly used entities. (This one in particular is a technique I use regularly), it can highlight gaps in your content and suggest new topics to cover.

For example, if multiple competitors rank for “on-page SEO” and Google NLP associates their content with terms like “meta descriptions” and “structured data”, it suggests that covering those topics can improve topical authority.

At the end of the day, you don’t need to be perfect, you just need to be better than those you’re competing with.

Using Schema Markup To Help Search Engines Understand Content

Schema markup is a type of structured data that helps search engines understand what your content is about. It is written in a format called JSON-LD and tells Google how different pieces of information fit together.

If you run a local business, adding LocalBusiness schema can help Google show your address, opening hours and contact details in search results. The LocalBusiness markup includes properties like

@type:

• LocalBusiness
• name
• address
• telephone
• openingHours.

For software companies, SoftwareApplication schema helps display software features, reviews, and supported platforms. A structured example of SoftwareApplication markup would include

@type:

• SoftwareApplication
• name
• operatingSystem
• applicationCategory
• aggregateRating.

Person schema is useful for authors, professionals, and public figures. It includes attributes such as

@type:

• Person, name
• jobTitle
• worksFor
• sameAs (for linking social profiles).

Organisation schema helps define brands, businesses and institutions. This might include

@type:

• Organization
• name
• logo
• contactPoint
• url.

To improve Entity SEO, schema markup should be structured properly. Nesting related data together, clustering entities correctly, and targeting structured data for informational queries all help search engines extract and interpret structured data more accurately.

How To Write Content That Works For People & Search Engines

Even though AI can help build content frameworks, it’s incredibly important to still write naturally, especially with upcoming algorithm updates targeting generic, programmatic and useless AI content.

As a result, I really encourage you to use entities and keywords naturally instead of forcing them into the text. Content should feel like a real person wrote it. Breaking up text with clear headings and subheadings helps both readers and search engines. At the end of the day, AI-generated content should always be edited to make it more engaging and accurate.

Contact FAR SEO For Comprehensive Content Strategies Leveraging Entity SEO

Entity SEO is becoming more important as search engines get better at understanding meaning and context. By combining entity research, keyword strategy, schema markup, and structured content, you can create content that is more visible and useful to both readers and search engines.

If you need help improving your SEO, get in touch today for expert advice.