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.

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research
      Moz Pro

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research

      Try it free!
    • 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. Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    4. Help! My Domain Authority keeps dropping! What do I do?

    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.

    Help! My Domain Authority keeps dropping! What do I do?

    Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    5
    12
    6613
    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.
    • KristyO
      KristyO last edited by

      Hey!

      I just noticed my Domain Authority keeps dropping? What's happening? What do I do to get it better. I'm scared and dont know the next move to make to get this site better. Help please!

      Thanks!

      http://www.moondoggieinc.com

      Kristy O

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
      • CodyWheeler
        CodyWheeler @KristyO last edited by

        If you're just getting started, I'd recommend the Beginner's Guide - http://www.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-seo

        Also - You'll want to make sure you've 301 redirected all of your pre-existing .asp URLs to your new .php URLs. You'll lose all of your incoming links with the URL changes unless you are using an extensionless structure.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • KristyO
          KristyO @KristyO last edited by

          Haha many moons?

          I dig the SEO stuff so far, gonna stay with it for sure. But my home still lies in Adobe Suite I think.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • KristyO
            KristyO @fenwaymedia last edited by

            Thanks!

            Ya, it's been 2 since I got the site in May.

            I'll be starting to go over the Open Site Explorer stuff now. I have a feeling stuff that was done before is showing up for me now.

            Thanks again!

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • mrdavidingram
              mrdavidingram @KristyO last edited by

              That's how I got started many moons ago.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • KristyO
                KristyO @CodyWheeler last edited by

                Yes, I was on the webinar too 🙂 Lots of helpful info, wish I could implement all of it.

                Thank you for your help! I've been changing parts of the site a lot lately... I completely redesigned the site from asp to php this past may, and have taken it completely over since. So I'm really trying to figure out what's lingering from before and what I can do to make it better. I'm just starting in the SEO world, from a designer background 🙂

                mrdavidingram KristyO CodyWheeler 3 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • mrdavidingram
                  mrdavidingram @KristyO last edited by

                  You're welcome Kristy, I'll have my fingers crossed that you see a nice jump up next month 🙂

                  Anything I can ever help with just give me a shout on here, or tweet me @mrdavidingram

                  David

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • KristyO
                    KristyO @mrdavidingram last edited by

                    Thank you!

                    mrdavidingram 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • gtrotter666
                      gtrotter666 last edited by

                      I'm not sure you really have any sort of problem at all.  Unless you have seen a fall in traffic/ranking etc then I wouldn't worry.  DA calculations seem to lag what Google is doing anyway, so if you have not suffered in terms of traffic/ranking then I wouldn't worry at all.

                      DA is just an indicative metric about your domain, the end goal is conversions, so worry about it if those are hit but otherwise - stay calm and carry on (I should get that on a T-Shirt or something!) 🙂

                      Gary

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                      • fenwaymedia
                        fenwaymedia last edited by

                        Hi Kristy,

                        The first thing I would do would use the tool here called Open Site Explorer and or use link:yourdomain.com to check all the sites linking to your site. loosing domain authority could be for a number of different issues but one could be some bad or non relevant links linking to your site. I would also use Google webmaster tools just to check the general health of your site and request a SEOmoz Crawl of your site. All of this data combined will give you a good starting point to what might be going wrong. I see you have a google page rank of 2 at the moment, what was it before?

                        Hope this helps.

                        Kindest Regards,

                        Craig

                        KristyO 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                        • CodyWheeler
                          CodyWheeler last edited by

                          First - stay calm. Is your traffic noticeably dropping? Have you been penalized in any way in the SERPs? If not, you might just be experiencing regular fluctuations and have nothing to worry about. Look at that first.

                          Next, I'm assuming you have a Pro campaign set up.

                          The first course of action there would be to analyze your warnings, errors and notifications to minimize those. Fix the low-hanging fruit there and move on. Next, make sure you're following proper on-page SEO architecture throughout your site. Proper titles, H1s, interlinking, hierarchy, sitemapping, etc.

                          Now analyze your link profile. Do you have a lot of low quality links? If so, you may need to do some cleanup.

                          Additionally, you're in an e-commerce sector, so you may also want to check out the most recent Pro webinar - http://www.seomoz.org/webinars/ecommerce-seo-fix-and-avoid-common-issues

                          There are a number of things that can contribute to this. Without more information, all I can tell you is to start with the basics and move up. Have you made any significant changes lately?

                          KristyO 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                          • mrdavidingram
                            mrdavidingram last edited by

                            Hi Kristy,

                            The first thing to say is that Domain Authority is a third party metric, so unless you have seen a drop in your traffic then there should be no need for immediate alarm. Although DA correlates with successful rankings, there is still no guarantee that a change in DA will effect your rankings in any way.

                            The solution for your issue might be quite simple. In last months update the number of links in the index was around 50% smaller than the previous update. This meant that a lot of links that where contributing towards your DA score are no longer in SeoMoz's index, and can therefore not contribute towards your DA score.

                            In no way does this mean that these links are no longer in Google, as the Google index and the Mozscape index are two entirely separate entities and are in no way connected.

                            After this month's update, it has been noted that the index is even smaller than last month (albeit by a much smaller margin). If you read the Q&A entries following last month’s update you'll see lots of people asking the same question, and it was confirmed that the drop in DA was due to the smaller index.

                            I expect we'll see the same over the next week.

