Web Ranking of Higher Education Institutions: An SEO Analysis

There are numerous ranking systems that provide web rankings for colleges and universities around the world. The aim of this paper is to present the findings of SEO audit and analysis of 34 HEI websites in Oman in terms of web presence and impact. The study used the SEO audit metrics-domain authority score, linking root domain, ranking keywords, and spam score which are provided by Moz. The findings revealed that only one (1) HEI has achieved a good quality for domain authority while all the others have obtained a low quality only for domain authority. The same HEI has scored high on the linking root domains and ranking keywords. However, 24 % of the HEIs have attained a zero spam score while 76% of the HEIs have attained a low spam score. The study recommends that HEIs should exert more efforts in improving their SEO to increase visibility and impact on the web.