It could be challenging to understand how the search engine result page rank-ability of your website compares to that of your competitors. Thankfully, a solution exists in the form of Domain Authority, courtesy of our partners at Moz (DA).

What is Domain Authority?

Domain Authority (DA) is not a ranking factor that Google takes into account when deciding how to rank your website, it should be highlighted from the outset. However, Domain Authority may be a helpful metric to show how your website compares against competitors.

According to Moz, the Domain Authority (DA) statistic was developed to help estimate how likely it is for a website to rank in search engine result pages.

A better possibility of your website ranking highly on the SERP is indicated by higher ratings. Scores range from 1 to 100.

Moz calculates Domain Authority using information from its Link Explorer web index tool and predictive machine learning modeling to provide an overall score.

Even though all of these data elements are unknown, Moz has said that high authority backlinks and overall SEO website health (on page optimizations, metadata optimizations, technical SEO enhancements) have a positive impact on Domain Authority.

Moz is no longer the only tool in use today that evaluates potential rankability based on these kinds of parameters.

For example, SEMrush also provides an Authority that bases its rating on similar data (such as the quantity and quality of referring domains and keyword ranks).

In addition, Ahrefs provides a tool of its own to assess the authority of your website using information from sites like SEMrush and Moz.

What is a high domain authority score?

Although Domain Authority is not taken into account in Google’s ranking algorithm, it may still be a helpful third-party indicator of how your website compares to the competition.

Websites with higher scores (1-100) will clearly have greater ranking indicators than those with lower scores. However, you may get a fair idea of how well your website is doing by comparing it to those of your competitors.

It’s important to investigate your major competitors, determine the industry average for domain authority, and go ahead from there because of the diversity of links that each website receives as well as the authority and accessibility of the referring sites.

For instance, if your industry and competitors get backlinks from reputable websites like Forbes, Business Insider, Wikipedia, universities, or governmental organizations, the baseline domain authority would likely be rather high.

However, industries unrelated to these types of domains (such as restaurants, small businesses, etc.) may search for backlinks that are more relevant to their personas regardless of their Domain Authority, resulting in lower scores throughout the industry and reducing the “industry baseline”.

How can you raise your domain authority?

Your website’s domain authority should be raised over the long run by gaining backlinks from trustworthy websites that are of high quality.

If you want to truly raise your domain authority, you should focus on getting referring domain links rather than merely numerous links from the same domain.

Focus on relevance

Obtaining backlinks is much easier when your content is of excellent quality and relevant to the websites you are contacting.

Additionally, the higher the quality of your content, the more chances you’ll have to build genuine relationships with other websites that link to it.

Look at your link profile

You should also periodically evaluate your backlinks to make sure that only highly valuable connections are being indexed.

If you find that you are gaining backlinks that may be negatively affecting your overall score, use tools like Google Search Console to stop these connections from degrading the trust of your content and site as a whole.

Be wary of your competitors

Last but not least, be sure to look at your competitors’ backlinks since you can uncover websites that have previously linked to content that is similar to yours and might be more willing to connect to your content.

Takeaway

Moz creates a domain authority rating on a range of 0-100. The connection network has the greatest influence on the DA. Check your website often and fix any broken links.

This article provides a basic overview of domain authority. Please post your inquiries in the comments area below if you want more clarification or have any other queries. We will be delighted than anything if we can help you.