Big Google Slap

Hi everyone,
Since the day I started my site, I had it fully optimized, in every way I know of. I had the keyword in the URL, tons of backlinks, etc etc... For this keyterm, I was ranked #3 on Google, just behind the "official" site that used this keyword. I noticed about a month ago, I was no longer ranked, and was losing traffic for that keyword. After optimizing with WebCEO and then with IBP, BOTH for this keyword, and even keyword sniping it, I am unable to get reranked for it.

What the hellllll am I doing wrong? Did I just get slapped, now Im fucked? I'm not even sure what I did illegally, other then it being a BANs site. But I have thousands of pages of information.

Is it likely because a lot of the pages are "headlines" that I got from other sites? Even though I still have lots of relevant original pages?

well, how long were you at #3 before you noticed being dropped?

Maybe the duplicate content that you have is the cause.

BANS sites got hit hard by G, that along with possible duplicate content could have gotten you slapped.

I was #3 for probably 3-4 months.

regroup with new domain-- start over-- Bans sites almost always go down with the Big "G"

.info? or .com? Preowned? or New?

funny my bans sites actually just went up in the pr rank in the last update.

but are they still ranked in the serps?

You need to add original articles to your BANS stores in order for them to stay indexed. Otherwise the spiders see the same basic script, ebay rss feed, and other similar template structure and they kick it.

It was .net property. And other keyterms are still ranked.