If you’re in charge of a company’s web or
marketing
, you’ve probably come across the word “authority,” but do you know what it specifically means?
Authority, which means authority, is one of the indicators that is emphasized in
SEO
. Increasing the authority of your website will help improve the search rankings of your entire site or pages.
This time, we will introduce the meaning and types of authority, SEO effects, how to check it, and how to increase it.
What is authority in SEO?
Authority is a term used to refer to someone who has authority in a particular field. Literally translated, authority means authority and prestige.
In SEO, it is an indicator that shows whether a website has authority or is a reliable site. Sites that have many citations and references from sites that deal with the same topic tend to have high authority.
Increasing your website’s authority will help it rank higher in search results and be indexed more easily.
・What is an index? Explaining the SEO effect, registration method, and importance in Google search
One of the EAT
Authority is one of the EAT indicators in the search quality evaluation guidelines.
EAT is an acronym for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
Article quality evaluation criteria in search quality evaluation guidelines
Google emphasizes EAT, which includes authority, when evaluating page quality.
The amount of expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (EAT) is very important. Please consider:
・The expertise of the creator of the MC.
・The authoritativeness of the creator of the MC, the MC itself, and the website.
・The trustworthiness of the creator of the MC, the MC itself, and the website.
Citation:
Search Quality Evaluation Guidelines
Especially important in the YMYL genre
High authority is especially important in YMYL genre SEO. YMYL is an acronym for “Your Money or Your Life” and refers to genres that require specialized knowledge such as money, health, and medicine.
YMYL genre sites often deal with important themes that affect the lives of searchers, so Google prevents pages with incorrect information from being displayed on the search screen.
This means that even if a site with low authority handles the YMYL genre, it will be difficult to rank high in search results.
Type of authority
In marketing and SEO, the following terms are related to authority. Let’s check it together with the authority.
authority site
An authority site is a site that contains primary information that is often used when conducting research. Typical examples include sites of public institutions such as the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare and the Ministry of Finance, and sites of leading companies in the industry such as Google and Apple.
If you want to know reliable information about tomorrow’s weather, you often use the Japan Meteorological Agency’s website, and if you want to check accurate information about income tax, you often use the National Tax Agency’s website. It contains a wealth of accurate and reliable information, and is quoted and referenced on a variety of websites.
In other words, a site that is seen as trustworthy by many people can be called an authority site.
domain authority
Domain authority is an SEO tool provided by MOZ that expresses the evaluation of the entire website from search engines as a number from 0 to 100, and is sometimes called domain power. MOZ is known as a tool that allows you to check domain power.
Domain authority is not an official Google metric and does not affect search rankings. Domain authority numbers should not be viewed as absolute metrics, but relative to competing sites.
page authority
Page authority is a numerical value of the rating a page receives from search engines. The basic mechanism and concept is the same as Domain Authority.
Even sites with high domain authority may have pages with low page authority.
How to check the authority of a domain page
You can check the authority of a domain page using the following SEO tools:
The authority values may differ depending on the tool, so basically use the same tool.
MOZ
MOZ is a tool that allows you to check domain power used all over the world. In addition to domain power, you can analyze your own site and competitors.
To check the authority of a domain page in MOZ:
1. Open MOZ’s official page
2. Log in
3. Click the yellow button “Find out now” inside the blue banner
4. Enter the domain you want to search in the blank field in the center and click “Find Competitors” on the right.
ahrefs
ahrefs is an SEO tool used by 600,000 people worldwide. In addition to checking the authority of domains and pages, you can also use various functions such as checking backlinks and acquiring related keywords.
In ahrefs, domain authority is displayed as domain rating (DR), and page authority is displayed as URL rating (UR), but the meanings of the numbers are the same.
Official website:
ahrefs
Ubersuggest
Ubersuggest is a free SEO tool. Similar to ahrefs, various features are available. Ubersuggest displays DOMAIN AUTHORITY and PAGE AUTHORITY, but the meanings of the numbers are the same.
Official website:
Ubersuggest
Authority SEO effect
Easily improve search rankings
By increasing your authority, you can expect an SEO effect that will help you improve your search rankings.
Although authority is not a factor in determining search rankings, Google emphasizes EAT, which includes authority, when evaluating page quality. In other words, increasing your site’s overall authority will indirectly affect your page’s search rankings.
If your site is rated as having high authority, newly submitted articles will also be considered to have high authority, making it easier to improve your search rankings at an early stage. Also, existing articles will be affected by the site’s authority and will be ranked higher in search.
more likely to be indexed
Increasing your authority will make it easier for new articles to be indexed.
Indexing means that a web page is registered with Google. If a user searches for a keyword, your web page will not appear in the search results if it is not indexed.
Normally, a web page will be automatically indexed within 3 days to 1 week after it is published. However, sites with low authority or sites that have just launched may take anywhere from two weeks to a month to be indexed.
By increasing your authority, you can increase crawler visits and reduce the time it takes to be indexed.
How to increase your website authority
There are three ways to increase the authority of your website:
- operate for a long time
- Create high-quality content
- Get useful backlinks and citations
operate for a long time
By running a website for a long period of time, you can increase the authority of your website. However, if you acquire a domain and leave it alone, you will not get a good reputation from Google. It takes a certain amount of time for a website to be ranked by Google, so it is important to continually update your website.
Create high-quality content
Creating high-quality content is also important to increase your website’s authority. However, mass-producing articles is not effective.
Google regards EAT, which includes authority, as an important indicator when evaluating the quality of articles. If you create low-quality articles, your website will be rated as having low authority.
Get useful backlinks and citations
You can increase your website’s authority by gaining useful backlinks and citations.
However, if you buy backlinks or get a large number of backlinks from low-quality content, Google will consider you to be violating its guidelines and you may be penalized.
To increase your authority, it is important to acquire backlinks from highly relevant and authority sites.
summary
Sites with high authority can expect SEO effects such as higher search rankings and easier indexing. On the other hand, increasing authority requires a certain period of time, and short-term results cannot be expected. As with other SEO measures, it is important to work diligently.