Low Domain Authority & Ranking
-
My Domain Authority has tumbled in the last six months from 28 to 21.
Search traffic has dropped from about 4,500 per month to 3,000 per month with most of the drop being in the more competitive terms. Lead generation is off by about 70%.
This is after spending $12,000 on "optimization" with a MOZ recommended SEO firm and spending another $17,000 implementing their suggestions.
My real estate brokerage firm has completed some press worthy deals in the last month. If I can get these deals mentioned in a reputable newspaper like The New York Times (or other real estate publications like NY Observer, Real Estate Weekly) will this help domain authority?
If my domain authority is this low, how difficult is it to move it higher?
Before reaching out to these publications, should I create a blog post about these transactions on my website?
Any suggestions as to how I can improve domain authority? My URL is www.nyc-officespace-leader.com.
I should add that my SEO firm had about 30 toxic links removed and filed a disavow for about another 80 links. MOZ is only showing about 25 domains linking to our site. I suspect not enough to get us to rank.
Thanks, Alan
-
Hi Alan,
automation is generally bad. By linking through to other relevant pages using a variety of anchor text you give a google a warmer feeling about your site - avoiding over optimisation penalties.
Cross linking between pages. There's a lot on site link structure and what is optimum. I tend to ignore this and thing of my customers buying behaviour. So in your case If in real life you'd offer a couple of buildings to a client then link them on the website. If not, then don't.
For me social media is a waste of time. We're a B2B industrial market. See what brings traffic and conversions.
The end goal really is to produce something amazing - a labour of love. think of it as investing a dollar a day in the website. To start with nithing is going to change much. After a while compound interest is going to start giving you momentum and there will suddenly be a crux point where you realise how much of an advantage you have over your competitors. It'll take a while though.
-
Hi Bruce:
Thanks for taking the time to respond.
The link building thing is a bit challenging. I can add content, post social media, work with developers on the user interface, but the technical aspect of link building is beyond me.
If I post good content on the site and on social media will this take care of itself? If not, do you think I can outsource this to a service, or is that asking for trouble?
An SEO firm removed many links, now ranking and traffic are really poor. I suspect that the removal of links has caused this.
Best, Alan
-
Thanks for your most interesting response!!!
From what you are saying the greatest payoff will be in developing new content on an ongoing basis.
A few questions:
-I also have hundreds of product pages in the form of buildings and listings containing 50 and 300 words. Many of them don't have text links to other pages. You think I am best off just editing/adding a paragraph or so and inserting text links to other pages on the site? From your post I am unclear if you are adding the links in some sort of automated way. In any case, sounds less traumatic than a total re-write.
-Are you using posts on social media (Google+, Facebook, Twitter) to exclusively promote your site or are you engaging in any link building?
From what you are saying (as well as other opinions) I guess I need to stop thinking of gaming the system and more in terms of creating very useful content.
Alan
-
Hi Alan,
We're in a similar position. A site that had 12,000 views a month a year ago now has 6,000. There's lots of things that we are doing but one of them is rewriting that content.
It is mind numbingly boring writing fresh stuff about one almost identical product after another. So I've taken a few approaches to make it easier.
First; I don't rewrite pages. I'm treating all my pages with 2 - 300 words as introductions. So I go through and add a specific paragraph or a type of link. It's generally a job that can be done in a few hours for my 100 product pages and normally delivers 2 - 5 positions on SERPS. Then I leave it for a few weeks - burnt out with the effort. It also slowly adds more structure and makes pages increasingly valuable
Second; I spend time making new good content. It's fun, its fresh and I normally get an immediate dopamine buzz as I get some more traffic after posting it in a newsletter or on a social media site. Being rigorous in linking back to my product pages helps too,
Third; I do it by the numbers. I've looked at 7 years of search queries to my site (so lots of stuff before 'not provided') and matched that up with moz difficulty and google traffic estimates and current serps positions. So when I do spend time on a page I calibrate the amount of effort specifically to the potential payoff.
Finally - given that your pages are likely to be similar to mine - we both have competitors who have access to the same content and write similar stuff I continually look for an angle to differentiate my page. For you it may be - other companies in the building, famous people who worked there, closest Deli or starbucks. This I think works, still experimenting, because if I was google looking at a keyword space i would compare the top x pages to each other - say on word usage. The ones several SD from the mean in word variation count (all other factors being equal) are likley to be saying more interesting stuff.
-
YES, IT IS A LOT OF MONEY. $12,000 for reports, maybe $4,000 for wireframes and designs and another $11,000 for coding modifications.
I used to own a website that was struggling to maintain rank but generating enough leads to earn a good living. Now I can go feed the pigeons in Central Park. After this immense effort, following every suggestions, buying report after report, ranking is down, traffic is down, lead generation is non existent.
