Domain rating

If you are in marketing, chances are that you use a DA checking tool to study and evaluate the results of your digital strategy, no matter if you call it domain authority, domain ranking, or website authority checker. What does this metric mean? Does a domain rating really make a difference in Google ranking? How to achieve a high DR?

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Templates using this KPI
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Integrations using this KPI

What is domain rating?

A domain rating is a metric developed to help predict how likely a domain, subdomain, or page is to rank in search engine result pages (SERP). This website ranking measure is determined on a logarithmic scale and the score ranges from 1 to 100, 1 being where all new websites start and move on up from there.

Although we don't know the exact algorithm of ahrefs' domain rating, it is calculated by looking at multiple important factors, including referring domain, linking root domains, and the total number of links, into a single DR score.

Whereas a website's domain rating measures the strength of a website there is also a DR score attributed to each web page, called page authority or page rank.

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How to calculate your domain rating

If you create your own algorithm, you can calculate your domain rating yourself, but that would be pretty time-consuming. Hopefully, many SEO tools are available. Moz, SEMrush, Ahrefs all have their own version of a domain authority checker tool so pick one and use that same one consistently. For each of these tools, you can find your full website's backlink profile with a number of backlinks, link profile, domain rating from these backlinks, etc.

What is a good domain rating score?

Domain rating scores range from 1 to 100. To determine if your domain authority score is good or not, compare it to your competitors' scores. If it's higher, you're doing well.

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What is a bad domain rating score?

If your domain rating is lower than your competitor's, it's your sign to optimize your website.

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Domain rating KPI examples & templates

Your domain authority can be (and should be) added to a few different reports.

See this KPI in action here!

See this KPI in action here!

SEO report template

Track all of your SEO metrics in this complete SEO strategy report template that is 100% customizable. Measure your digital marketing strategy with metrics like organic traffic, link profile, and root domain external links.

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Domain rating best practices

Here are some of the best practices you should keep in mind to increase your website's domain rating.

Build a high-quality backlink strategy

If you want a high authority website, you want to build a content marketing strategy as well as a link-building strategy. You want to have dofollow, high-quality links on high domain authority websites. Conduct keyword research, create high-quality content, write guest posts, and know how to take advantage of linking opportunities with high-dr websites.

Focus on search engine optimization

SEO basics can be a differential ranking factor in a site's DA score because the better user experience is, the more popular it becomes and the more inbound links it gets naturally. You should pay attention to your on-page seo, make sure it's mobile-friendly, and add internal links as they help your search engine ranking (google search).

Keep an eye on your competitors

Your competitors are the best indicator of your domain rating progress. Audit regularly your competitor's backlinks via your favorite SEO tool's link explorer. This can help identify websites that have linked back to similar content to yours. Stay away from no follow links, as these have less impact and of course shady or bad links.

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Domain Rating Synonyms

Although domain rating is widely used, there are multiple synonyms that can be used. Here are a few :

Domain authority score, Moz domain authority, Domain Rating score, Domain Authority (DA), Ahrefs Domain Rating, Authority score, SEMrush Authority Score, PageRank, Website Authority, Domain score, DA score, DR score