Is ranking power mainly a matter of links?

[AndyKubrin]

Hey all. SEO noob here, trying to check my understanding.

In competitive analysis, is ranking power at the domain level really all about DA? And is DA basically a count of unique inbound follow links, modulated by the authority of the referring source and spam scores?

In other words, is ranking power basically a function of DA and PA?

I realize on-page and technical factors can also play a role, but authority seems to be key.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

[vidi34234]

For the most part, yes. There aren't a lot of other signals that can put trust in your article. There could be signals like how many people searched for your site and then went to that like without going back to search etc., but links still matter a lot. I'd go on a limb to say it is the most important factor.

• V

[AndyKubrin]

Hey, thanks V!

[LoganRay]

You should read Google's Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines. This document includes details of what they call E-A-T (Expertise, Authority, Trustworthiness). It's a long read and relatively dry, but there is some really good material in there that will help you better understand how Google evaluates a page. DA and PA are much simpler metrics than what Google actually uses in their algorithm, they're meant to help you make decisions and gauge competition, but these numbers are not provided by or used by Google.

And for what it's worth, I've seen countless instances of sites with great content and no links outrank mediocre content with a decent link profile. As Google gets more advanced in their ability to understand the content (using NLP), searcher intent, and engagement signals, links become less and less important.

[HeinHaji]

there are many ranking factors. in affiliate on page+low kd+strong backlink+user experience these are the key factors for website ranking.

[asanawnra]

Yes and also in my observations, it is age, content, authority site of your domain site as well. Also if your domain is expired domain with good repute in google search or other engines. I recently created a site watersoftenerideas my i did all above things and all is on the pace.