Domain Authority (DA) contributes to your SERP.
This may be a new concept, but gone are the days when a website is ranked solely on page SEO. Domain Authority is more important than ever. Ineffective SEO may not be the reason why you’re not hitting those top spots like you were before. Instead, you may be suffering from a Google penalty that you’re unaware of. The cause of this could be your domain authority, used by search engines as a direct ranking factor. Although frustrating, you’re not alone. Many site owners and SEO optimisers face similar issues from time to time.
Domain Authority results check
We thought it prudent to undertake our research and testing on this matter. Firstly, Outhouse Media produced data corresponding to a unique term. We matched this phrase against search results and the SEO scores of those who ranked high on Google. In most cases, there was no obvious correlation between low and high SEO scores in comparison to site ranking positions. Small websites were outranking larger sites and low SEO-scoring sites were performing better than those with great SEO. This data, therefore, seemed to be at odds with general practices, and SEO rules, and completely random.
We knew, however, that there had to be some reason for this. All became abundantly clear as soon as we used a domain authority checker to track website positions. In every instance, DA scoring results directly correlated to ranking positions.
Off-site SEO
With the results in, it’s clear that domain authority and off-site SEO practices play an important role in website ranking positions. That is not to say that standard on-site SEO practices are any less crucial. It just means that external factors must be taken into consideration when trying to achieve optimum results.
Off-site SEO is based on a many factors. These could, in the short term, be beyond the reach of those trying to rectify issues. For example, domain age or backlinks to your site from reputable sources. Effective social media postings can play a part in combatting this, but only if done correctly.
Business owners, therefore, need to consider domain authority and external works if they are to gain the best results.
Further reading and useful links
Because we have only really scratched the surface of explaining the complexities of domain authority and the issues surrounding this, we are including this reference to Neil Patel. Here he offers great further reading and information on this subject, including how to improve your domain authority: