During an account review in November 2025, [1] was identified as having a critically low Domain Rating (DR) of 2 — well below the 25+ scores held by local competitors. This article documents the technical SEO recovery plan initiated to address that gap, centered on a paid backlink service and Ahrefs competitor monitoring setup.
This account is being treated as a [2], with Ben San Fratello leading execution and Mark Hope providing oversight.
"How come I've been paying you for three years and my domain rating is two?" — Mark Hope, illustrating the client's likely perspective
The low DR is a compounding problem: without backlink authority, even well-optimized pages struggle to rank, and the site's existing content was already failing to target relevant keywords.
Mark initiated a $200 backlink service (resold at $250 to the client) with the goal of raising the DR from 2 to 30 within 30 days.
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Service cost | $200 |
| Client price | $250 |
| Target DR | 30 |
| Timeline | ~30 days |
| Tracking tool | Ahrefs (updates DR metric monthly) |
Important caveat: Ahrefs only updates the Domain Rating metric once per month, so improvement will not be visible in real time. Monitor on the monthly Ahrefs refresh cycle.
A DR of 30 won't make the site dominant, but it closes the gap with the weakest local competitors and gives on-page SEO and content efforts a foundation to build on. The same service was already initiated for [3], where DR was at 28 heading toward 50.
Two Ahrefs configurations were completed during the review session to establish baseline monitoring:
The following local competitors were added to Ahrefs for ongoing monitoring:
Note: Infinity Roofing is a larger regional company, not a pure local competitor. Use SpyFu alongside Ahrefs to isolate Madison-specific keyword data.
Recommended next step: Run a Madison-localized competitor search using a VPN (set browser location to Madison, WI) and cross-reference results in both Ahrefs and SpyFu to identify keyword gaps.
A new Ahrefs tracking tag was added to the Exterior Renovations website. It will take a few days to begin populating visitor data in the dashboard.
| Metric | Tool | Cadence |
|---|---|---|
| Domain Rating | Ahrefs | Monthly (Ahrefs update cycle) |
| Organic traffic trend | Ahrefs / Google Search Console | Weekly |
| Competitor DR & referring domains | Ahrefs | Monthly |
| Visitor data | Ahrefs (new tag) | Weekly once populated |