What is Domain Authority?
Domain Authority Background
Google founder Larry Page developed an algorithm called PageRank.
PageRank is a measurement of the number of links to a website but also their perceived quality.
This gave an ‘authority’ measurement for a website and allowed for a method to determine and sort which websites were of a higher quality than others and should therefore rank higher in the Google search results.
The logic being that a website with a higher number and quality of incoming links will have a higher PageRank and ultimately will perform better in the search engine results pages (SERPS).
PageRank was for a long time a useful quality measurement of a website and the PR Score of a website was often touted as an indicator of its value.
It has now decreased in use as Google no longer publishes regular updates to PR Score and arguably it is used only as an internal metric for the company.
Domain Authority
Domain Authority is a metric that was created by Moz and in many ways works the same way a PageRank did.
The higher the score the better.
It is important to note that it is not used by Google.
It does not have a direct effect on SERPS but it is a good indicator of a websites ability or likelihood to rank.
It looks at a variety of factors to establish the quality of a domain including:-
- Quality and number of links
- Quality and number of outgoing links
- The age of the Domain Name
- PageRank
- Range of Links and Diversity
- Range of Links over time
Current usage of Domain Authority
Arguably Domain Authority is a more useful metric to use than PageRank as being more readily available and current, it allows comparisons between websites.
Domain Authority is kept up to date whilst PageRank has fallen in usage – so although Google does not use it – it does give insight.
Many SEO tools and websites use Domain Authority and it is now a well established metric for those involved in Digital Marketing.
Checking Domain Authority of competitor websites gives a good indicator of how well a website is likely to rank in relation to its competitors.
What is a good Domain Authority score?
Websites that score highly and that are well-trusted include bbc.co.uk (96), google.co.uk (94) and amazon.co.uk (94)
It is interesting to note that they do not score a perfect 100.
This is because the score is a comparison figure and gives a good indicator of how your website is likely to perform in search results compared to your competitors.
Comparing Domain Authority Scores
If your competitors are all scoring in the 40s and your website scores 60, then your score is very good and you should outrank them.
Similarly, if your score is in the 30s and your competitors all score 60+ then you have work to do to improve your SEO ranking.
How can I improve my website’s Domain Authority
There is a lot that can be done to improve Domain Authority.
You should remember that it is easier to improve a score from 30 to 40 than it is to improve a score from 70 to 80.
It is also very difficult to obtain a score of 90+ as these businesses tend to be huge multinationals or organisations (e.g. Wikipedia) which have thousands if not millions of backlinks.
As part of an SEO Strategy here are 10 great ideas to boost your Domain Authority.
10 Great ideas to boost your website’s domain authority,
- Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly
- Review the internal linking of your website
- Create high-quality content that visitors will want to share.
- Optimise the content on your web pages
- Remove bad links to your website
- Establish your authority in your market
- Speed up your website
- Promote your content on Social Media
- Review your core web vitals
- Make sure your website is secure (i.e all pages load as ‘https’ and not ‘http’
Top 100 car dealers in the UK ranked by Domain Authority
The following is a table that shows the top 100 car dealers in the UK and their Domain Authority Scores.
There is clearly a wide range between each website’s scores and this has an impact on how they would likely perform against each other in search results.
Arnold Clark’s website has a Domain Authority score of 59 and whilst this is not a very high score – it is high in relation to competitors in the table.
All things being equal the Arnold Clark website is more likely to perform better in the search results (as a consequence of its higher Domain Authority score) than its competitors who score much lower.
Only the top 7 have achieved a score of 50 or above.
Monitoring your website (and your competitors) Domain Authority score and working to improve it will help drive more conversions of your website visitors into paying customers.
The table can be sorted by Car Dealer Group or Domain Authority score.
Top 100 Car Dealer Groups by Domain Authority (DA)
Conclusion
All things being equal, a website with a higher domain authority will rank higher in the search engine results than a lower one.
It is therefore essential that you track your own website’s score and your competitors – and work to improve your score.
Questions about Domain Authority?
Get in touch if you have any questions about the content of this article, Domain Authority or your website’s performance in search.