If you want to clearly demonstrate that you are the expert in your niche, I have a great SEO strategy for you: Topical Authority!
This strategy is all about consistently proving your expertise in your field, whether through blog posts, guest articles, videos, podcasts, or other formats. Over time, if you do this often enough, you’ll become well-known for your topic.
On the one hand, users will recognize you for your subject (topic), and on the other hand, so will search engines. And this SEO strategy of “Topical Authority” is all about earning that recognition from search engines.
On this page, you’ll find everything about this topic: what it means to achieve Topical Authority, how to get there, and what you need to keep in mind.
What is Topical Authority, and why does it matter?
In the SEO world, there is a lot of talk about Topical Authority, but until I accidentally became an authority on the topic of Interrail with my travel blog, I thought: just another SEO strategy.
What I understand by Topical Authority in SEO is that Google becomes absolutely certain that you are knowledgeable in a specific area. This means, for example, if you sell project management consulting and Google grants you Topical Authority for this topic, it will consistently check if the answers to related queries can be found on your site. Because it already trusts you on this topic.
The result? You rank quickly and with little effort for anything related to that topic. And that is exactly what we want for our website.opical Authority is a popular concept in the SEO world, but I only fully understood its value when I unintentionally became a go-to source for Interrail on my travel blog. Initially, it seemed like just another buzzword in SEO.
Case Study: Achieving Topical Authority
I briefly mentioned my travel blog earlier, where I achieved Topical Authority for Interrail. And that happened purely by chance because, at the time, I didn’t even know what I was doing.
You can dive deeper into this story on the Moz blog, where I wrote about it in detail: Topical Authority Case Study.
What I want to highlight here are some experiences that completely convinced me that Topical Authority is a really interesting SEO strategy:
Competing with Giants
Everything started with my post on “Interrail Routes in Italy,” where I wasn’t happy with any of the top 10 results and decided to do something completely different. I planned five possible train routes through Italy that anyone could easily follow.
The result? When you now search for “interrail routes Italy” on Google, my post ranks comfortably at position 2, nestled between pages from Interrail itself, which has a much higher domain authority than mine.
I didn’t engage in link building or anything similar. I simply published better content. The amazing part was that after this post, all my Interrail-related articles suddenly started ranking on the first page.
Ranking for Unrelated Content
When I achieved Topical Authority for Interrail and all my posts related to the topic suddenly ranked on the first page, one post on page two immediately caught my attention.
This was a post about “meeting people while backpacking.” The post offered a few suggestions on what you could do but didn’t even mention the word Interrail.
Yet suddenly, it was ranking on page two of Google for the term “meeting people during Interrail.” That was the moment when everything clicked for me, like the light bulb turning on above my head.
A New Post Ranking in Days
But that wasn’t the end of it. For my Moz article, I conducted an experiment and started a post about “Interrail with a Bike.” What I wanted to demonstrate was how quickly you can get a post to rank on Google if it’s about your topic.
The post is far from perfect, because dealing with bikes and Interrail is ridiculously complicated, and at some point, I just lost the motivation to research further.
The post went live on September 18, 2023, and immediately climbed to top positions for the relevant keywords. And yes, I know the clicks were modest at first, but that’s because Interrail keywords have their peak season from spring (planning phase) to summer (travel season).
Currently, the post is ranking at position 3, at least here in Switzerland.
Topical Authority vs. Domain Authority
I’ve mentioned Topical Authority and Domain Authority a few times.
While Domain Authority is built through activities like link building and digital PR, Topical Authority focuses on showing Google that you are the expert for a specific topic.
On my travel blog, for example, I managed to rank without heavy link building, purely by building Topical Authority.
For more on this, read my article: The New Ranking Factor: Topical Authority.
What the Google Leak Reveals About Topical Authority
In June 2024, the entire SEO world was a bit stirred up, busy, and, one could say, confused. The reason? A leak of Google’s internal documentation about the programming of their search algorithm. It was an extensive set of lines and pages describing code details.
Everyone analyzed what could be learned from it, and I took a closer look at the topic of Topical Authority. It was truly fascinating to see how this might work in Google’s eyes.
For the full analysis, check out: Google Leak Insights: Understanding Topical Authority.
When NOT to Use Topical Authority
I want to be honest with you: there are cases where I would definitely advise against this strategy. Because as great as Topical Authority sounds, it has its downsides.
It Can Take a Really Long Time
Let’s be realistic: you don’t become an expert overnight. Even with my travel blog, I had written extensively about Interrail before my big breakthrough. I often compare this to YouTube stars. People think, “Wow, they blew up overnight,” but in reality, they’ve likely been uploading videos consistently for months or even years that barely anyone watched.
This can be super discouraging, and the same applies to Topical Authority. So, this SEO strategy is certainly not the one to use if you’re looking for quick traffic gains.
Be Careful with Topical Authority for Client Projects
The previous point is incredibly important when it comes to client projects. We all know the skepticism some clients have towards SEO. And the “I’ll try SEO for six months” mentality. In such cases, you need to show results quickly, and Topical Authority is definitely the wrong strategy for that.
If you decide to implement an SEO strategy based on Topical Authority for a client project, you need to make sure that the client trusts you and is in it for the long haul. Most importantly, you must set expectations clearly from the start to avoid unpleasant surprises.
Switching Topics is Not That Simple
The issue isn’t necessarily that switching topics is hard. The real challenge is that if you choose a new topic or want to cover a second topic, you’re essentially starting from scratch.
For example, if Google has positioned you as a Topical Authority in the SEO field, it’s incredibly motivating to write more articles on that topic. But if you want to expand your business into content marketing, for instance, you’re back at square one. Everything you write in this new area won’t just rank effortlessly on page one. And that’s super frustrating!
