Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Let your business shine with Listings AI
      Moz Local

      Let your business shine with Listings AI

      Learn more
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Technical SEO
    4. Domain Authority dropped 10 points and I don't know why

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    Domain Authority dropped 10 points and I don't know why

    Technical SEO
    domain authority optimization
    3
    3
    2333
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • LisaBabblebird
      LisaBabblebird Subscriber last edited by

      In my latest site crawl, the domain authority dropped 10 points for no apparent reason. There have been no changes to the site. The only change I have made this month is to block referral spam to the site. My competitors' DAs have stayed the same too.

      website name: https://knowledgefront.co.uk/

      Any ideas?

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • RaviKumarRana
        RaviKumarRana last edited by

        Check for incoming links and see if there's any pattern. Check referral traffic and see if any bot traffic is landing on your website or not. Try the following steps:

        1. Create a filter in analytics
        2. Block spam IPs
        3. Block bot traffic to land on your website.
        4. Create quality backlinks
        5. Find out pages that are performing lower in SERP i.e. 5,6,7 or 8,9th positions. Optimize them and push them for better CTR.

        Once you are done, submit sitemap and wait for some time, I hope this will help you out recovering the lost DA as it works for me.

        Regards,
        Ravi Kumar Rana
        TheSEOGuy

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • PaintedBrickDigital
          PaintedBrickDigital last edited by

          @lisababblebird said in Domain Authority dropped 10 points and I don't know why:

          https://knowledgefront.co.uk/

          With just a quick look, you've got 53ish links and many of them are questionable at best, or directory links.

          So, link quality may be an issue, also, did you manually disavow links? If so, you probably just brought unwanted attention to your site.

          We never tell clients to disavow on their own... only if they receive a manual penalty do we take that step.

          Instead, focus on building actual valuable links as Google and other search engines have gotten pretty good at recognizing and ignoring spam links on their own.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • 1 / 1
          • First post
            Last post

          Got a burning SEO question?

          Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


          Start my free trial


          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.

          • See all categories

          Related Questions

          • rashedkhalaf1991

            Unsolved SEO Domain Authority

            domain authority

            https://aljoodservices.com
            I am working on improving this site now, but while searching, I found a site that allows me to create a blog and the site ranks high 77. If I create a blog for us and direct it to this site, will I get a high domain authority through this site? I don't know if the domains are spam or something like that.

            Moz Tools | | rashedkhalaf1991
            2
          • g3mmab

            Unsolved Huge Increase In Internal Links + Domain Authority Tanked

            internal linking domain authority

            Hey, I am very concerned about the link metrics I am seeing, really hoping someone can help. In October last year there were a total of 34.7K 'total links' attributed to my E-commerce website . This compared to 41.2k and 213k links attributed to my two main competitors. In November, my website had a forced update due to incompatibility issues my shopping cart version was having with the server on which it is hosted. (I was told by my web developers / hosting company that their server was upgraded.) This update created many problems such as checkout issues, page layout issues, sitemaps not automatically regenerating and the big one - it reverted back to http instead of https. Along with my developers, I spent 2 weeks fixing all of the issues until everything worked correctly and https was reinstated. After initial warnings from Moz, I have not received any critical crawler issues or warnings, big ranking drops etc since November. I was satisfied that all was ok. However, in November my 'total links' jumped to 81.5k and have since continued to balloon. December - 309.1k, January -335k, February - 665k, March - 716k, April - 719k, May - 742k, June - 751k. In the same period (November - June), my external links went from 5.3k - 8.7k. So it appears the huge increase in links are internal. In my latest report it states that 'internal follow links' are up by 8k and 'internal no follow links' are up by 1k. This is insane. I cannot understand why I have so many internal links and why they keep increasing. I maintain the website with updates, blog articles etc but no more than I have in the past several years. Worryingly, once this increase in links started being reported, my Domain Authority has also tanked. In October my DA was 37 (higher than my competitors) and has since dropped as low as 19. It has gone up to 21 this month (still significantly lower than my competitors). I have spent hours researching why this huge increase in internal links could be happening but have got nowhere. If anyone could advise what the issue could be and how I can fix it, I would be eternally grateful. Issues I have discovered along the way that may help with analysis:
            My site has many 404s (hundreds) - all relate to urls of old images that have been removed from the website. The 'Top Hits' on my website are from blogs (some spammy) to these deleted image urls that return a 404. I don't use any plugins. I do get 'duplicate content' notices as my blog posts archive themselves and generate new urls - as an example - 'blog post name' archived December 2023. It may be the case that the old http urls have been redirected to https but I have no warnings for 'redirect issues' in Moz. Thanks for taking the time to read this and thanks in advance for any help.

