Are you looking to improve your website’s ranking on Google’s search results? You may have heard of “domain authority.” It is one of the methods to improve your SEO and is a positive ranking signal. Let’s discuss domain authority and how to improve it on your website.
What is a Website Domain Authority?
The Domain Authority (DA) score predicts a website’s ranking on search engine result pages (SERPs). It is a metric developed by Moz to predict the overall rating of your website. It is a comparative metric based on machine learning calculations. The scale is 1-100, with higher scores indicating higher chances of ranking up. It shows the relevance of your website for a specific topic or industry. It calculates a rank based on the strength of your domain. Similar to this, page authority ranks the ability of an individual page.
Let’s understand this with a simple example. A website domain ‘A’ appears more on Google than ‘B’ when someone types a query ‘Q.’ So, the rating of ‘A’ will be higher than ‘B.’ This rating is subject to fluctuation. It’s worth noting that achieving a score between 20 and 30 is comparatively easier while reaching a score between 70 and 80 can be challenging.
To increase your site rating, check your competitor’s website rating and try getting a score above it. Since any website’s domain authority ranking is relative, the rank itself does not mean anything. DA below 30 can generally be considered poor, 40-50 average, 60-70 very good, and above 80 excellent.
Domain authority is determined by several factors, such as:
- Quality of backlinks
- Quantity of backlinks
- Relevance to a specific search query
- Trustworthiness of website
- Linking root domain
Bear in mind that DA is not Google ranking Signal. However, it can help improve your website performance. Google does not use DA to rank your page or website. DA is Moz’s metric.
But don’t worry, if you don’t want to go through all this, we will take care of it on your behalf. You can hire Bespoke Digital Marketing Agency; we will cover the rest.
How to Calculate Your Website Domain Authority?
Factors that affect your DA are:
Link Profile: Ensure you have an adequate amount of internal and external links. If your external link refers to a website with a high DA and you get linked back by other trusted sites, you get a high score.
Root Domains: No. of unique backlinks matters. Try to diversify your links to various websites to get a higher ranking.
MozTrust: Moz checks the backlinks of the website for credibility. Your rating will be higher if your source is some government or reputed organization’s website.
MozRank: Moz counts no. of internal and external website links to a webpage and its quality.
Site Structure: The more accessible your webpage is for search engines to navigate, the better your chance of achieving a higher ranking.
User Friendly: A good UI will retain views and have more clicks. Ensure all information on your website is structured correctly and easy to understand.
How to Increase Your Website Domain Authority?
Below are a few tips that can help you to increase your DA ranking.
1. Quality Content:
High-quality content is one of the best ways to attract visitors to your page and generate organic traffic. Search engines aim to give users content that interests them. Well-written content enables you to rank high on Google and increase your visibility.
General content that people look for are:
- How/ When/ What/ Where – finding answers to their questions.
- A solution to a specific problem.
- Looking to purchase quality products.
- Get precise information on a particular topic.
Unique content written in bullet form is more readable than a paragraph. People skim through pages to know if the whole content is worth reading. Hence, ensure you add proper headlines and emphasis text, images, and video.
Writing content for each webpage can drain your energy and time. We at Bespoke Digital Marketing Agency understand the needs of our clients. Leave content writing and other hassle to us and focus on your product building.
2. Get High Authority Links:
Backlinks provide a massive boost to your domain authority ranking. According to a report published by Ahrefs, an SEO software suite, 55.24% of websites don’t get organic traffic because they do not have any backlinks. So, to enhance your website rating, you need high-quality backlinks. So, how can you do this?
- You can find the link to top referral sources and choose the one similar to your website topic.
- For WordPress users, MonsterInsights is an excellent choice to pick a link source for your website.
- You can look for the backlinks on your competitor’s website and refer to one of them.
For example, if your website’s DA is 30, referring a backlink to a website with DA 80 will increase your DA rating.
3. Remove Spam Links:
A bad link will do you more harm than good. Please don’t put links into your website to bluntly increase the number of links. Spam links may get penalties from Google. Ensure you audit your website occasionally and remove any faulty links. Also, don’t forget to improve your internal links. It will keep visitors engaged on your website. Internal links help Google’s crawler to go through your website while indexing.
How can you identify bad links? SEO tools will help identify toxic links. Please review the links on your website, determine which links are broken or are no longer active, and remove them.
When someone uses your link as a referral, Google sees it as an endorsement. This boosts your website’s traffic and DA rating too.
But what if you are not able to remove those links? In that case, you can disown those links using Google Search Console or Moz’s Link Explorer. Google’s crawler will not consider those links when indexing.
4. Get traffic-driven Links:
If you have good-quality content and high-quality backlinks, then they will boost your website’s organic traffic. However, they are useless if your high-quality link has no organic traffic source.
So, don’t forget to check the traffic of those links you refer to. When you consistently have a certain amount of organic traffic every month, it aids your DA ranking.
5. Enhance UI/UX & Optimize SEO:
A reasonably well-structured website with a clean user interface helps readers navigate the content smoothly. So, how can you structure your website?
First, you can create a sitemap using WordPress. A sitemap is like a tree structure showing the whole website’s order or hierarchy. Ensure your website is responsive, which means it can adjust to fit the device it is viewed on. Avoid heavy graphics and delayed loading time. An average user will wait for your page to load only for about 3 seconds on mobile before hitting the back button.
For SEOs, ensure the following:
- On-page optimization
- Well-structured URLs
- Meta-description
- Better Title and Headers
- Relevant keywords in the content
- Optimize image alt tag
Promote your top page and its content, and keep a check on the status of your home page.
6. Get Social Media Engagement:
Embrace your presence on various social media platforms. This will assist you in enhancing your visibility and expanding your audience reach. Engage with followers by joining discussions and replying to comments to build credibility.
If you have a product to sell, you can collaborate with influencers and reach a wider audience. Don’t get exhausted if results are not showing up immediately. Building DA is a long-term process. Maintaining your focus on creating top-notch content, improving your website, and connecting with your audience is essential.
These efforts will help you build a loyal following and keep your visitors returning for more. Stay the course and keep striving for excellence. This will gradually increase your website domain authority ranking with time.
As a Bespoke Digital Marketing Agency, we offer worry-free DA outsourcing services. We understand that your time is your most valuable asset, and you would prefer to focus your efforts on other creative tasks.