This isn’t just theoretical; I’ve experienced this myself.
That’s why it’s so important to be clear about this from the outset.
Not Every Business Model is Suitable for Topical Authority
There are businesses out there that are absolute specialists, and others that are more generalists. The latter are definitely not suited to building their SEO strategy around Topical Authority, because what topic would they even choose?
My favorite example is two sports equipment stores. On the one hand, there’s Bike World (well-known in Switzerland, but that’s irrelevant for this example). Bike World sells, as the name suggests, bicycles. E-bikes, mountain bikes, racing bikes, etc. They sell everything from the bikes themselves to accessories and even offer repairs.
This is a specialist business, and we could easily start building Topical Authority around bicycles here.
On the other hand, there’s Decathlon. Decathlon sells everything: gear for hiking, cycling, swimming, horse riding, fishing, hunting, tennis, soccer, running, and so on.
What should they build Topical Authority on? Sports? That’s definitely too broad. Decathlon, as a generalist, should definitely look for a different SEO strategy.
Step-by-Step to Topical Authority on Google
If you’ve decided to build your SEO strategy around Topical Authority, the next big question is: how do you actually do it?
I’ve written a detailed article for Rivalflow that you can read here: Rivalflow article.
But here’s a quick summary of what you should do.
Step 1: Find Your Topic
First, you need to choose a topic. This is usually dictated by your business since your services already suggest a certain topic and expertise.
But I want you to define it precisely and break it into subtopics. For example, for the bike shop mentioned earlier, a subtopic could be e-bikes, another could be mountain bikes, or even more specific ones like e-bike batteries or bicycle brakes.
Select 2-3 subtopics to start your research with.
Why be so specific? Simply because we don’t want to spend the next six months just on keyword research but rather get started with one area.
Step 2: Keyword Research
When doing keyword research, I want you to dig deep. Don’t just choose high-volume keywords; go all the way to zero-volume keywords or even topics frequently discussed in forums that might not have keywords yet.
Why? Because with surface-level topics and basics, we don’t prove we’re true experts in a subject. But if we answer super specific questions no one else addresses, we show the depth of our knowledge.
Step 3: Create High-Quality, Helpful Content
Once we’ve completed keyword research and created a content plan, it’s time to produce high-quality, helpful content. Here are three tips for you:
Start with Specific Posts, Known as Long-Tail Keywords
If you want to prove you’re an expert, you don’t start by quoting the absolute basics. That only shows you’ve acquired foundational knowledge. Instead, you show true expertise by providing solutions to very specific problems.
This is the logic behind starting with long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are search terms with lower volume, are less generic, and often consist of multiple words. For instance, “shoes” is a generic keyword, but “red shoes with 5-cm heels” is very specific and long-tail.
The advantage of starting this way is that you face less competition, making it much easier to rank for these terms than for the generic ones. This can already bring you initial successes—never a bad thing.
Don’t Cram Everything into One Post
Sometimes, it’s better to create a separate page for each specific topic or question rather than cramming everything into one post. Unlike here, where I’ve put everything into one post, split your topics into shorter, more focused posts. The internet is full of articles that take hours to read (especially in the SEO world, I know). That doesn’t always need to be the case.
Perhaps you’ve heard of the Hub & Spoke model for creating topic clusters. It’s about having many pages on specific subtopics that are briefly introduced in a main article (the Hub), where readers can dive deeper into a topic (the Spokes) if they’re interested. This is exactly how you should structure your topic. As mentioned earlier, we’re starting with the Spokes.

Publish Beyond Your Website
This is my pro tip and something you should consider during your keyword research. But more on that under “Pro Tip” below.
Step 4: Monitor and Adjust Performance
Once everything is published, we want to monitor the website’s performance. That means keeping an eye on Google Search Console, setting up keyword tracking, and creating regular reports.
I want you to keep one thing in mind above all: the entire topic. It’s not just about individual posts—though they matter—but the sum of all the posts you’ve written on the subject.
What happens is that once you’ve achieved Topical Authority, all your posts on that topic start ranking better. And that’s what you should focus on.
When you reach this point, it’s time to revise posts that aren’t performing well and, when enough content is online, conduct a content audit. But that’s a topic for another day.
Pro Tip: Go Beyond Your Website
My final tip, as teased earlier, is not to limit yourself to writing about your topic on your own website. You should also demonstrate your expertise outside of your website.
This has several advantages. First, you’ll get in front of new people who don’t know you yet. Second, it’s another confirmation for Google that you’re featured in important magazines, blogs, etc., with your expertise. This helps you gain authority.
Finally, this will become increasingly important with AI search. All these AI tools draw their information not only from your website but from everywhere.
So, go out there, show your expertise on prominent blogs, podcasts, and at conference talks. Just as I’ve demonstrated throughout this article.
Dive even deeper into Topical Authority
I’ve already talked about Topical Authority in several podcasts, given various talks, and as you’ve seen throughout this article, written guest posts on the topic. Here are a few additional links to dive deeper, especially in video and audio formats:
Vixen Digital | How To Build Topical Authority in SEO with Dani Leitner | SEOs Getting Coffee Ep. 16 |
Collaborator.pro | Podcast with Collaborator.pro Building Topical Authority in SEO: Dani Leitner’s Expert Insights |
The SEO Club | SEO Prediction for 2025 (related to Topical Authority obviously) |
My Talk at BrightonSEO October 2025 | How to create topical authority to make search engines love you |
P.S. There’s more content coming soon, but I’m waiting for the videos and podcasts to be released. This page will definitely be updated again.