Recently, I’ve seen a few website owners that are looking for link builders to increase their domain rating, go online and type out an advert that looks something like this; “Hey guys, I only want links from websites that are DR30 or DR50. Only those links! I don’t care about anything else.“
In other words, it seems as though some website owners are obsessed with domain rating, and Moz’s domain authority. These are metrics where you can estimate the value of a website’s quality.
But, this approach is so wrong, my link-building friends! Let me explain why.
It’s like going to the gym, slamming on loads of weights, having terrible form, and just doing bicep curls. It’s not going to help you improve!
If you don’t use any common sense, when it comes to the gym or link building, you could be harming your website in the long-term, which could damage your results. In the same way that smashing loads of weights in the gym while using terrible form, will not help you build muscle.
If you only care about Domain Rating or Domain Authority when it comes to link building, and you don’t use any common sense, you’re not focusing on the right approach to getting the results that you want.
In this article, you’ll learn exactly why Domain Rating isn’t as important as you think it is, as well as the best ways to find and build links for your website.
Table of Contents
DR and DA Metrics Do Have Some Value
It is important to start by saying that domain rating and domain authority metrics do have some value. This is the way that I price my link building when it comes to my agency. At the same time, it’s not gospel and shouldn’t be followed without using common sense. That is exactly what I’m going to explain in this article.
Bear in mind, the Ahref’s domain rating does have some value, but it’s not the be all and end all.
Google Doesn’t Care About DR
The first thing you have to realize is, that Google doesn’t care about Domain Rating or Domain Authority, or any of these types metrics. What they care about is their users.
Domain Rating isn’t an actual ranking factor, but rather, more of a vanity metric. Google ranks content that benefits the people using the search engine. It’s not going to rank your content, simply because you have 10 DR70 links or above to your page.
Plus, if you only have high DR links to your website, it looks really unnatural, and makes your backlink profile seem pretty strange.
It’s important not to get too hung up on the DA and DR metrics, and better to use common sense when it comes to link building. If you were trying to lose weight, you wouldn’t just eat fruit all day because that’s considered healthy, right? You have to look at other factors too. A lot of which may be subjective. You would need to look at how you’re sleeping, what you’re eating, the amount of protein you gain, and what sort of workout routine you have. It’s the same with link building.
Other Metrics To Consider
You have to consider factors such as:
- organic traffic
- the quality of the content
- the quality of the website
- the history of the website’s organic traffic
- whether the site has received a penalty
As well as some other factors that you can’t see precisely, when using a tool like Domain Ratings.
You have to balance the DR, which is valuable, but also look at other subjective SEO metrics too.
If you only look at DR and ignore everything else, then it’s quite a short sited link building strategy. You could miss some powerful link building opportunities, simply because you think, “Well, it’s not a DR30 or a DR50 website, so it’s not worth my time.”
There are some low-DR websites out there, that are awesome link-building opportunities, simply because they’re more relevant, they get more organic traffic, and are more natural compared to websites with inflated DR metrics.
DR and DA Are Easily Manipulated
DR and DA metrics can be easily manipulated by other links. For example, you see loads of PBNs that have high DR, which technically means that’s they are a high-quality website.
But, when you look at the quality of a website, if you look at the organic traffic to that site, it’s actually a dead site. It’s only gotten a high DR because of inflated metrics through other PBNs.
These Will Probably Do More Harm Than Good To Your Site
PBNs might have high DR metrics, but does that actually make them a good link? Far from it! You can go on fiverr.com and buy DR70 links all day long, but is it going to help your website? Absolutely not. Is it going to grow your rankings? No. In fact, It’s probably going to do more harm than good to your site.
You have to have other metrics in place and not just use DR blindly if you want to help rank your website. Don’t just think that if you go to a DR80 or a DR90 link, that it will take your website to the moon.
This is unlikely, unless it’s a very high-quality website with lots of organic traffic, that is highly relevant to your site, and doesn’t have a super spammy link profile.
It is really important to make sure that you have other metrics in place, apart from domain rating, to measure the quality of a backlink.
Quality Websites Have Low DR
Finally, there are some websites with a very low domain rating metric, but they actually get thousands of organic visitors per month from Google.
The truth is, that Google obviously likes these websites by favoring them in the rankings. Do you want to miss out on links from websites like that, simply because you don’t want to get any links from sites that are below say, DR30?
By doing this you’re missing out on valuable link-building opportunities that will help move the needle for your site. This is particularly important if you’re in a small niche without many link-building prospects.
Let’s say a website is DR10, it’s probably on an upward trend and the domain rating has grown every single month for six months to a year. It is going to be a DR20 or DR30 website, which is something that will move the needle even more for your site.
If you get a backlink from them now, it’s just going to compound. If you get 10, 20, or 50 backlinks from websites that are DR10 now, but they’re on the upward slope and will become DR20, DR30, or even DR50, then you’re going to reap the benefits.
Think Long Term
If you think long-term when it comes to link-building, you’re going to see the benefits of the compound effect with backlinks.
You’re going to get links from websites that have grown in authority, and will benefit you even more in the future.
This is such a valuable opportunity for your site.
If you have a brand-new website without any backlinks to your site and it’s like a DR0, then a link from almost any other relevant website is going to move the needle for you.
Even if you get links from DR0s, DR5s, or DR10s, if you’ve got a brand-new site with no backlink profile, those links are still really important and should not be ignored. They’re going to be powerful link-building opportunities for you now, and potentially in the future.
As I have explained in this article, domain rating and domain authority metrics are still really valuable and useful. However, you need to use other metrics as well if you want to build a high-quality backlink profile. This will get the needle moving on your website and achieve those higher rankings on Google.