                            Personally, I saw my clients DA drop by an average of 3-4 points.

                            If your drop in score correlates with this pattern, then you have nothing to worry about at all. Especially if your traffic hasn't been effected.

                            Here are the details of the smaller update from last month:

                            http://www.seomoz.org/blog/july-mozscape-update

                            And here are this month’s details:

                            http://www.seomoz.org/blog/august-mozscape-update

                            If your drop in score doesn't coincide with this, then it most likely means that you've lost one/some links that were contributing to your overall Domain Authority score. You can get to the bottom of this by using the historical link date in Majestic to figure out what links where lost, and when.

                            If this is the case then you can either try and rebuild the lost links, or create some new ones. Or ideally, both!

                            Best of luck.

                            David

                            KristyO 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                            • 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

                            • jgoehring-troy

                              Is domain authority lost if you create a 301 redirect but mark it as noindex, nofollow?

                              Hi everyone, Our company sells products in various divisions. While we've been selling Product A and Product B under our original brand, we've recently created a new division with a new domain to focus on a Product B. The new domain has virtually no domain authority (3) while the original domain has some (37). We want customers to arrive on the new domain when they search for key search terms related to Product B instead of the pages that previously existed on our main website. If we create 301 redirects for the pages and content on the main site and add noindex, nofollow tags, will we lose the domain authority that we have from our original domain because the pages now have the noindex, nofollow tags? I read a few blog posts from Moz that said there isn't any domain authority lost with 301 redirects but I'm not sure if that is true if the pages are noindex, nonofollow.   Do you follow?  🙂 Apologies for the lengthy post. Love this community and the great Moz team. Thanks, Joe

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jgoehring-troy
                              0
                            • Max_

                              One of my Friend's website Domain Authority is Reducing? What could be the reason?

                              Hello Guys, One of my friend's website domain authority is decreasing since they have moved their domain from HTTP to https. 
                              There is another problem that his blog is on subfolder with HTTP.
                              So, can you guys please tell me how to fix this issue and also it's losing some of the rankings like 2-5 positions down. Here is website URL: myfitfuel.in/
                              here is the blog URL: myfitfuel.in/mffblog/

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Max_
                              0
                            • LJHopkins

                              Referring domain issues

                              Our website (blahblah).org has 32 other domains pointing to it all from the same I.P address. These domains including the one in question, were all purchased by the website owner, who has inadvertently created duplicate content and on most of these domains. Some of these referring domains have 301's, some don't - but it appears they have all been de-indexed by Google. I'm somewhat out of my depth here (most of what I've said above has come from an agency who said we should address this before being slapped by Google). However I need to explain to my line manage the actual issues in more detail and the repercussions - any anyone please offer advice please? I'm happy to use the agency, or another - but would like some second opinions if possible?

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | LJHopkins
                              0
                            • webbmason

                              Domain Forwarding - SEO Impacts?

                              I have a site that has been active for years - thinkbiglearnsmart.com. Awhile ago I had purchased about 50 domain names that were relevant to my company. I still have those urls and would like to use them to point to different pages on my site - just because they have good key words in the URLs. For example - one is dreamweavertrainingclassesonlinelive.com.  Currently they are all redirecting to my homepage. A. is that hurting me? B. I would like to redirect to the more relevant page. ie the page dedicated to Dreamweaver training (http://thinkbiglearnsmart.com/dreamweaver-creative-cloud-training-course/ ) Will this hurt my Dreamweaver keyword for example because there is already a 301 redirect on that page from a very old Dreamweaver link which was something like thinkbiglearnsmart.com/dreamweaver C. On my hosting account where I can select where the URL forwards to - it has an option for "Location forwarding" and "Frame forwarding" - currently they are set to Frame forwarding - which one is best? Any help is much appreciated!!! Thank you!

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | webbmason
                              0
                            • co.mc

                              When should you redirect a domain completely?

                              We moved a website over to a new domain name. We used 301 redirects to redirect all the pages individually (around 150 redirects). So my question is, when should we just kill the old site completely and just redirect (forward/point) the old domain over to the new one?

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | co.mc
                              0
                            • Gordian

                              Drop in traffic after redesign

                              Is it common for a site to see slight traffic drops after a site redesign (containing cleaner code, more usability and basically just being more helpful for the end user)?  A new site of ours went live last Wednesday and has experienced a drop in traffic. If you have seen this in your own site, how did you recover? And how long did the recovery take?

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Gordian
                              0
                            • djlaidler

                              How do I list the subdomains of a domain?

                              Hi Mozers, I am trying to find what subdomains are currently active on a particular domain. Is there a way to get a list of this information? The only way I could think of doing it is to run a google search on; site:example.com -site:www.example.com The only issues with this approach is that a majority of the indexed pages exist on the non-www domain and I still have thousands of pages in the results (mainly from the non-www). Is there another way to do it in Google? OR is there a server admin online tool that will tell me this information? Cheers, Dan

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | djlaidler
                              0
                            • hellemans

                              Buying a banned domain

                              Hello all, I've found a exact match keyword domain that I'm able to buy. Problem is that I'm under the impression it might have been banned by google, currently it is only showing adsense without content. The site can't be found using the cache: or site: parameters in Google and the PR is 0. What are your experiences on buying a banned domain and how can I double check if the domain is banned? This blogpost suggests I should not buy it, any other opinions? Thanks. Hellemans

                              Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | hellemans
                              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.