DR increased from 20 to 23 with no new backlinks or content

[pgmath]

Our site’s DR increased from 20 (having this metric since 2021) to 23 (yesterday) and I am trying to figure it why.
Under the following conditions over that period:
- No backlinks were purchased.
- No content has been added, except two pages dedicated to our GamMathQA project (with topic outside the niche of the site).
- Number of sites linking to us did not increase much and no high-authority site linked back to us.
- About five links to other gambling sites were sold in our website and about 25 added by our own criteria.

Does anyone have any idea what the possible explanations could be? Or it’s just about a normal “rearrangement” of the rankings due to the new sites coming in?

[baldidiot]

DR is nothing to do with google, it’s an ahrefs stat. It could be something as simple as a rejigging of how they calculate it. They’ve recently changed their keyword stats so plausible.

Ahrefs are also very open about how it’s calculated, so it could be that you haven’t gained any more links but the links you do have are now passing more DR - either by the linking sites increasing in DR or by a reduction in OBL.

It’s not a massive gain so could easily just be fluctuations.

It also means nothing in terms of rankings or actual site strength / health. We have DR30+ sites that have one link.

[chaumi]

There are many, many variables, and this is not something you can approach with anything approximating any form of mathematical certainty (even if the tool tells you so).

So, a few immediate thoughts, though there could be several others:

The 'measuring' tool is inherently flawed or lagging (ie it only just allocated an increase for something that happened some time ago).

One or more of the existing inbound links may in turn have been linked to/gained links, increasing it's authority and 'passing some of it on' (in the eyes of the tool).

"Number of sites linking to us did not increase much" - how much is 'did not increase much'?. Maybe a small increase took you over some sort of threshold. (have a look at referring domains numbers, those can make a difference at certain values. Although that's more from a search engine ranking perspective, I don't know if tools react the same way).

[vabank]

It might happen. This calculation is done by Ahrefs. I would be stressed because of it. At the end of the day what is important traffic. )

[pgmath]

DR is nothing to do with google, it’s an ahrefs stat. It could be something as simple as a rejigging of how they calculate it. They’ve recently changed their keyword stats so plausible.

Ahrefs are also very open about how it’s calculated, so it could be that you haven’t gained any more links but the links you do have are now passing more DR - either by the linking sites increasing in DR or by a reduction in OBL.

It’s not a massive gain so could easily just be fluctuations.

It also means nothing in terms of rankings or actual site strength / health. We have DR30+ sites that have one link.

So, is DA more relevant than DR?

[baldidiot]

So, is DA more relevant than DR?

They're both nothing to do with google (they're scores totted up by seo software) so they're as relevant (or irrelevant) as each other. There's also sem rush's authority score. I'm sure there are others as well.

Both DA and DR can be manipulated if you know how they work.

[Mattbar]

Actual traffic and real rankings is what matters, DA, DR and the others are just stats that can be manipulated. It's great if you are only building sites to sell links as all a lot of people (and all agencies) care about is DA/DR.

[pgmath]

Ok, so you are saying that there is just no metric/measure for a general ranking in Google search other than seeing the returns themselves and noting the page where your site lands on? If Google does have an algorithm for measuring a site's authority (which to use in ranking the search results) there is no relationship between this authority and Moz DA? Not even a relation preserving order/ranking (that is, if one site ranks higher than another for Google, so it ranks by DA)? Sorry if the questions seem stupid. I admit I know nothing about the SEO stuff.

[bpmee]

There's no relationship between Google's algo and Moz/Ahrefs/SEM domain authority because the latter are all proprietary estimates and approximations.

Those services do NOT have access to Google's algo and will never come close to approximating it. Google tweaks its algo almost daily, with major changes happening monthly to quarterly. By the time 3rd parties have reverse engineered the most recent update, the algo has already changed.

As others have indicated, you're better off focusing on existing KW rankings, inbound links, and traffic estimates (also rough). Sites with solid rankings across many hundreds or thousands of KWs have suggest more authority than sites that simply have a high DA/DR/SEM score.

Sadly, most link sellers still mislead many unsuspecting buyers with long lists of high DA sites that are just repurposed expired domains, PBNs, or networks designed to inflate DA to make money. Buyer beware. Believe it or not, many SEO managers still use DA as a means to assess leads. I wish them luck with their budgets and results.

[chaumi]

Ok, so you are saying that there is just no metric/measure for a general ranking in Google search other than seeing the returns themselves and noting the page where your site lands on?

None that anyone (outside of the Google algorithm) knows of, that's right.

If Google does have an algorithm for measuring a site's authority (which to use in ranking the search results) there is no relationship between this authority and Moz DA?

