Star ratings in Google search results come exclusively from schema-org AggregateRating or schema-org Review structured data — a testimonials section in your UI does not surface this data to crawlers. Businesses displaying review stars in their search snippet receive significantly higher click-through rates. If your site already shows customer testimonials but lacks the corresponding JSON-LD, you're doing the work of collecting reviews while forfeiting the search result benefit entirely.
Medium because the omission loses a high-impact click-through signal (review stars in SERP) without creating a security or correctness defect.
Add aggregateRating to your LocalBusiness JSON-LD in app/layout.tsx. Use only real review data — fabricated values violate Google's structured data guidelines and can trigger manual actions.
"aggregateRating": {
"@type": "AggregateRating",
"ratingValue": "4.8",
"bestRating": "5",
"reviewCount": "127"
}
If review counts are dynamic, pull them from your database at build time or via generateMetadata and inject the live values rather than hardcoding.
ID: marketing-local-seo.local-schema.review-schema
Severity: medium
What to look for: Check the LocalBusiness JSON-LD for an aggregateRating property (with ratingValue and reviewCount) or a review property (array of Review objects). Also look for any testimonials or reviews component that renders review data — check if it uses structured data.
Pass criteria: Count all review/rating related properties in the LocalBusiness JSON-LD. The schema must include either aggregateRating with a valid ratingValue (numeric, 1-5 scale) and reviewCount (at least 1), or a review array with at least 1 Review object.
Fail criteria: No review or rating data in the LocalBusiness schema, even if the site has a testimonials section in its UI.
Skip (N/A) when: The project has no testimonials, reviews, or ratings anywhere in the codebase (no review components, no rating displays), or whole-audit N/A rule applies.
Detail on fail: "Site has testimonials/reviews in UI components but no aggregateRating or review property in LocalBusiness JSON-LD. Review stars will not appear in search results." or "No review or rating data found anywhere in the project"
Remediation: Add review data to your LocalBusiness JSON-LD in app/layout.tsx:
"aggregateRating": { "@type": "AggregateRating", "ratingValue": "4.8", "reviewCount": "127" }
Only include ratings you actually have -- fabricated ratings violate Google's structured data guidelines.