Domain Authority: What Is It and How Do I Boost It?
Date: October 18, 2022
What Is Domain Authority?
Domain Authority (DA) is a search engine ranking score developed by Moz that predicts how likely a website is to rank in search engine result pages (SERPs). Domain Authority scores range from 1 to 100, with higher scores corresponding to a greater likelihood of ranking.
Domain Authority is based on data from Moz’s Link Explorer web index and uses dozens of factors in its calculations. The actual Domain Authority calculation itself uses a machine learning model to predictively find a “best fit” algorithm that most closely correlates link data with rankings across thousands of actual search results that are used as standards to scale against.
Domain Authority is calculated by evaluating multiple factors, including linking root domains and a total number of links, into a single DA score. This score can then be used when comparing websites or tracking the “ranking strength” of a website over time.
The Importance Of Domain Authority
Domain authority is the most accurate representation of the search results landscape and a key to understanding why certain websites rank higher than others. Higher DA sites perform better than lower DA sites. As a result, there’s a direct correlation between high DA scores and higher rankings.
How To Improve Domain Authority
The best way to influence the Domain Authority metric is to improve your site’s overall SEO health, with a particular focus on the quality and quantity of external links pointing to your site. Here are a few tips that can help increase your domain authority score.
Pick a good domain name. If you are starting at the very beginning, it is essential to choose a good domain name that is relevant to your website: the clearer and more simple, the better.
Optimize your on-page content. SEO isn’t just for Google search engine ranking, it also affects your Domain Authority. Ensure that your page is fully optimized including your title tags, meta descriptions, image alt tags, and content.
Create linkable content. Be that thought leader in your industry. Create high-quality content that is published regularly, so that it is more likely to be linked to from other sites. This will help you earn those high-quality links from multiple domains that are essential factors.
Improve your internal linking structure. Internal linking is just as important as external links. Internal links help to direct visitors to different parts of your website. Having an easily accessible internal link will help with their user journey. Internal links help keep visitors on-site and engaged for a longer time.
Remove toxic and bad links. You should be doing an audit of your website every once in a while and search for any backlinks that are bad or toxic. It is important to do this because you could potentially remove links from bad sources that could end up hurting your domain authority instead of helping it.
Make sure that your website is mobile-friendly. In 2022, most users are accessing websites and search results on mobile devices.
Traditional websites, even those developed a few years ago, were not commonly formatted for mobile display, and do not render well on today’s modern devices. While some industries have been quick to respond by transitioning their company websites to mobile-friendly formats, many decision-makers are still not aware that this is an important issue that can affect the bottom line of their businesses.
With more visitors accessing your company website on mobile devices, it is important to make sure that all of your visitors have a positive experience, regardless of what type of device they’re using to get there. If your website takes too long to download or is not easy to use on a mobile device, they may move along to a competitor.
Ultimately, the better an experience you can provide for your mobile visitors, the better the chance they will convert into new business. You never know where or when your target visitor will arrive on your site, so it is important that your website is ready to work on any device they may be using, wherever they may be.
Improve your website speed. Very few people have the patience to sit and wait for a website to load. Having a website that loads slowly can have a horrible effect on your bounce rate.
Become an authority within your industry. By boosting your reputation as an authority, you will strengthen your brand identity. Not only will this help increase traffic, but it will help to increase the number of external links. Create great content and engage with your followers!
Promote your content via social media. As mentioned above, social signals are one of the important key factors in your DA score. Make sure you are promoting your content on social media in order to obtain those signals.
Key Takeaways
In essence, don’t neglect your Domain Authority! DA is important because it allows you to take a look at the overall performance of your website and it lets you compare the score to competing sites to see where you stand against competitors and others in your field. Need help improving your Domain Authority score? 9Sail can help! Start by contacting us today for a free website audit.
