Case study · Pool & spa
How Compass Pools became Australia’s #1 fibreglass pool brand in search
A decade of integrated content and authority building put Compass clearly ahead of every national fibreglass competitor — on traffic, domain authority, keyword footprint and search value.
- Client
- Compass Pools Australia
- Location
- National + dealer network
- Year
- 2015–2026
- Services
- SEO · Content · Authority building · Technical SEO
- 10.4KMonthly organic traffic — #1 of 5, 46% ahead of the nearest rival
- DR 54Highest Domain Rating in the category
- 556Keywords ranking in Google’s top 3
- $5.0KMonthly organic traffic value
The category, and the numbers
Fibreglass pools is one of Australia’s most contested home-improvement search markets. We benchmarked Compass against four of the strongest national manufacturers on the metrics that actually drive enquiries.
How this was measured: every figure comes from Ahrefs — Site Explorer and the Ahrefs AI-responses index — captured on 16 July 2026, compared against 16 July 2021.
The scoreboard
| Brand | DR | Organic traffic | Traffic value | Keywords | Top-3 | Ref. domains |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Compass Pools | 54 | 10,442 | $5.0K | 1,800 | 556 | 955 |
| Leisure Pools | 46 | 7,158 | $3.4K | 949 | 427 | 559 |
| Barrier Reef Pools | 46 | 6,065 | $3.9K | 994 | 501 | 813 |
| Narellan Pools | 42 | 2,309 | $1.4K | 399 | 177 | 1,600 |
| Freedom Pools | 41 | 1,884 | $1.2K | 341 | 115 | 2,500 |
Source: Ahrefs, 16 July 2026. Compass leads every commercial metric despite fewer referring domains than Narellan or Freedom.
The trajectory
Five years of momentum
A single snapshot can flatter anyone. Over five years, Compass is the only brand in the set to climb steadily to the top of the category and hold it.
| Brand | July 2021 | July 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Compass Pools | 6,358 | 10,442 | ▲ +64% |
| Leisure Pools | 3,928 | 7,158 | ▲ +82% |
| Barrier Reef Pools | 4,887 | 6,065 | ▲ +24% |
| Narellan Pools | 9,073 | 2,309 | ▼ −75% |
| Freedom Pools | 2,266 | 1,884 | ▼ −17% |
Monthly organic traffic. Source: Ahrefs, 16 July 2026 vs 16 July 2021.
Competitor spotlight
Narellan Pools: the front-runner Compass overtook
In July 2021 Narellan was pulling 9,073 monthly organic visits — more than Compass at the time — with 546 keywords in Google’s top three to Compass’s 421. Compass overtook them and kept climbing, while Narellan declined — even as its referring domains rose from 278 to 1,600.
- −75%Narellan organic traffic, 2021 → 2026
- −54%Narellan top-3 keywords (546 → 251)
- 4.5×Compass now out-traffics Narellan
AI search
Visibility in AI answers
Compass is one of just two fibreglass brands with real presence in the AI answers buyers increasingly rely on — in a close race with Barrier Reef.
| Brand | AI Overviews | Google AI Mode | ChatGPT | Perplexity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barrier Reef Pools | 393 | 517 | 7 | 20 |
| Compass Pools | 314 | 364 | 7 | 22 |
| Leisure Pools | 139 | 176 | 9 | 4 |
| Narellan Pools | 99 | 129 | 2 | 1 |
| Freedom Pools | 14 | 36 | 1 | 1 |
Source: Ahrefs AI responses index, 16 July 2026 (new index; figures move quickly).
What we did
A continuously expanded content library
Content targeting every stage of the pool-buyer journey, built out over more than ten years.
Disciplined technical SEO
Across a large, multi-page, dealer-linked site — so authority signals flow where they’re needed.
Sustained authority building
Growing a high-quality referring-domain profile and Domain Rating faster and more efficiently than the category.
The evidence
Straight from the source
Every number above comes from these Ahrefs Site Explorer dashboards, captured on 16 July 2026.
Compass Pools — DR 54, 10.4K organic traffic, 556 top-3 keywords
Leisure Pools — DR 46, 7.2K organic traffic
Barrier Reef Pools — DR 46, 6.1K organic traffic
Narellan Pools — DR 42, 2.3K organic traffic (down from 9.1K)
Freedom Pools — 2.5K referring domains, 1.9K organic traffic
Full Ahrefs performance charts
Referring-domains, organic-traffic and position history for each brand. Filenames keep their original screenshot timestamps as evidence of provenance.
Compass Pools · 19:53:59
Compass Pools · 19:54:50
Narellan Pools · 19:55:59
Narellan Pools · 19:56:11
Leisure Pools · 19:56:56
Leisure Pools · 19:57:07
Barrier Reef Pools · 19:58:19
Barrier Reef Pools · 19:58:34
Freedom Pools · 19:59:45
Freedom Pools · 19:59:58
Authority built patiently over a decade is the hardest advantage in search to replicate quickly — and the profile that put Compass on top is the same one that keeps it there.
