DomDetailer Majestic Referring Subnets reports how many distinct network subnets host the sites linking to a URL, using Majestic data supplied through DomDetailer. It is a diversity proxy, not a link count — and a value of 0 can mean either no recorded subnets or simply that provider data was unavailable.
| Factor ID | RG-BLK-007 |
|---|---|
| Family | Backlinks & authority |
| Measurement | Provider-supplied count |
| Measured zone | Off-page URL/domain data |
What it measures
This factor reports the diversity of referring network subnets represented in Majestic data. A subnet is a slice of IP address space, so counting distinct subnets across a URL’s backlink profile approximates how many independent networks the linking sites sit on. The idea is that citations spread across many unrelated networks look more organic than a cluster of links concentrated on a single host or provider.
How RankGear measures it
RankGear reads the dd_majesticRefSubnets value for the exact result URL and returns it as the factor score. When that data is absent from the provider response, RankGear returns 0. The number is taken as-supplied from Majestic via DomDetailer — RankGear does not recompute subnet membership itself.
| If the subnet count is… | What it likely indicates |
|---|---|
| 0 | No referring subnets were recorded — or Majestic/DomDetailer data was unavailable for this URL |
| Low relative to total backlinks | Links concentrate on a few networks or hosts |
| High relative to total backlinks | Citations are spread across many independent networks |
How to optimize it
Treat this as an observation about your backlink profile, not a target to engineer. Pursue genuine citations across independent, relevant publishers rather than attempting to manipulate infrastructure diversity. A healthy subnet spread tends to follow naturally when links come from a broad set of real, editorially distinct sites; gaming the underlying hosting is both fragile and off the point.
Important considerations
- Subnet count is an indirect diversity proxy — it infers network independence from IP space, not from editorial independence.
- Hosting arrangements can distort it: several unrelated sites on one provider, or one publisher across many, can skew the count either way.
- Missing provider data also produces 0, so a low reading is not proof that diversity is genuinely low.
- Editorial relevance of the linking sites remains more important than raw subnet spread.
- This is a correlation-based prioritization signal observed within a measured result set; a higher subnet count does not by itself cause or guarantee a ranking.
Related factors
Part of the Factors reference · how RankGear measures · glossary.