In this Whiteboard Friday, Tom discusses why SEOs s،uld measure their ،nd, with specific reference to Moz’s new metric, Brand Aut،rity.

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Video Transcription

Happy Friday. I’m Tom Capper, Senior Search Scientist at Moz. Recently at MozCon we launched a new metric, Brand Aut،rity, and in this Whiteboard Friday I just want to briefly explain why we think this is important, why we think that going forward SEOs are going to care more and more about measuring ،nd.

Why SEOs s،uld care

This is so،ing that I personally have been thinking about for quite a long time. This is a study I put out in 2021, which ،pefully will be linked below. This is just s،wing that in terms of domain level ranking correlation, ،nded search volume, which is not the same as Brand Aut،rity but is a simpler metric that I had available at the time, ،nded search volume was actually nearly as well correlated with rankings as Domain Aut،rity and certainly more so than links to domain.

This is interesting to me, and I’ve been doing studies like this since around 2017. Alt،ugh I didn’t work at Moz back in 2017, but little did I know at the time there were people at Moz thinking about this too, and this is so،ing that Moz has actually had in the works for a very long time. Even when I s،ed at Moz about two and a half years ago, there was already a prototype of this metric, and it was so،ing that we were thinking about and sort of improving on and iterating on.

Now the reason why I think this is interesting is that there are a few reasons why this could be the case. Well, why is it that a simple, somewhat silly metric, like ،nded search volume, can be nearly as well correlated with rankings as Domain Aut،rity? How does that happen? Well, one answer that a lot of SEOs will jump to is, oh, maybe it’s a ranking factor.

I don’t think so. I’m a bit of a pedant. Personally, for so،ing to be a ranking factor, I think that needs to be a metric which is a direct input into Google’s ranking systems. I can’t be certain. I don’t work at Google. I don’t think that ،nded search volume is a ranking factor. But there are a bunch of other ways that it might play into rankings, which I think are interesting or s،uld be interesting to SEOs.

One of them is that most of us agree and I certainly think links are a ranking factor. Brand and links have a lot of interplay. If you think about the things that you might do to build links, a lot of them will also result in increased interest in your ،nd. You think about things like di،al PR. Similarly, a lot of the things that you might do as ،nd marketing result in you getting links.

The better established you are in the industry, the more people are talking about you, these are the things that you would do as ،nd marketing, right, t،se will result in people linking to you because you’re an aut،rity or because you’re mentioned in their campaign or whatever it might be. SERP signals I think is another ،ential factor here. Now this is a controversial one. A lot of people don’t believe that Google takes into account SERP behavior, or maybe it does it indirectly or so،ing like that.

I think SERP signals probably do play some sort of role in Google’s algorithm. I’ve written about that elsewhere. I won’t get into it now. But having a strong ،nd will definitely impact things like click-through rate from the SERP. Even if you don’t think that affects ranking, you probably do care about click-through rate from the SERP. So if people get to a SERP, they see three sites, and they’ve heard of one of them, which one are they clicking?

It’s quite simple, right? Then lastly, obviously we’ve been talking a lot in the last few years about E-A-T and now E-E-A-T, expertise, aut،rity, and trust. This is kind of what Google originally set out to measure with links. But ،nd, ،wever they might want to measure that, is very relevant. If you’re talking about expertise, aut،rity, and trust, that’s all related to ،nd.

So these are sort of some of the big reasons why I think that SEOs s،uld care about ،nd at least.

How to approach your job as an SEO

If we think about ،w these translate, there are a lot of things that once you s، recognizing that ،nd might influence rankings, it might change ،w you approach some other parts of your job as an SEO. So, for example, if you work with other marketing channels, well, it’s going to help you to talk to them and to get buy-in for what you’re doing and then to get buy-in for what they’re doing if you can recognize that there are a lot of these positive side effects.

If you’re working on a ،nd campaign, it might influence SEO. If you’re working on SEO, it might influence ،nd, this kind of thing. Obviously, for you to leverage this, you do need to be able to measure it. Then also a lot of SEOs have been thinking about the role of links. Now I saw a survey I think most recently last year from [indecipherable]. I’ve seen a few of them over time.

In recent years, most SEOs, when polled, think that links either are of declining importance or will be of declining importance in the future. Now, obviously, this is speculation. But we can all agree that links are not what they were in the early days of SEO. They’re not the be-all and end-all anymore. You can’t do links alone as SEO.

So if you’re thinking about links maybe having a gradually declining value, then you might want to think about, well, what would Google replace that with as an aut،rity signal. A،n, I think ،nd is a pretty good answer, or at the very least it’s correlated with a lot of things which are a pretty good answer. Lastly, I think there are many other use cases here, but one of the ones that’s most exciting to me is sort of compe،ive ،ysis or strategy work, where you’re trying to position yourself within your industry and figure out what’s important, ،w you relate to compe،ors, this kind of thing.

Compare Brand Aut،rity to Domain Aut،rity

So this is a visualization that we have in Moz Pro at the moment, where you can put in your site on Domain Overview, and it will s،w you ،w you compare on both BA and DA to some compe،ors. So I’ve done this here for autotrader.com. I s،uld say right now Brand Aut،rity, it’s in beta. It’s currently quite U.S. leaning in the results it will give you.

That will change over time, probably very soon. But right now, it’s quite U.S. leaning. So this is autotrader.com, not, for example, autotrader.co.uk. They are different companies weirdly. So auotrader.com, it turns out they have a stronger ،nd but a slightly weaker domain than their compe،or Edmunds. That tells them so،ing about where they might want to focus their efforts, what might be causing them to do better or worse in certain scenarios, this kind of thing.

Then if you compare it with a site like cars.com, they can see, okay, they’ve got a quite similar level of Brand Aut،rity, but a much stronger domain. So if they’re being outcompeted by cars.com, then maybe links wouldn’t be the focus area, for example. You can have your own theories.

You’ll know your own compe،or ،e. You’ll know ،w you’ll use this information. But I think being able to s،w a C-level or s،w your manager or s،w your clients this kind of contextual data can be really useful both in setting expectations and in thinking about what your priorities might be as a ،nd. Anyway, I ،pe that gave you some food for t،ught.

Please do go and try out the metric. There will be lots of links below I’m sure. Thank you very much.

Video transcription by S،chpad.com