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There are clearly benefits to both.
Brand -
Keyword -
If I were Nike, then I'd go with my brand name over 'shoes'. But as an unknown pest control guy, I'd take 'pestcontrol'
You aren't going to get much support for an automated link building system around here. You may want to check into some black hat forums for that kind of feedback.
In the end, if it's a tool or system that everyone can use than you are going to find that Google is already of aware of it, and that it will give you no competitive advantage because anyone can do it.
Having said that, many SEOs get a short boost from spamming tools, but at the cost of loosing all rankings in the future. If you want to play a game of constant building and burning then you are free to live the treadmill life of nonstop running.
Title & Description really get read?<sarcasm></sarcasm>
I appreciate the feedback. Very insightful. And it is reassuring to know that titles do help CTR.
So I did a little more digging. This is actually a branded term, and it appears that the maps listing is currently in the 2nd position. Which leads to the next potential discovery, ...Does google webmaster tools consider a map listing a rank 1-10? Further investigation of my keywords suggests "Yes". So the map listing is getting a higher CTR than the first position.
I'm digging through my Google Webmaster tools and found something really odd. On one particular keyword phrase Google is reporting a higher CTR on the 2nd position over the first. A lot higher. Per Google the 2nd position is getting a 31% CTR. Has anyone else seen this?
Well I am just a pest control guy....
But I don't think I am the only one that has had this happen to them.. http://www.seomoz.org/q/one-keyword-rank-inexplicably-blasted-into-oblivion
Link juice is lost in a redirect. You should never expect to gain 100% of link value from a redirect.
I'd certainly look at cleaning up the duplicate titles and content. Add cononicals if you have multiple URLs referencing the same material.
What does your link portfolio look like? Anchor text distribution?
If you don't see any huge red flags then take a breathe while google puts you under water. There is constant flux in the serps. Sometimes drops in rank are simply google testing. I've had sites drop out for a week or two at a time then rebound to where they were previously.
If you are saying you have 75k links from your domains cross linking then I would agree. Product websites have been under attack for awhile now.Tough one.
In my opinion, linking from sister sites can be done if the links are useful. Seomoz.org links to Mozcast.com. I link from my offsite blog to my main site. I believe that when the link is relevant then you can link it over. If the links are footer or done by a program that links all "key-word" mentions to the other site then it looks bad. The best place for links is in the content and where it is relevant. Diversify the anchor text. Make it more natural. Your hosting on these sites could also be affecting your linking. Are all the links from the same IP address? Are all of links coming form within your 3 sites?
There are many other reasons your rank could be dropping. Duplicate content, thin content, bad links.. For most product websites it seems that the product description is either too thin, or duplicate from all the other product descriptions for that item online. How unique is your product content?
When ever I approach a poor performing website, I try to evaluate all the onsite elements first. After I've fixed all of the onsite elements then I will look at linking problems.
An account with SEOmoz does give you historical ranking information... but only from the time you created your account. There is no system that will give you historical rankings from a date prior to beginning the ranking log. There are other factors you could use to determine if your site was hit and possibly determine a loss in ranking. General traffic loss would be the prime indicator. If your traffic took a huge dive when penguin went live then you can likely attribute that loss to the update.
As far as keywords go, you can compare keyword traffic to your site before and after the date. Sadly "Not Provided" can skew this data. You would need to look for changes greater than the "Not Provided" average. Most changes, however, are based on so few numbers that the margin for error is pretty high.
Honestly your best bet is to look at pre and post penguin traffic. I have a site that dropped by half. Conclusively a penguin attack.
You did say you were working on a "Pharma" site right? What other types of viagra sites exist besides spam sites?...
Kidding aside, sites may rank in spite of their poor link profiles. Links are not everything. They are a lot, but not everything. If the sites are old enough and perform well enough, their history may outweigh the updates. If you don't want to follow the crowd then better for you. Your very own diversified link portfolio is better than trying to match another site's. Go for links a spam site can't get. Get quality Edu links. Put out quality content. Go for long tail search and rankings. Watch your site slowly pick up speed. It's a slow road, but has sure footing.
Or follow the crowd and go for that automated link building. Just remember, if you want a quick road to the top then you can expect a rapid decent as well.
Disclaimer, either approach could fail, either could win. Know your risks.
No language change on the servers. I know I shouldn't be worried but hey, it's my baby. All grown up and going off to a college of her own now...
The upgrade should help with site speed so I am hoping that I might get a boost.
Good to know that the SEO isn't harmed if there are no errors... I can see how a site missing the htaccess could be damaging. Ouch.