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Avvo provides only one follow link, and that is in the person's profile.  Links in answers are nofollow. As a result, answering questions on Avvo should not harm a site.

I answer a lot of questions on Avvo and it hasn't hurt my firm's site. I often put relevant links in the link section of my answers. For example, if I am answering a question about medical malpractice, I might put a link to a page I wrote on the basic requirements for a medical malpractice case.  However, I do not put links to my firm in every answer. I only use links when I think the person might be a potential client for my firm and I would like to guide him/her to my firm's site.

I agree with irvingw that your client may well be doing this sort of thing all over the web, which might be the source of the problem. In addition, if your client is adding a general non-useful link back to his website, he might be violating Avvo's terms of service.

I see a lot of disavowing in your future.

I thought you would like to know, I figured out the problem. My traffic had not dropped at all.  The problem was actually with the tracking code.  When my programmer went to add in the new, more advanced Google tracking code, it didn't work properly. I was actually waiting for Yoast to update its plugin to work with the new code, so I put it out of my mind for the moment.

Well, the initial effort to put in the new code caused a problem, resulting in (a) an artificially low bounce rate and (b) artificially low traffic reporting.

The page deletion had nothing to do with it.

Phew.

Thank you, everyone, for your input.

No, you cannot edit Avvo answers.   I suppose you can ask the folks at Avvo to just remove all of client's answers. No idea whether they will do it for you. I have had them remove an answer or three for me, so it can't hurt to ask.  Not sure how your client will feel about you doing that, of course.

You better believe it! My traffic is already showing an upward spike.