Domain authority, as the name suggests, is a measure of the potential of the website to get noticed in search engine rankings. It is a rating given to websites, on a scale of 0 to 100 and takes into account several metrics like Alexa Rank, Google Page Rank, the traffic flow to the site, backlinks generated by it and its comments.
According to seoMoz, authority numbers are high level metrics that attempt to answer the question “How strong are this page’s/site’s links in terms of helping them rank for queries in Google.com?”
A higher rating is indicative of a better domain authority.
How exactly is Domain Authority calculated?
The domain authority of a website is a collective measure of its performance on several fronts due to which it is not possible to lay down the exact procedure for calculating DA. In all, more than 150 factors and signals sent out by Google algorithm are taken into account before a website’s domain authority is calculated.
There are three main factors that influence DA. They are:
1. Domain age
In an age when thousands of websites are created every day, and an equal number of them die too because of various reasons, DA serves to indicate how trustworthy the website in question is.
Obviously, the older the website, the more will be its domain authority because search engines are more likely to repose their trust and faith in older websites.
2. Domain popularity
This is a comparison of inbound links to the website vis-à-vis its outbound links.
Inbound links to any website indicate that it contains useful and reliable information. Website owners, bloggers and SEO experts who know about link juice might be able to appreciate and understand the concept faster than those who are unaware of these terms.
The higher the ratio of inbound links to its outbound links, the greater will be its domain authority. Here it is important to point out that the quality of inbound links is as important as the quantity. It is essential to build ‘good’ links.
3. Domain size
The more the number of indexed pages on a website, the greater will be its DA. That is probably because a larger content base generates, more often than not, a larger number of inbound links to the website merely by virtue of its size.
So, the thumb rule is that if you are a website owner:
The older the domain, the higher the domain authority. The more the number of backlinks to your website, the higher your domain authority, and the more the content on your website, the higher will be your domain authority.
How can I influence my domain authority?
Though it would not be right to say that it is impossible to influence DA, doing so is not an easy task.
As described above, an old website with lots of content and back links would generate a higher DA.
But how can I push up the measure of my DA to improve my credibility?
These are a few things that a website owner or blogger can do to increase his DA:
1. Guest Blogging: Do lots of guest posts, because the links generated by guest posts are extremely valuable. Try to get at least 1 dofollow link per guest post, though most bloggers would be happy to offer 2 for quality content.
2. Blog Commenting: Comment heavily, preferably on the blogs in the same niche. Again, prefer to comment on blogs which give dofollow links for comments. Most SEO experts would suggest you to do at least 15 comments after each post. You can easily locate comment luv enabled blogs on the keywords of your choice by typing [comment luv + keyword] in the Google search bar.
For instance, if the main keyword for your last post was ‘Samsung galaxy S3’, you can find out other comment luv enabled blogs writing on the same keyword by typing [comment luv+ Samsung galaxy S3] in the google search bar.
3. Social Bookmarking: Do lots of social bookmarking. Learn how to use Social Networking & Bookmarking for Blog Promotion.
4. Forums: Participate actively in discussions at forums.
5. Article Directories: Submit articles to directories which give you 1-2 dofollow links per submission. Check the Importance of Article Directories in SEO.
6. Press Releases: Distributing press releases is also a good idea. Learn how to write a Good Press Release.
Now while generating enough links is essential, it is of utmost importance to see the QUALITY of links that you are creating. Generating irrelevant links or bad links could do you more harm than good.
Try to get links from authority domains to push up the level of your DA in a shorter period of time. This is because authority domains usually do not give too many back links!
Do not get links from porn sites or gambling sites. If you do so, your website/blog could get hit and pushed down in search engine rankings as well.
Though there is no doubting the fact that a website or blog with greater DA commands more respect, the fact is that most blogs are unable to cross the 50 notch barrier.
How to check your domain authority?
For as long as I have been blogging, I have been using moonsy.com to know my domain authority.
Visit Moonsy and at the bottom you’ll find a textbox to enter the Blog URL.
Enter your blog URL there, for example, to highlight the value of DA I’m entering a popular blog’s URL here.
As you can see, problogger.net is a blog with exceptionally high DA. And need we mention why? Go on, check out your domain authority!
Hi,
I am Linda, I own number of websites and I have hired people for SEO of all those sites, but Lately I myself learning something about technical stuff, which can help me handle my site son my own and latest i learned about Domain Authority and I have been working on it in past few months.
But despite having good internal Linking and god content, Most of my sites Domain Authority is around 15-20 which I think is not good, as I love to attract more advertisers and without having Good Domain Authority, it is tough to attract high paying advertisers.
So, what basically, I want to ask here, is there any way to increase Domain Authority quickly, I mean in 2-3 Months?
~ Linda
this is good informative post i did not know about DA before reading this post
Hello,
I have been trying hard to increase domain authority of my blog, but even after working for few months, I haven’t seen any improvements.
So, where I am going wrong? Does I need to create links in bulk to get high Domain Authority?
