Hitwise Data Pegs Panda Impact On Demand Media Sites At 40%

Demand Media sites have suffered an estimated loss of about 40% of overall Google traffic since the Panda/Farmer update took effect. That’s according to new Experian Hitwise statistics measuring outbound traffic from Google to other sites, and reported today by Forbes.

The Hitwise numbers suggest that about 0.57% of all outbound Google traffic went to Demand Media sites in early January, but that’s dropped to 0.34% as of April 23rd. That’s an overall loss of 40% when measuring outbound/downstream traffic from Google.

On an individual basis, Hitwise includes these Demand sites and their estimated losses:

• Answerbag.com: 80% decline when measuring outbound Google traffic to it
• LiveStrong.com: 57% decline
• eHow.com: 29% decline

Yahoo properties are also on the Hitwise list, with AssociatedContent.com dropping 61% and Yahoo Answers down 13%. It also includes stats for several other winners and losers that have been mentioned in pervious articles, like Mahalo.com (down 78%), EzineArticles.com (down 77%) and YouTube (up 20%).

Demand Media’s sites reportedly escaped harm when the first Panda/Farmer update was pushed out in late February. But when the algorithm was expanded two weeks ago, eHow.com was named one of the losers by companies that estimate overall search visibility. Demand Media admitted that its sites had been impacted, but said the third-party reports were significantly overstated.