Everyone's listing the same metrics, but you asked the real question: how to judge relevance, not what to name.
My checklist is pretty simple: niche relevance, organic traffic trend, indexation, content quality, outbound link profile, anchor diversity, and whether the site has a real audience.
Outbound links that have nothing to do with the site. A gardening blog quietly linking out to casino, essay writing and CBD from three month old posts is a link seller's shop window, and Google has seen a million of them. I do not care how clean the DR looks at that point.
I check topical relevance real organics traffic indexing rate outbound link quality. And the site have generic engagement not a DA.
i believe the error lies in using DA as a quick fix for qualiity. when doing outreach work i value more if the website has managed to build trust on the subject. in most cases i will consider if theeir content is relevant, their traffic is consistent if the audience is engaging nd if their articles are helping the users. a niche website that has the right audience may sometimes be better than a highlly authoritative website.
Check if the site gets real organic traffic and whether it's regularly updated. A relevant site with real visitors is usually a better pick than a high DA site with no activity.
