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Antony,

If your site structure is to remain the same use Google's Step by Step Guide to Migrating a Domain

Google recommends redirecting all pages. After you follow Google's suggestions on the move there are things you can do to speed this up. Tweet every URL on your new site that you want indexed. Check the site: indexation for inclusion of the new pages and don't forget the sitemap and Google Webmaster Tools for your URL preference.

Any time I have a question about valid HTML I go to the Source. W3C has an invaluable tool for HTML . Becoming familiar with this will help you always create clean code.

The tried and true methods are keyword research and those you mentioned but to your question, I have always found that observation and opinion posts work very well for us. Whether you observe your industry, your city, your coworkers, your backyard, your commute to work, all are good idea generators. It pays to throw out the old preconceptions and just let it come. Sometimes the harder I try to create content, the harder it is. Forget the box let alone thinking outside of it. Reading is also very helpful. Read all you can about your field and your hobbies. Sometimes a connection happens when least expected. You could actually build out this Q and A and make it a topic to write about. Happy writing

I don't think it's the quantity so much as the quality. EGOL alluded to this. Semantic processing of keywords in relation to other keywords in a context relevant to the search term is key. We have examples of this where our site beats much larger and authoritative sites on long tail keyword phrases even with their brand name included. This is as a direct result of the number of ways the keyword is used in relation to other keywords.

Some really crafty ways to increase clickthrough and enhance your listings in general can be found here. This post should provide you with some other great ideas for your ecomm site as well.

Grader is an overview. Use the SEOMoz Web app for a much clearer picture of your site. Just curious what conflicts?

Not only are they above the free listings but they are on every page at the top. Thus citing your example of 5 pages they would have 5 citations; Where a free listing would only appear on one.

In addition, Google has a crawl budget - how long they spend on a site and page. If these limits are reached there is a possibility that the lower listings don't get crawled or acknowledged especially if they are buried deep into the navigation levels of a site.

I would say yes this hurts. It confuses the signals that Google looks at for it's ranking factors. now with blended search becoming more prevalent, the data integrity should be consistent. See David Mihm's authoritative Local ranking factors.

Great find on that post. It lays it all out. As long as the silos are thin (not more than 2 layers beneath the home page) it can bring a benefit to adding extra ranking pages with minimal work comparatively. Rand talks about eliminating the bottom layer of the hierarchy to push the content up a level and make the resulting pages extremely stout. The major problem is always going to be the end of the chain. He calls them PageRank sinks.

I gotta go with EGOL on this one. Change the link where you can and 301 where you can't.

I think we're all very lucky to have such problems. This field is so diverse and there are opportunities everywhere. I'd study 100% if I could. I like it that much, alas there are bills. In direct response to your statement there's an old saying that if you love what you do you never work a day in your life. Sounds like you do. Congrats.

I have a motto "Google likes Google" for this reason alone its worth the few minutes it takes to add. - Just my Opinion

Please have a look at this question about local listing services : Manual submission trumps auto submissions in many ways. I know you're looking for a down and dirty service but like the post states - you can end up causing more work by using a service. I've used UBL and frankly was unimpressed.

The quickest and most effective way to get quality is to submit to the Acxiom, infoUSA and Localeze databases directly as they feed many of the directories you should be looking for. This does 2 things - it lets you control the quality and offers a short list for future changes.

I would suggest researching the traffic sources in detail if possible to see if a referring site dropped thus causing your decline. Maybe they got hit with the update and not your site.

Any time I have a question about valid HTML I go to the Source. W3C has an invaluable tool for HTML . Becoming familiar with this will help you always create clean code.

Directory Links most certainly still work. If you use this strategy make it a part of your overall link-building campaign but not the be all and end all. Also check the value and relevance of the directories as they may be subject to scrutiny by Google in the future. Good research here will serve you well. Make sure the page you're listing will potentially go on is strong and not loaded with other links as the power gets diluted with the number of links per page.

I like to call it building a diversified link portfolio using many tactics to guard against any major hiccups with a change in the algorithms of the Search Engines. Check out the webinars under the Learn SEO tab and the SEOMoz blog under the Community tab for great detailed info on tactics.

Time to diversify and in a hurry. Good old fashioned niche directories still work and haven't gotten crushed nearly as bad as the farms. The trickle down effect is sure to come and when it does it won't be pretty if most of your campaigns were based on articles. Try the juicy link finder tool or any number of the other link tools here.There is also this awesome linkbuilding resource to get you going.

One more tactic I use here is to use the keyword difficulty tool to find the top ranking sites for your terms and do an OSE analysis for gems.

Nice Find on that article and Congrats on the Guru status

Not only are they above the free listings but they are on every page at the top. Thus citing your example of 5 pages they would have 5 citations; Where a free listing would only appear on one.

In addition, Google has a crawl budget - how long they spend on a site and page. If these limits are reached there is a possibility that the lower listings don't get crawled or acknowledged especially if they are buried deep into the navigation levels of a site.

When I see questions about PageRank I always first point to this Awesome Pagerank Document. It lays it all out for you.