Did Google just release another massive update in September?

[BlueLinkERP]

Our number of external links has dropped by over 50% in mid-September!

So far our domain authority hasn't been impacted and traffic is only slightly down.

I did not hear of any major Google changes . . . did this happen to anyone else?

[OlegKorneitchouk]

Have you checked the links that dropped? Maybe your link or that page just no longer exists. Likewise, G could be discrediting some negative links and therefor you aren't seeing them. There were many updates last month (October) and a few in September.

If your traffic is only slightly down, I would just continue to build high quality links to your site and not do anything drastic.

[ElevateMP]

Google went through 65 changes for Aug and Sept, not all related to search mind you, but some of these changes were aimed at "helping find more high-quality content from trusted sources". So if half of your external links were coming from link farms or sites that Google deems untrustworthy, that would explain it.

Hope that helps.

Mike

[BlueLinkERP]

How would I go about checking the links that have been dropped? From what I have been told, SEOmoz has no way of looking back at individual historic links . . .

[BlueLinkERP]

Our link building has always been legitimate so I don't think that would explain it. It is very odd to see 20,000 links (half of our total count) disappear in a single week.

It has not seemed to impact much though. At least, not yet . . .

[OlegKorneitchouk]

I don't think SEOMoz has that option but you can check out ahrefs and majesticseo - they both track backlinks gained/lost.