Do pages with low PA effect DA?

[BossArrighi]

I was looking into raising my firm's Domain Authority and I had a thought. I was wondering if our very low PA pages are bringing the overall DA down?

Our homepage is at 43 currently and the DA is 32. We have quite a few pages and I am trimming a little fat in the deep pages currently. I was wondering what would be the result in terms of DA

I am also starting an aggressive initiative to blog more and try to attract links through guest posting and HARO (Hep A Reporter Out).

I understand that many people will say DA is not a metric your should necessarily build around. But, while I am fighting for rankings in a very competitive vertical, I assume a higher DA is better, no?

From everything I have read on Moz over the years, they say that the DA metric is the one that tries to encompass a multitude of factors, similar to the way something more complex like the Google algorithm does. So, I assumed finding small gains in DA could be beneficial to the site's rankings and traffic

I tried to go into detail and get specific here because I know how many bad questions are asked daily. Thanks anyone and everyone for the help, I do thoroughly appreciate the Moz community

[Cyrus-Shepard]

Howdy,

Let me address your question from a technical point of view. Disclaimer: I am not a Data Scientist at Moz, nor do I know the precise algorithms that comprise DA and PA. That said, I am comfortable discussing these metrics in broad terms.

Q. "I was wondering if our very low PA pages are bringing the overall DA down?"
A. In short, no. Generally speaking, low PA pages won't bring down a site's DA.

Q. "If I delete low PR pages, would that help my overall DA?"
A. Again, no, but this is a more interesting question! If your site was hit by Panda, or has lots of low-quality duplicate content pages, then in many cases removing the worst offending pages has sometimes been shown to improve search rankings.

This won't be reflected in your Domain Authority score, as DA doesn't take Panda-like considerations into its algorythm. And this isn't to say you should remove low PA pages based on this consideration. But if you suspect low-quality pages (not the same as low PA pages) are hurting you and serve little purpose to the visitor, or you suspect a Panda penalty, then this is the only case I'd suggest considering removing pages.

Hope this helps!

-Cyrus

[BossArrighi]

I figured I would get a response like this. I will tell you that working with a law firm, we are limited in what exactly we can do as far as being very outside the box. We definitely have to stick within a certain comfort zone of tactics. I think I have some really wild ideas that would bring links, but I also have to keep a very specific brand image.

As far as fighting for metrics, I thought the point of these specific metrics were to at least suggest how a site looks to a search engine. My point of that statement is that, it would seem as though trying to up these metrics would result, in most cases, in better rankings.

People find lawyers in a very specific way, which most of the time who their peer group has used. Coming up more prominently in SERPs could be a large boost to business and I was looking for some possible gains through adjusting the site architecture.

If I put the response as a "Good Answer", will I cease to get responses. I appreciate it, but would love to hear anyone who have actual information or hypothesis about the question directly, which was "I was wondering if our very low PA pages are bringing the overall DA down?" or "If I delete low PR pages, would that help my overall DA?"

[EGOL]

I am fighting for rankings in a very competitive vertical.

OK.... then why are you  fighting for metrics?    Take the fight directly to your competitors.  What can you do that will have a direct and immediate impact against them?

Can you attack them with superior content?

What do people in your niche need to know that nobody is talking about?    What are the misconceptions?   Where is the beef?

I am also starting an aggressive initiative to blog more and try to attract links through guest posting and HARO (Hep A Reporter Out).

Why do this?   Take the fight on your domain and direct it straight against your competitors.  Get into their SERPs with something competitive.  Get into SERPs that they have ignored with something that will pull traffic.

Why create content that will put these guest blog sites into your SERPs as competitors.  Build assets for your own domain with that same effort.

So, I assumed finding small gains in DA could be beneficial to the site's rankings and traffic

Attack things that will directly improve your rankings and traffic.  Attack the root, not the numbers.

How can you improve your website?  Make a list of actionables that you can build to impress your visitors.

I was wondering if our very low PA pages are bringing the overall DA down?

Do something about those pages.  Improve them.  Get them into the fight against your competitors in a meaningful way.