Latest / Semantic SEO Podcast / Semantic Triples | RDF Triple Explained
Transcript
- **James Dooley says:** Hi. Today I'm joined with Kasra Dash and the topic is about semantic triples. So within semantic SEO a common used term is a semantic triple. So Kasra what is a semantic triple. **Kasra Dash says:** So a semantic triple consists of three components a subject predicate and a object and basically a subject refers to an entity or concept being described. You then also have a predicate which expresses the relationship or attribute connecting to the subject and also to the object. You then also have got the object which is the entity or value that is linked to the subject or predicate. Which I definitely didn't read off of a laptop screen. **James Dooley says:** So with regard to the semantic triple there he's talking about subject predicate and objects. So it's the sentence structure but also it's very important on certain pages to make certain that you start the sentence with the correct subject and not starting it with the object. So trying to make certain you understand exactly how you should be writing semantically your content using semantic triples is very very important. But Kasra what is the purpose of semantic triples. **Kasra Dash says:** So semantic triples is a way of describing information and it creates a structured machine readable framework for data to be processed in a cheaper way. The cost of information retrieval is key especially when you're trying to rank in Google. **James Dooley says:** Yeah so I mean this is probably one of the most important parts of why semantic triples are very very important and they're going to stay with regards to SEO. They've actually been around for over a decade and people just don't realise this. But the semantic triples form part of the knowledge graph and this can help you with regards to like your knowledge panels and stuff like that. But the fact that they're able to use semantic triples and it helps their cost of information retrieval and brings that cost down from a business standpoint of course they're going to want to be using something like that within semantic SEO. So why do some call it rdf triples. **Kasra Dash says:** Rdf triples comes from the resource description framework which is the standard model used for representing relationships between data on the web. Both mean the same thing but rdf triples focuses more on technical side of this and semantic triples is how semantically you can tie together all the relationships. **James Dooley says:** Yeah so with regards to the RDF which is the resource description framework like I said that's the technical side of it all being done. The semantic triples is more about how the context between words and entities can show the relationship between them. So it means the same thing with an RDF triple and a semantic triple. Just one's technically talking about the structure and stuff. So what are the universal standards governing semantic triples. **Kasra Dash says:** You've got some brilliant questions today. The universal standard governing semantic triples primarily include RDF resource description framework standardised how the data is described and interlinked in the semantic web. OWL web ontology language defines how to use RDF to express ontologies including classes properties and individuals. And then you've got SPARQL and SPARQL protocol and RDF query language is used to retrieve and manipulate RDF data stored in triple stores. I'm not even going to expand on that because that was very technical and Kasra sounds like he knows what he's on about with these semantic triples. So does Google use semantic triples. **James Dooley says:** If you go into Google patents then semantic triples is currently part of 12,672 different results when you do like a control F across all the actual patents. The RDF technology is crucial for Google search as it enhances the precision and relevance of search results by understanding the relationship and the context of data. **Kasra Dash says:** So you heard that right. Within Google patents there's over 12 and a half thousand patents that they've gone and put forward that have all got semantic triples in there. So you can see the importance and how they're using it across their search engines and the algorithms. We will have the link in the description as well which that might change. That could be up to I think at the start of the year it was only 11,700 patents and now it's like you said 12,672 different Google patents that Google have got that have got semantic triples in. The link will be in the description which will show you exactly what those patents are. So is there any tips to include semantic triples for SEO content. **James Dooley says:** Using question answering frameworks on the headers and employing entity references in unstructured data can be an effective way to generate semantic triples. When you use questions in your H2s and answers and answer them concisely so you're not actually got any fluffy content with an answer that is usually written directly underneath with a semantically triple form way. **Kasra Dash says:** Yeah so basically what that's saying is if you get good at understanding semantically you need to get the semantic triples in there. If you start using your H2s and your H3s as question based H2s and H3s. So how old is James D. You're naturally going to be answering that James D is 23 years old or whatever age I am. I always say I'm 23. So with regards to that you're going to naturally then in the answer James Dooley is 23 years old. James Dooley is the subject. Is is the predicate. 23 years old is the age. That is a semantic triple. That is an SPO. So if you can start getting the questions in the H2s naturally you're going to start getting in the answers a lot of semantic triples which is very important for higher rankings when you're writing SEO related content. So how do semantic triples improve link building. **James Dooley says:** If you can write content for guest posts using semantic triples it gives the guest post a better chance of ranking which we all know more traffic to your guest post can obviously help impact your rankings as well. And then the traffic you get from that ranked third party website it all goes into the NLP categorisation. So for example if we have a guest post and that guest post the only thing on that title let's say is just talking about casinos but the actual content itself isn't actually in the correct NLP library Google's going to be like well there's not that much relevancy there. So again using semantic triples can definitely help with that. **Kasra Dash says:** Yeah so when you start getting the semantic triples in let's say guest posts so if you're going using a freelance writer or an in-house writer and they're writing the content for those third party websites if you can try to get the semantic triples in there in the guest posts that then with an NLP categorisation puts it under the right categorisation which means it's a very very relevant backlink. The semantic triples now we're starting to understand are very important for rankings. If you can rank your