I would be generous if I described this so called SEO company as charlatans, imposters and clowns. When the real drop occurred after their Voodoo last spring, and I had the temerity to complain, they could only respond that I had not spent enough money and that there had been a recent Penguin update (the drop in traffic was a gradual slope occurring since they started their "magic" and did not correspond with the May 20th algorithym update. But I guess I have no recourse against these criminals. They got the maximum advertising budget out of me, collapsed my business and can now move onto their next victim.
Now, back to my original question, how I build links to worthy content? The number of sites linking to us is so low that if that number can be increased somewhat perhaps it will have a tangible effect.
Thanks, Alan
-
Hi Alan
I think you need to think about two different contexts here.
1: Google crawls fresh and unique content often. Static not fresh content is not crawled that often, Google gets to know how often to crawl your site based on how often fresh content appears. You can only make this happen by adding new unique keyword rich information.
2: Domain authoritiy and Page Rank are not the start of a good site but an outcome metric. There are no quick fixes to build a quality site.
Pick your most important pages and start there. Once Google crawls more often and finds good content and you see a rise in impressions, you are on your way on a long journey...
Think also about your site from another users perspective, does it look appealing, is the content relevant to me, is the information well presented etc.
Building links: There is a great blog here on Moz about building quality relevent links. Follow it and plan time to do this
Hope that helps
Bruce
-
Hi Bruce:
Also, I have found that pages that I have re-written, that provide quite useful information do not attract links (such as http://www.nyc-officespace-leader.com/blog/how-long-does-leasing-process-take).
How can I go about attracting links for such pages?
Is it far to say that since the site has so few links, that attracting a few quality links should have a noticeable effect on Domain Rank?
Thanks, Alan
-
Hi Bruce:
Thanks for the response. Our bounce rate has held steady in the 68-72% range in the last year. So has the click thru rate, ranging between 2.59 and 2.31 per visit.
Our site consists of the following types of pages
-330 Listing pages. 200 are set to no-index, follow. Only about 50 have more than 300 words.
-150 Building pages. About 140 have about 250-300 words.
-35 Blog pages. Only four entries written this year.
-Another 60-75 static pages (neighborhood, types of space, about us, services).How much of this do we need to rewrite to get an improvement in Domain Authority? Obviously re-writing hundreds of pages is a huge task.
Also, once these pages are promoted do we need to promote them to get links? Or will those links develop naturally if the content is of high quality?
Am I correct in assuming that a site with a Domain Authority of 21 is not going to have the potential to rank well? Being that the Domain Authority is pretty bad, how difficult would it be to get it back to say 30-33?
Thanks, Alan
-
Hi Alan
Sounds like a bit of a headache. First things first...don't assume all drops etc are negative. Often big drops in search via good SEO are a sign that you might be serviing better content and this must be also compared to other metrics like bounce rates etc.
Domain rank drops can also mean that sites which are also high ranking have been removed, because their links where not related to your content and therefore in the longer term, could be damaging. Remember links should be from sites which are somehow related to your site. Google is striving for better service delivery to all searchers and therefore does not want links from a site selling widgets to be linking to sites selling cakes, unless the widget is something to do with cakes.
Press coverage, tends to have no-follow links and therefore check out the value of a link before spending time trying to get the link.
Domain Authority comes from quality linked content and therefore high ranking links in your industry sector should be sought. Links are like roots, tiny capillary fibres that grow to big anchor roots in time.
Improve your content and make it fresh. This will do wonders for natural links and google serving up your site. Track keywords and distil the essence of your site pages to ensure that not one hit is wasted. I could be wrong but Google also monitors BOUNCE RATE.
Hope that helps somewhat
Bruce
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Cleaning up a Spammy Domain VS Starting Fresh with a New Domain
Hi- Can you give me your opinion please... if you look at murrayroofing.com and see the high SPAM score- and the fact that our domain has been put on some spammy sites over the years- Is it better and faster to place higher in google SERP if we create a fresh new domain? My theory is we will spin our wheels trying to get unlisted from alot of those spammy linking sites. And that it would be faster to see results using a fresh new domain rather than trying to clean up the current spammy doamin. Thanks in advance - You guys have been awesome!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | murraycustomhomescom0 -
4-5 New High Quality Links/Month, Enough to Increase Domain Authority?
The link profile on our domain is poor and our domain authority is only 18. In April we migrated domains and our domain authority tumbled from 24 to 8 and as of August had recovered to 18. Since August we have engaged in a link building campaign. We are getting 4-5 new links per month. They are good quality. Can we expect to see see an increase in our domain authority? If so, when? The domain is www.metro-manhattan.com. The new links to date are below: <colgroup><col width="114"><col width="252"><col width="377"><col width="296"><col width="97"></colgroup>
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Kingalan1
| Status | Anchor text | Final URL | Terget URL | Live date |
| | | | | |
| Done | office space for rent in Manhattan | | | |
| | | | /commercial-space/office-space | 9/20/2018 |
| Done | medical office for rent | | /commercial-space/medical-space | 9/21/2018 |
| Done | office space for rent in Manhattan | | /commercial-space/office-space | 9/23/2018 |
| Done | office space for rent in NYC | | /commercial-space/medical-space | 9/24/2018 |
| Skipped | | | | |
| | | | /commercial-space/medical-space | 10/8/2018 |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |0 -
Domain authority a better metric then referring domain count?
