Raising Domain Authority

[rswhtn]

Hi everyone, I'm looking to find out if there are any tried and tested ways to raise DA.

We have regular articles, a good backlink profile, we post regularly to social media, but we seem to be stuck at DA27.

One of our competitors who has no real backlinks, only backlinks from citations and no social media posts has a DA of 31 which we find quite confusing.

Thanks in advance!

[donsilvernail]

DA is not just based on backlinks but the quality of backlinks. Also the longevity of the domain plays apart in authority. So if your competitor has been around awhile and has a few backlinks from high quality websites then he very well could have a higher DA then you. Maybe their backlink profile can shed some light on some backlinks you might try to obtain.

Thanks,

Don Silvernail

[nhhernandez]

If your current backlinks also average DA 20-30, that may be preventing your site to go any higher. Try obtaining links that are in the DA 40-50 range or higher. Having those quality sites consistently linking back to you should move the needle up.

[rswhtn]

Thanks for the replies! That all makes sense, and certainly Nikki we will work on getting links which are of a higher DA. A lot of our links have been from sites which have similar DAs to us, so getting links from higher authority websites is certainly something for us to try where possible.

[Dr-Pete]

First, let me say something that may sound strange coming from a Moz employee. Don't try to raise DA. DA is a proxy for your link authority, and if you get obsessed with trying to raise that score alone, you may find yourself link-building in artificial ways. This isn't unique to Moz -- I'd say the same thing about raising toolbar PR in the old days.

In a broader, conceptual sense, DA attempts to measure your overall authority. Ultimately, this is a product of PA and means getting high-quality links to a variety of pages (ideally). From a pure DA perspective, that means links from high-DA domains and a diversity of domains (not thousands of links from a handful of sites). From a broader perspective -- which DA doesn't measure -- pursuerelevant links that will drive traffic and produce value.

So "How do you raise domain authority?" really becomes "How do you build high-quality links?" and that's a tremendously difficult question to answer. Or, maybe better to say that the answer isn't one most people want to hear, because it's going to require a lot of time, energy, and probably money.

I will add this -- don't get tunnel-vision on links from super-high-DA sites. Not every link has to be from the New York Times. Links from low DA sites that are relevant and legitimate are perfectly fine. Plus, it's going to be much easier to approach these sites and build relationships with them, especially in your own industry. Find the sites that would naturally want to link to you, because you offer something of value to them. They don't have to be mega-sites that dominate the web.