What is authority? That is probably the first question that you would ask yourself if you ever happen to come across the word as it is thrown about in lists of traits that are characteristic to successfully optimized websites that have reached amazing heights on search result pages.
To put it simply, authority is a combination of various traits, including trustworthiness, reputation, and professionalism. When all three of these traits are combined through the utilization of various elements on a website, you gain what is known as an authority site otherwise known as a site with something called authority.
Typically, an authority site is credited as a trustworthy site for a particular search query. This means that the site is judged as reputable and trustworthy on a particular topic because of a number of different characteristics that are visible on the site. Among the most notable is links.
In order to gain authority for your website, it is important to associate and link your website to other reputable websites that are universally judged as authorities on the particular subjects that you are trying to specialize in. You are able to gain two things from linking to authority sites; you gain a higher reputation through association and you also gain a sort of “parent” website that you can study and copy in order to create the same perceived trustworthiness and reputability in your own website.
Beyond the basics of gaining a greater link campaign, authority can also be gained through other statistics such as page rank and recorded visitor behavior. Basic search engine optimization and a well maintained site will help attribute to authority. However, even more important than that is the role of visitors in determining your website’s perceived authority. If visitors stay on a website for long amount of times, search through the website, and return to the website of their own accord multiple times, the website will gain status as a reputable, professional, and reliable source of information.