guest post and that can then start getting traffic. Traffic and relevance are massive players with regards to everything to do with backlink building and stuff like that. So is semantic triples a fad or do you think like with regards to keyword density and optimisation or do you think that semantic triples are here to stay. **James Dooley says:** No so it's definitely been around for a very long time. It's only going to get more and more advanced. Obviously you mentioned before that it had been mentioned 12,000 times and it's only going to get more and more. Semantic triples can make it cheaper for Google to score your content and also get around the web quicker. So again if we're going back to like the ROI of Google. Would they rather crawl a website that costs them 5 quid to crawl every single page or would they rather crawl a website that takes them a lot less. Let's say one pound. So from that point of view again Google's just going to rely more on this technology as time goes on and especially with the rise of AI content. And also by structuring your information subject predicate object triples it becomes more easy and understandable for machines. The machine readable semantic triples in there the subject the predicate and the object just makes it so much cheaper for them. They then factually can start seeing that if someone starts writing a piece of content about how old is James Dooley and it's a 2,000 word article it only needs to be one sentence. **Kasra Dash says:** Yeah so that semantic triple they need to do is connect the subjects and the objects and then that's it done. That's the answer to that question. Can you start getting more for your brand or for your name. More semantic triples out there. More factual information that's connected in the right way. That's machine readable which then can improve your knowledge panels personally or even your knowledge panel for brands for companies. So can you give us some examples of semantic triples. Having a bit of a play around here. **James Dooley says:** Yeah I've seen a couple on the list I'm like oh that's a funny one. We will go with Craig Campbell is James Dooley’s VA. Yeah so that is an actual semantic triple. Craig Campbell is the subject. Is is the predicate. James Dooley’s VA is the object. Now is that true. Craig Campbell is my virtual assistant. Right what some that you want to get out. **Kasra Dash says:** So other ones that are important I'm going to name some of these here which kind of touch upon then the importance of let's say E-E-A-T with semantic triples. So trying to get if you have won an award. James Dooley wins Best SEO Expert 2025. Right that is a semantic triple. James Dooley being the subject. Wins being the predicate. The object being the award of Best SEO Expert 2025. That connects James Dooley the entity with an award. Right okay. Right so then a different way instead of saying wins. James Dooley awarded Number One UK Lead Generation Specialist. James Dooley is the subject. Awarded is the predicate. And then whatever the award is in this case Number One UK Lead Generation Specialist. Moving away from awards you could then start saying James Dooley which is not a true statement because even though we are talking about semantic triples. James Dooley is a semantic triple expert. I'm going to hold you to that one. But I like this one. James Dooley is better than Koray at semantic SEO. I'm going to hold that one. **James Dooley says:** I first learned everything to do with semantic triples from Koray’s course The Topical Authority Course. At first I thought it was overcomplicating certain terminology but then when I started to dig deeper into what semantic triples are and what RDF triples are. Can I not just add certain words on the page and it helps me go up using certain keyword optimisation tools. But when I started to understand the methodology behind semantic triples then it became really really important. **Kasra Dash says:** Yeah I mean it does seem like there is a bit of a science to just writing your content. A lot of people even like you started doing SEO way longer than I did but back then when you started it was all about keyword density. And then it basically became like copycat content so just trying to figure out okay these guys they've got these headings they've mentioned this keyword x amount of times I need to do the same. And now it's kind of we're essentially on another level here. **James Dooley says:** Yeah I mean I feel like it's gone from keyword density to TF-IDF to entity optimisation to now semantic triples. Entity optimisation is still very important and it falls very closely related to semantic triples. But when you start to get the questions in the headers and then you're getting the direct answers underneath it naturally you're working in those RDF triples or semantic triples for SEO. It just makes a huge difference. **Kasra Dash says:** And one thing as well to mention just looking at some of the examples like we've got James Dooley is an office cleaner. Right that's another semantic triple. But in some cases you might already accidentally be including semantic triples without knowing it because sometimes it's just good SEO. But you might just not know that you're doing it. It's kind of like if you accidentally get a good link because you've published an article and you're like oh Forbes linked to me. It's kind of like that in this case. **James Dooley says:** Yeah for sure. I mean if you are looking to get a knowledge panel if there's not much information about you on the internet and what I mean by not much information you have loads of articles but if you don't have the semantic triples set up of like James Dooley was born on the 7th of September 1991. So that date of birth connected through to the entity James Dooley. James Dooley is an office cleaner. James Dooley was born in Salford. The more and more information the more confidence Google has of who this person is. That's when you can start to get the knowledge panel. Semantic triples form a big part of you getting those knowledge panels. But away from the knowledge panels if you can get the semantic triples in the knowledge graph what starts to happen is the knowledge graph is what feeds the LLMs. The large language models. And that's basically then these two side by side. If the knowledge graph is feeding the LLMs the retrieval augmented generation then starts making life much cheaper. They're not having to read every single word that's on the page. All they need to do is extract the knowledge graph and the information of what they have within the knowledge vault. That's where the semantic triples form part of a great SEO strategy. So I would strongly recommend anyone that doesn't know much about semantic triples to dig deeper into it. Obviously we've been here speaking to Kasra about it. We're definitely not the experts out there with regards to going into too much more detail on it. If you are looking to expand on it further there's lots of information and guides even within Google patents. I strongly recommend looking if you are going into 2024 for SEO understanding what a semantic triple is.