Implications from portfolio site

[MickEdwards]

I'm looking for a bit of advice regarding links coming into main site from another site in the client portfolio.

The main site we are working on has been going great, organic traffic has grown considerably.  The past few weeks there has been a subtle decline including ranking for a few keywords down a little.

What I have noticed is that there is another site in the portfolio (that I am not working on) has had a steady tailspin in organic traffic since Jan and i've been informed it is a dying site in terms of the products offered.  This has some links in the main menu going directly to the main site. My gut feeling is to isolate the secondary site from the main (no-follow or remove links), but the impact on slightly dropped rankings on the main site is not directly related to those linked pages.  Would you go for it and isolate anyway?

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Michael,

Unless it is very clearly explained, a menu link to another external site, is considered pretty bad form. When someone clicks on your menu, they expect to then stay on your site, not be taken off somewhere else.

I am unsure if this would be a direct cause for any decline in ranking, but it is certainly something that needs to be taken care of.

There are so many reasons for a little decline in the SERPs though. Anything from others doing SEO (so knocking you down) to a change to an algorithm. If it is only subtle, I wouldn't think it is a penalty though.

-Andy

[MickEdwards]

Yes I know what you mean - the external links are not directly explained, but there are signals on the site to keep visitors shall we say relaxed. I don't like it but i'm not in the position to advise on that site at the moment.

It's possibly something on-site going on - same server for both as it's IIS (DNN).  If I overlay the GA organic results  for both sites they are identical (good and bad) apart from the second site being far more accentuated.

At least if we separate link wise then that will remove that possibility.