(updated) Huge Drop in Traffic Related to DMCA...?

[Linwright]

(update: How would I know if someone has filed a DMCA Takedown Request? There is no message on Webmaster Tools. The reason I ask is because a few months back my client's old SEO threatened him with copyright infringement, and I believe the date of the threatening letter coincides with our drop in traffic. Coincidence?)

We've been increasing traffic for a pest control client on a very consistent basis throughout the year. However, in October we noticed a drop but I honestly didn't dig too deeply into the issue. In November we saw another drop...a very large drop...in traffic. Since September, we've lost 50% of search traffic.

We've lost specifically branded search traffic, which baffles me. What are some reasons for losing branded search traffic? I've consulted the client and asked if there is anything happening within the business that I should know about, but things seem to pretty normal as far as he can tell.

We are also losing rankings dramatically. We've had two locations on Google Places pending for over a month, which I've consulted Google about but, of course, have received no response.

The strangest part is that SEOMoz is showing our errors on site have increased dramatically, when we have done nothing new or different over these past few months. It's been business as usual, and yet we are losing traffic, rankings, and errors have gone up.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated! http://www.MagicPest.com

Thank you!

[Linwright]

Yep, this definitely is an issue that we are painstakingly working through. The old SEO really did a number on their content. Thanks so much!

[eli.boda]

It has to be something related to their recent algo updates.

This little chunk of text might be your problem as it is showing up on most pages - http://screencast.com/t/3SakXPlpL.

1. This is duplicate content.

2. It also looks like keyword stuffing

3. More than the suggested amount of links

4. Google might be viewing it as an excessive and unnatural internal linking strategy

I can't guarantee this is the main cause of the problems, but it might be contributing to it. Google's just getting way more picky about this stuff

[Linwright]

Thanks Streamline Metrics! Yes, the drop has been across all keywords. I've checked our branded rankings and they have remained the same as branded traffic has decreased. And yes, I did check Google Webmaster Tools and do not see anything fishy, although it does appear that Google is crawling less pages, though not sure why. It's got to be the recent Google updates.

[StreamlineMetrics]

Usually a drop in branded traffic can be attributed to a change in offline advertising, such as ending TV or radio commercials or flyers in those coupon magazines. But if the client says everything has remained the same, then I'm not 100% sure what to tell you without actually digging into the data. Did you notice a similar drop in non-branded keywords? Or only branded terms?

Have you claimed your site in Google Webmaster Tools? Have you gotten any messages from Google about possible penalties (usually from unnatural linkbuilding), site errors or even possible malware?

Also, there have been several Panda updates/refreshes the past few months, which may have had an impact on your site if you have several pages with low quality content.