If yes, then How many links to need to get?
I am not sure what to do.
looking for quick response.
Great article. On the topic of domain age. Are there any simple things that a webmaster can do to “age faster”? I’ve read that securing longer leases and might help. I’m wondering if there is anything else worth taking a look at. Or is it a case of simple being patient and “Waiting until you grow up” before you can play with the big (old) boys?
Amazing tips to enhance the domain authority… The blog is really very informative… Keep sharing such outstanding blogs.
Improving Domain Authority is proving very difficult task for me, I was wondering how, Domain authority 40 can be achieved.
But recently getting help from many experts, so now I am focusing on tips which can increase DA,
Although, I have a question here, Will High DA means my ranking will be good? or it’s just a waste?
Regards,
Rubel
Great post Ambika. I have one health blog whose DA is not getting increased, I don’t know why? I write unique and quality articles on that and also doing social bookmarking. Yaa I have not tried guest posting and press release submission for that blog and I hope it will work.
Social Media is having a big effect on DA.
I should point out that this is one of the few articles about DA that I have stopped to read simply because your DA is so high (48).
Great article on domain authority. You told us that Domain Age, Domain Size and Backlinks influences this Domain Authority metrics. Is social signals also plays vital role for achieving higher domain authority?
Domain authority and page authority its good for search result .its
important now a days and quality content is all matters!
Informative guide for increasing domain authority of a blog. Domain authority is more important than page rank these days. Thanks for sharing effective tips.
Informative Post. Now i can improve my DA.Thanks
Another very good piece of information. DA is something all bloggers should be concerned about.
Thanks for a Wonderful share Ambika and HBB and Pradeep for publishing it.
I come to this post while searching the DA of my blog and it’s really less. I hope your tips will improve my BLOG DA to some good extent 🙂
I want to know how to determine which is good score of domain authority….can you suggest any range for good domain authority.
As a thumb rule, anything above 40 is considered good.
50 and above is commendable but difficult to get to.
Wow, Amazing post man, I really appreciate your content this article has really peaks my interest. all tips is very good & effective, Thanks for sharing.
I never managed to figure out how the size of the site can influence the DA. I had small sites with higher DA than the bigger sites, both in the same niche
Most of link buyer see the DA before they purchase link from any website. I also notice that a good DA website also have very good PR.
For my website as I do not do much linkbuilding, so I can not expect good DA for now.
My website is just 2 months old and having DA of 26 and page authority of 35. Is it okay to facilitate sponsored reviews on my site ?
I had no idea the size of a website actually contributed to the domain authority. Thanks so much for sharing!!
Thanks for appreciating!
Domain authority has become an important thing now a days , so we must concentrate on the best strategies to improve Domain Authority . Nice Information.Thanks
It is actually gaining more importance over PR now. That is because it gets updated more often than the PR which gets updated only a few times every year.
Great post. I am just learning of the importance of Domain Authority and how it impacts your website placement. I’ve personally benefited from some early exposure on CNNMoney and other sites that now have a high domain authority. I’ve been working with my clients with a local focus and telling them that getting links from their local news sources is a necessity for 2013. Ongoing, I’m we are encouraging them to make conscious content creation a part of their overall website maintenance plan. I’m glad to see the Google algorithms finally have some way to capture the quality of good traditional PR efforts.
impressive writing, now DA becomes an important part so to work on it. These are the best tips to follow.
I have found that it is relatively easy to achieve a da of 25+,but achieving day of 40+ is extremely dificult
Nice stuff. I just want to ask , Is no-follow links are counted in DA?
Other factors are quit clear to us.
thanks
Hi Ambika,
I use all these trend (Guest Blogging, Blog Commenting, Social Bookmarking, Forums & Press Releases) I believe these are valuable trend to increase domain authority.
Well, One of my new blog got DA 24 which is only 40 Days old only by Blog Commenting. I had made around 50-80 Comments till now but my comments are on high authority website whose da is 70+. We can easily get a decent DA with commenting.
you can also download seomoz toolbar to check DA of each blog you visit, and also PA
great article ambika…i never knew how to check my blog domain authority…its nice to learn how it gets calculated and what things we need to improve it! 🙂
Hey Ambika, guest blogging is a great way to influence domain authority but I think doing lots of it will be useful only if we do it on high PR blogs. So I instead prefer selecting just a couple of very high PR blogs to post on as it can increase my domain authority manifold rather that posting on a lot of low PR sites.
Ram
DA is very essential and we are missing it. Now it’s time to take deep focus on it.
After reading this, learnt about finding blogs with commentluv by searching the keyword with commentluv. Great trick ! Thanks 🙂
Is there any way to Check Domain authority (DA)of blogspot blogs like xyz.blogspot,com.
It is showing 95 for all blogspot blogs.
There is no way you can check the DA of blogspot blogs, as your blog or anyxyz.blogspot.com is a subdomain, I think the PA is unique for every blogspot blog. This is also applicable for wordpress.com blogs or blogs with any such platform. sorry to disappoint you.