How To Improve Domain Authority For Your Website

Written in partnership with Alisha Shibli of Radix

Domain Authority (DA) is a predictive ranking metric developed by Moz and something that businesses often refer to when building their website’s SEO portfolio.

Your domain authority is a way to gauge your SEO progress as well as compare it to your competitor’s websites. The higher your domain authority, the better your chances of ranking higher in search results and attracting quality web traffic.

Some key facts about domain authority:

• Domain authority is dependent on multiple factors—one of them being the number of backlinks that are pointing to your websites and the DA of those websites.
• Achieving the domain authority of 100 is extremely difficult. Websites such as Google, Wikipedia, and Facebook have a DA of 100. So, don’t be disappointed if you don’t reach that number.
• You cannot directly influence your website’s domain authority. You can, however, work towards improving that number.

What is ‘good’ domain authority and how is it scored?

Domain authority is scored out of 100 with 1 being the lowest and 100 being the highest you can achieve. It’s easier to grow your website from a score of 20 to 30 but taking it from 70 to 80 can be a bit of a struggle.

According to Moz, websites with high-quality backlinks are at the very top of the domain authority scale. However, websites that are new or don’t have enough backlinks tend to score much lower. New websites always start with a domain authority score of 1.

Pro tip: You can download the MozBar extension to see the domain authority of any website from your browser.

Ways to improve the domain authority of your startup’s website

1. Choose a great domain name

If you’re a new business, then pick a domain name that is relevant to what your industry. Random words in the domain name do not communicate anything to your visitors. Register a domain name that is meaningful on its own.

A good way to do this is to make use of new domain extensions such as .TECH, .STORE, .SITE, .ONLINE, .SPACE, etc. They enable you to have a domain name that is short, memorable, and relevant. For example, companyname.com could be anything but companyname.store will most likely be an eCommerce store.

A good domain name helps the user create an association with your website. Not only that, but it also helps you get on-topic backlinks. For example, think the URL digitalclass.online/content getting backlinked to the anchor text ‘digital content classes online’. This helps you with your SEO and in turn helps increase your domain authority.

Search for your perfect domain name here.

2. Create high-quality, linkable content

Your content has a direct and significant impact on your domain authority.

In order to increase your DA score, you must create value-driven content that encourages other blogs and websites to backlink to you. Create content that people can use such as case studies, statistics based on marketing research, infographics, detailed 10,000-word guides, and more.

Content drives business. It’s at the core of any marketing and regularly pushing out good content can improve your search rankings and your domain authority.

3. Improve your on-page SEO

On-page SEO is a great method of optimizing your website. It plays a crucial role in improving your website’s domain authority. On-page SEO includes working on certain technical factors such as page titles, keyword placement, meta tags, keyword density, and more.

Here’s a simple checklist that will help you improve your On-page SEO:

• Target keyword – before crafting the content, choose a target keyword for the post—the topic around which you will write the article. Use this keyword in the title and in the first paragraph of your content.
• Headings – Use heading tags (H1, H2, H3) to share important points. Try to include the target keyword in at least two headings.
• Keyword density – Avoid overusing the keyword. That’ll only make your content come across as a scam. Try to keep the density between 1-2%.
• Permalink structure – Include your target keyword in the permalink structure. This is where having a domain name on a new domain extension helps. For example, digitalnews.online/content-marketing.
• Image optimization – Write Alt Text for images in your post with your target keyword.
• Meta description – Fill out the meta description explaining what the post is about. Make sure to include your target keyword.

Ensuring your website pages are optimized for SEO is essential if you want them to increase your domain authority.

4. Enhance your internal linking structure

Websites get so caught up in scoring external links to their blogs that they miss out on the significance of internal links. Internal links direct visitors to resources within your website that are related to the topic, improving their experience.

For example, when explaining a technical term, you could backlink that term to an article on your website that explains what it means. Or, you could add a list of ‘suggested articles’ and list down articles that are in the periphery of your current topic; in case the readers would like to read more about a particular topic.

Internal links help prevent the visitors from leaving your website and increases the time spent on your website. They also make it easier for search engines to index your entire site.

5. Become an authority within your niche

This is entirely about owning your niche in your industry. The way to do it is to create high-quality, value-driven content and engaging with your followers and consumers on social media in a meaningful manner.

By boosting your reputation as an authority, you’ll strengthen the position of your brand. Not only does this help you in web traffic, but it also gradually increases the number of external links you earn from other high-quality sources.

Another great way to further enhance your authority is to write guest blogs on other top-quality websites that are relevant to your industry.

Conclusion

Domain authority is important for multiple reasons. It allows you to judge the overall performance of your website and tells you how you compare to your competitors.

Use this checklist to ensure you’ve covered all bases when it comes to improving your website’s DA:

• Get a good domain name that’s relevant to your website.
• Create high-quality, value-driven content that people can link to.
• Optimize your on-page SEO including your target keyword, meta description, heading, etc.
• Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly.
• Become an expert within your niche.