Hi Guys, When reviewing competitors what would be a better metric - Referring domain count OR domain authority. From my understanding DA is a indication of the quality of the link profile. So if a site has a high DA this is a better metric for comparison then referring domain count. What are your thoughts on this? Cheers/
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | cathywix0 -
Can new domain extensions rank?
Hi Does anybody know if it's possible to get domains with extensions like .party or .world to rank? Even for high competitive keywords? Can they rank over .com?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MikeWU0 -
Compare the rankings
Hi All, I have an example 2 domains are targeting the same keyword, one of them ranks higher then another. Here is the image from OSE http://www.freeimagehosting.net/udq2f Would you be able to tell ( based on the image )which of the domains is winning , "domain 1" or "domain2" and what exactly the " looser " should do to improve its rankings Rgds Webdeal
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Webdeal0 -
Losing Rank As A Result Of Domain Change
I have a client who is wishing to switch from an established, but unattractive domain, to a domain he just purchased that is more attractive. For example purposes, his existing site is "His-Company-Website.com" and the site he just purchased and wants to transfer to is "HisCompanyWebsite.com." The only difference is the old site has hyphens in between the words and the new one does not. He is not making this choice from an SEO perspective, but more of a "I don't want to keep saying all those hyphens when telling people about my website." But he said he doesn't want to lose his search engine rankings as a result. So he knows this won't necessarily increase his ranks, but doesn't want them to drop as a result. When speaking with him, I thought we could simply toss in a 301 redirect at the root level and pipe them over to the other site, but he wanted some actual proof. I went back to look at what I thought would be a similar case that I did earlier in the year (transferring from a .net to a .com) and noticed that we did see some rather substantial drops in at least traffic, so I am not so sure about this plan any longer. So my questions for my far more insightful colleagues... What would be your suggestion on this problem? Transition to the more user friendly domain or stick with the unfriendly domain? If he does elect to transition to the new domain, what all can I do to preserve his search engine rankings? Should a rankings and/or traffic drop be predicting when completing this? Thank you all in advance. Any other tidbits anyone has to offer would be great. Looking forward to your replies.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ClayPotCreative0 -
Can SEO increase a page's Authority? Or can Authority only be earned via #RCS?
Hi all. I am asking this question to purposefully provoke a discussion. The CEO of the company where I am the in-house SEO sent me a directive this morning. The directive is to take our Website from a PR3 site to a PR5....in 6 months. Now, I know Page Rank is a bit of a deprecated concept, but I'm sure you would agree that "Authority" is still crucial to ranking well. When he first sent me the directive it was worded like this "I want a plan in place with the goal being to "beat" a specific competitor in 6 months." When I prodded him to define "beat," i.e. did he mean "outrank" for every keyword, he answered that he wanted our site to have the same "Authority" that this particular competitor has. So I am left pondering this question: Is it possible for SEO to increase the authority of a page? Or does "Authority" come from #RCS? The second part of this question is what would you do if you were in my shoes? I have been devoting huge amounts of time on technical SEO because the Website is a mess. Because I've dedicated so much time to technical issues, link-earning has taken a back seat. In my mind, why would anyone want to link to a crappy site that has serious technical issues (slow load times, no persistent cart, lots of 404s, etc)? Shouldn't we make the site awesome before trying to get people to link to us? Given this directive to improve our site's "Authority" - would you scrap the technical SEO and go whole hog into a link-earning binge, or would you hunker down and pound away at the technical issues? Which one would you do first if you couldn't do both at the same time? Comments, thoughts and insights would be greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | danatanseo1 -
Content on New Domain or Sub Directory of Existing Domain?
I have a client with a well aged, high DA site. They rank well for their wedding photography business in several cities. They are launching a new service which is related to photography (photobooths and flipbooks) which they built and developed content on a new domain. The existing domain has 0 links with a DA of 1. The site is brand new.. Is there any drawback to moving the existing content on the new domain to a sub directory of the high authority domain? EX: http://domain.com/newcompany The look, feel, and design of the new site / service is much different than the high DA site. My thoughts are that this will give them an automatic step up, especially since they will be marketing this in several major cities. Also, since the design will be different, if it is good to move to the subdir, should we put the new company name in the subdir folder or something keyword friendly like domain.com/photobooth as opposed to domain.com/newcompanyname. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | itrogers0