            Link Explorer | | g3mmab
            0
          • courtney.lou

            Should I switch back to my old domain?

            domain analysis domain authority domain migration domain

            I'm looking for some advice on switching domains for my survey/giveaway website.
            I purchased a website that gets around 1,500 in traffic and makes a few hundred in Adsense. The previous owner had rebranded the site and changed the domain which ended up hurting his SEO and traffic. Before that it was getting 10,000 in traffic on the old domain.
            It's been a few years since the rebrand but the original domain still holds a lot of authority and got way more traffic. Should I consider switching the website back to the original domain to try to improve rankings again or should I just focus on the new domain?
            The website now is snipon.com and the previous domain name was surveyh.com
            I'm wondering if switching back to the original domain will still be beneficial or if it will just mess up what's happening now on the rebranded site.

            SEO Tactics | | courtney.lou
            0
          • libertyjumpers

            looking for strategies to increase DA

            domain authority link building

            any pointers or information on strategies to increase DA. I'm just starting to understand and get results on my website so I'm looking for any idea sharing.
            my names mike, i have a Las Vegas bounce house party rental business.
            website
            https://www.libertypartyjumpers.com/

            Link Building | | libertyjumpers
            0
          • iamshrawan

            Unsolved It's been 2 years and my Domain authority is not changing

            domain domain analysis domain authority domain author

            It's been 2 years and my Domain authority is not changing. I have been making so many quality links but domain authority does not increase or decrease for my website Tricky enough.
            Can anyone help with what is the problem with my website?

            Link Explorer | | iamshrawan
            0
          • HayleyBowyer

            Moz Domain Authority [Megathread]

            domain authority da

            Hey Moz Community, We've noticed that there are questions about Domain Authority, what it is, and how to positively impact it. We're here to answer your questions! For a full overview, please see our help hub article here: https://moz.com/learn/seo/domain-authority First, it's important to keep in mind that Domain Authority (DA) is a search engine ranking score developed by Moz that predicts how likely a website is to rank in search engine result pages (SERPs). It is not a Google ranking factor. Domain Authority scores range from one to 100, with higher scores corresponding to a greater likelihood of ranking. Since DA is based on machine learning calculations, your site's score will often fluctuate as more, fewer, or different data points become available and are incorporated into those calculations. For instance, if facebook.com were to acquire a billion new links, every other site’s DA would drop relative to Facebook’s. Because more established and authoritative domains like Facebook will have increasingly larger link profiles, they take up more of the high-DA slots, leaving less room at the higher end of the scale for other domains with less robust link profiles. Therefore, it's significantly easier to grow your score from 20 to 30 than it is to grow it from 70 to 80. For this reason, it’s important to use Domain Authority as a comparative metric rather than an absolute one. The best way to influence your DA is to improve your overall site health with a focus on the quality and quantity of external links pointing to your site. Check out this video for more details on how to impact DA Happy analyzing!

            Moz Pro | | HayleyBowyer
            0
          • mollykathariner_ms

            Forwarding a .org domain to a .com domain: any negative impact to consider?

            Hello! I have a question I've been unable to find a clear answer to. My client's primary domain is a .com with a satisfactorily high DA. My client owns the .org version of its domain (which has a very low DA, I suppose due to inactivity) but has never forwarded it on. For branding/visibility/traffic reasons, I'd like to recommend they set up the .org domain to forward to the .com domain, but I wanted to ask a few questions first: 1. Does forwarding low-value DA domains to high-value DA domains have any negative authority/SEO impact? 2. If the .org domain was to be forwarded, am I correct that an SSL cert is not necessary for it if the .com domain has an SSL cert? Thanks in advance!

            Technical SEO | | mollykathariner_ms
            1
          • scott315

            How to find temporary redirects of existing site you don't control?

            I am getting ready to move a clients site from another company. They have like 35 tempory redirects according to MOZ. Question is, how can I find out then current redirects so I can update everything for the new site? Do I need access to the current htaccess file to do this?

            Technical SEO | | scott315
            0

          Get started with Moz Pro!

          Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

          Start my free trial
          Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz API
          • Moz Data
          • STAT
          • Product Updates
          Moz Solutions
          • SMB Solutions
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          • Digital Marketers
          Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Authority Checker
          • Link Explorer
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • Brand Authority Checker
          • Local Citation Checker
          • MozBar Extension
          • MozCast
          Resources
          • Blog
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Help Hub
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • How-to Guides
          • Moz Academy
          • API Docs
          About Moz
          • About
          • Team
          • Careers
          • Contact
          Why Moz
          • Case Studies
          • Testimonials
          Get Involved
          • Become an Affiliate
          • MozCon
          • Webinars
          • Practical Marketer Series
          • MozPod
          Connect with us

          Contact the Help team

          Join our newsletter
          Moz logo
          © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
          • Accessibility
          • Terms of Use
          • Privacy

          Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.