There will be some correlation, but it's open to being affected by multiple influencing factors and interpretations and you couldn't trust it.

Not even a relation preserving order/ranking (that is, if one site ranks higher than another for Google, so it ranks by DA)?

Definitely not. There may be some rough ordering, but the algorithm is using multiple factors (thousands) in its interpretation and retrieval/display decisions for any given page, and no one knows the weighting given to individual factors.


*******

Note : Google interprets/stores/retrieves/displays pages, not websites. Though, of course, there are relationships between pages and at a site level that play major parts.


*******

If what you are trying to learn here is 'what's the value of my site to link seekers?'...

Yes, some of them may (mistakenly) just go on the tool figures.

But...

The knowledgeable link seeker will be considering:

Overall site/page quality (mainly the content).
Inbound links to it (ie not obviously engineered spam links in entirety, mixed with some good authority)
Its history.
Whether its a link farm (or might turn into one).
To a certain extent, its potential (if it's fairly new).
Traffic, or traffic potential.
Rankings, or ranking potential.

[dannyx]

Note : Google interprets/stores/retrieves/displays pages, not websites. Though, of course, there are relationships between pages and at a site level that play major parts.

I've always wondered about that.
I've often encountered opinions on blogs and in various articles that for Google, each page is like a separate story.
So, theoretically, it shouldn't be difficult to break through on any one particular keyword by having a much smaller and less authoritative site than the competition. It was enough because simply making a better quality page for that particular keyword was enough.

It seems to me that the truth is in the middle. But it's something I've always wondered about, which direction the algorithm rates more. Is the specific sub-page, or the sub-page more as part of the whole website.

[chaumi]

It seems to me that the truth is in the middle. But it's something I've always wondered about, which direction the algorithm rates more. Is the specific sub-page, or the sub-page more as part of the whole website.

The truth is in the middle, exactly. It seems logical that the algorithm has to see the site has some (consistent) authority at a site-level around the subject (a kind of recognition that the site is an entity related to the subject in question). Then it can store pages in their own right in 'compartments' related to their topic, before pulling them out and displaying when a searcher asks for info, with the express intent of answering that searchers query in the best way.

As to how you might weight the relationship - probably an impossible task without running a very specific and highly controlled test experiment.

[dannyx]

The truth is in the middle, exactly. It seems logical that the algorithm has to see the site has some (consistent) authority at a site-level around the subject (a kind of recognition that the site is an entity related to the subject in question). Then it can store pages in their own right in 'compartments' related to their topic, before pulling them out and displaying when a searcher asks for info, with the express intent of answering that searchers query in the best way.

As to how you might weight the relationship - probably an impossible task without running a very specific and highly controlled test experiment.

As for the consistent nature of the site around a given subject.

Do you think that casino sites that add several pages on poker or sports betting (or any other configuration) might lose consistency to some degree, and thus ranking position, in this way?

[chaumi]

As for the consistent nature of the site around a given subject.

Do you think that casino sites that add several pages on poker or sports betting (or any other configuration) might lose consistency to some degree, and thus ranking position, in this way?

If they've already built some authority around casino, my personal view is no there are unlikely to be any conflicts by introducing other (gambling-related) topics. I guess that maybe if the distribution got skewed, that might introduce some doubt for the algorithm.

[wonderpunter]

You can have 80 DR and still be a jnk site just worry about traffic and conversions those are the only metrics you really need

[nevstakai]

Sometimes Ahrefs uses random with DR. Mostly because of updates
My site had DR 35, and once it became 19

[icecasinos]

I have seen fluctuations in these types of metrics my self too. It doesn't affect the traffic so I don't worry about it.

[davidmoore]

The system for assessing the Domain Rating (DR) indicator changes periodically. Additionally, the sites that previously linked to your website may have also gained more authority.

[pgmath]

Thank you all guys for your answers. What I have learned is summarized as follows:
DA and DR as measures for site authority are just private statistics that can be manipulated. Only organic traffic is the objective measure for a site’s authority, as a direct consequence of having the websites in the top-ranking pages of the searches.
Overall, your answers support the general principle that “Content is king”.
And yet in the trade of links DA and DR count as objective measures for those buying links. It might be a matter of time-saving and simplicity in sites’ evaluation, I don’t know.

[CasinosBroker]

They're both nothing to do with google (they're scores totted up by seo software) so they're as relevant (or irrelevant) as each other. There's also sem rush's authority score. I'm sure there are others as well.

Both DA and DR can be manipulated if you know how they work.

Traffic and rankings matter.

Those metrics can be easily manipulated.