Only showing googlebot schema.org tagged content - cloaking??

[Sebes]

Would it be considered cloaking if I only show schema.or tagged content to searchengine bots and not to regular visitors. Mind you, no other change on the page, design or content. So instead of

Googlebot would be served:

41 Main Street

Regular visitors:

41 Main Street

[RyanKent]

Cloaking is defined by Google as "presenting different content to users and search engines".

I recall Matt Cutts offering a geo-targeting example to further explain this issue. It's ok to show users in Canada some content, and then users from the US different content. It is not ok (i.e. would be considered cloaking) to set it up to always show Google bot the US version.

Google wants you to treat their bot as a normal user and not make any special changes for them. In your case, you are specifically showing Google bot something different then regular users, so yes it is considered cloaking.

The two points to make in the case you brought up are:

• you are not altering "content", you are altering meta tags which the users do not see anyway and do not impact the user experience

• there is no malicious intent. You are not doing this to deceive users or Google.

In short, yes it meets the definition of cloaking. Google specifically says offering "different" content represents cloaking. Even though you are showing "more" content, that would be a difference. If you didn't show users an H1 tagged title at the top of your page, but you showed it to Google, that would be an example where you are showing more to Google and would definitely be cloaking.

My biggest concern would be Google's automated system detecting it as cloaking then removing your pages or site from the index. You would then explain your actions through the Reconsideration Request and then Google would either accept your explanation or require a change.

[Sebes]

Quiet the contrary..it is certainly a somewhat theoretical question and has nothing to do with css or coding.
One reason is to get an opinion on what is considered cloaking, another reason is a to assess whether giving out more information (such as microtagged content) would be detrimental not to your rankings but to your whole business.

[RyanKent]

Why would you consider making such a change? I cannot conceive of any logical reason. The meta data involved is not seen by users.

If I was to stretch for a reason, it would be that you are not familiar with website coding and are having CSS issues?

[NFI]

Hi Sebes, I don't think this will be too much of a problem. Google will crack down hard on cloaking that will actually benefit your website, although sometimes you can do it by accident. This is adding no value to your website and I wouldnt worry about it too much. Always try to make your website the same for crawler + visitors it goes without saying.