Engineering Copywriter Blog

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November 27, 2024

What is Domain Authority and Why Does it Matter for an Engineering Blog?

Estimated reading time: 10 minutes

There are many terms thrown around in the world of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and content marketing that aren’t always easy to understand.

One of these is domain authority (DA), a concept initially developed by Moz to help predict how well a site will rank in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). The idea has since been generalized, and you’ll find that a variety of analytical tools give DA or DR (domain rating) scores.

But what exactly does this mean and why does it even matter?

What is domain authority?

To put it very simply, domain authority is a score given to a website to rank how authoritative it is.

The scale ranges from 0 – 100, and the higher a website’s domain authority, the more reputable it is in the eyes of search engine bots. More authoritative sites are generally more highly valued by Google, so pages with high DA scores tend to rank higher in the SERPs.

domain authority score measured for website
Image Source: Moz

Very high-DA domains include pages like Wikipedia, with a DA of 97*, and TIME Magazine, with a DA of 94*. Other domains that tend to have very high DA ratings include popular newspapers and magazines, journals, and social media pages. Facebook, for example, has a DA of 96* (*DA scores fluctuate, so these are the Moz-checked DA rankings at the time of writing).

Search engines generally consider websites with a weaker domain authority less authoritative, so it’s more difficult to rank highly in the SERPs with a low-DA site.

If you establish a brand-new website, you’ll likely start with a DA score of 0, which doesn’t seem very authoritative or trustworthy, so Google is unlikely to rank you well. And, of course, why should the algorithm rank a page that’s just been established over well-established, highly authoritative pages?

This makes sense, of course, but it also presents new website owners with a problem. If they want their page to rank higher on Google, developing domain authority is paramount. In fact, it’s a critical piece of your SEO strategy.

To illustrate this with an example, let’s introduce Mark, a senior marketing manager at an engineering solutions company. Since he’s been in the game for a while, Mark knows how important DA is. But he also knows that you’ve got to start somewhere, so he goes ahead to buy a new domain – let’s call it Example Engineering Solutions. This baby domain has nothing on it yet, and a perfectly-useless DA of 0.

So how can Mark increase his DA score?

To work on that, you first have to understand how DA scores are calculated.

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How is domain authority measured?

Basic on-page SEO elements play a small role in calculating DA scores, so the first step Mark needs to take is to set up his website correctly and optimize it with basic SEO.

This may bring his DA score up to 5 or 6, if he does a phenomenal job of optimizing his site and introducing fantastic content.

That’s a start, at least, but it won’t get him competing with the likes of Wikipedia. Of course, it’s important to remember that while DA scores aren’t industry-specific, the competition you’re seeing as a result of it is.

So if, for example, Mark is competing with other engineering businesses that have no website at all, he’s already winning. But if he’s competing with other engineering businesses that have websites with DA scores of 80+, he’s in trouble. Most “average” websites score between 30 and 60, so that’s a good minimum to aim for.

domain authority scale for guide
Image Souce: iTech

One of the prime ways DA is measured is through a site’s backlink profile. Backlinks are simply links directing from other websites to your site.

The more sites that link to you, the higher your domain authority will be.

But there are a number of specifics that come into play:

  • – The total number of inbound links (i.e. links that direct to your page)
  • – The quality of the linking pages (i.e. a link from a high-authority page will count for more than a link from a spam site)
  • – The topical relevance of the linking page (i.e. how relevant the content on the linking page is to your page)

This suggests that if Mark wants to increase the DA score of his site by focusing on a backlinking campaign, he needs to focus on getting a number of backlinks from high-quality websites that are also in the engineering field, or at least those covering engineering or adjacent topics.

If a page with higher authority links to yours, it’s more likely to generate higher DA scores for you. But the topical relevance is important. A technology firm, for example, might look for links in engineering publications, companies, technical articles, or industrial websites.

This is because those backlinks have more topical authority and would be more relevant to the site in question, even if they might not have the highest domain authority score overall.

So how can Mark get these backlinks?

How to increase your domain authority

As we’ve seen, you can do some basics like ensuring optimized on-page and technical SEO and creating high-quality content. Building a social media presence also helps.

But the real trick is a successful backlinking strategy.

Generally, the better the content on your site, the more likely other sites are to connect to yours. This would be the natural strategy, and the way authority is traditionally established. Since Mark knows this, his prime goal is producing high-quality engineering content that other sites will naturally want to link to.

You can also begin guest posting for other pages and including links back to your site, either in your author bio or within the post itself.

If you’re working on something very newsworthy, you can even approach magazines or PR agencies to get your company interviewed or profiled, which will likely result in a backlink.

It’s important, though, to focus on do-follow backlinks.

Links can either be classified as do-follow, which means that Google is “allowed” to follow that link and therefore read where it goes, or no-follow, which means Google is prohibited from following that link and cannot read where it goes.

In order for value to pass from one site to another, the link that directs from one to the other has to be a do-follow link.

People linking to your site with do-follow links signals to search agencies as well as other SEO tools like Moz, Ahrefs, and SEMrush that your domain is reliable.

difference between nofollow vs dofollow link domain authority
Image Source: Sanjay Shenoy

Here are some tips to consider while you’re working on your domain authority and backlinking strategies:

  1. A handful of quality backlinks with topical authority are much better than dozens of irrelevant links. This is particularly true at the moment, where spam behavior is penalized by Google.
  2. In order to gain traction from backlinks, it’s important that backlinks possess the do-follow attribute.
  3. Focus on producing high-quality content or pillar content that naturally increases the chances other sites will link to yours.
  4. Run a competitor analysis and see who links to your competitors. This may give you some inspiration of who you could approach for possible links, guest posts, or company profiles.
  5. Volunteer to write guest posts for other sites, ensuring you include a link back to your site either within the content or in your author bio.

It takes time and patience to increase your domain authority – this is definitely a long-term project, and you should really play the slow game.

Avoid buying backlinks or engaging in black hat SEO techniques, as you’re likely to be penalized by Google.

If Mark continues his long-term linking strategy, he’ll eventually achieve higher DA scores, which will allow his engineering blog to rank more highly in the SERPs, leading to higher website traffic numbers and more opportunities to create leads and grow the company.

Start improving your domain authority today

Even though domain authority isn’t directly related to SEO, it’s a good predictor of how you will rank in search results.

Our team at Engineering Copywriter can help you create expert engineering content that can attract natural and authoritative backlinks, leading to higher DA scores. Get in touch today.

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Domain Authority FAQs

Does social media activity influence domain authority?

Social media doesn’t directly influence DA scores, but it can help by driving extra traffic and creating brand awareness, which increases the likelihood of earning backlinks from other sites.

Why do backlinks from high-DA sites matter more?

If a high-DA site links to your site, search engines often read this as an endorsement that your content is valuable and trustworthy. Since the algorithm already trusts the high-DA site, it’s more likely to then trust your site as well.

What is link juice?

Link juice is a popular term referring to the authority or value passing from one web page to another through hyperlinks. So if a high-DA website with a lot of traffic links to your smaller website, some of that “link juice” will flow from the more authoritative site to yours, lifting your site up in the process.

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