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All great points. The individual sites are going to be re-designed as they are old designs and the content is a little thin. I will take all your points into consideration and make a decision. Thanks for the great answer!

The exact threshold that Google uses to determine duplicate content is a tricky one. The more important question is, are you noticing a problem? Are both pages being indexed (2013 & 2014)? When you search for the 2014 model in Google, is it showing up in the search results or is it being filtered out as duplicate content? If your content isn't being indexed or isn't ranking, then you have a problem. Panda also can be an issue, but only if a large portion of your site is duplicated. Is this model upgrade process something you apply to 1 or 2 products, or are you talking hundreds? What proportion of your site is nearly duplicate content compared to original content. If the percentage is too large, you could be at risk of Panda. If this is only for a couple of pages, you can always just take a little time to re-write the description from last year to improve its uniqueness, and also bolster the page with unique content like user reviews and new photos & videos of your product. Once a product model is discontinued, you can also 301 redirect it to the newer models.

It's definitely us down under here in Australia.  The thing I would recommend is getting started on reconfirming your categories and your listing addresses now.  Google has started heavily validating categories and making sure only one of each type of business is at an address (is it possible to have 8 photographers in one building?  Sure, but not likely.) Just review things now, while you have the chance. We're re-validating a LOT of clients and it's a lot of work.

The best thing to do is to create assets on these product listings where you can add certain unique content to the pages and minimize the duplicate and a "mix" to these specific listings. great implementation is Zillow. check out these home listings on zillow and see the zillowestimates and other information that zillow provide to the user. the mix is helping getting their listings rank higher because they are differentiating themselves from others. but adding more "information" from the data they are collecting. hope it helps

Apparently there's a workaround for Canadian businesses: http://www.stepforth.com/blog/2013/get-listed-on-bing-local-canada/ Hope that helps!

Have a read of this page http://www.seomoz.org/blog/retargeting-basics-what-it-is-how-to-use-it half way down it has a paragraph on remarketing and how it is Google's 'word'. If you are looking into retargeting I highly recommend investigating multiple stage remarketing (link above). The blog you listed, well yes, I think you are right to search for other sources of reference

Have to agree with Takeshi. In my experience, even still in 2013, having a blog on a subdomain gives you all of the disadvantages of it being a separate site while achieving none of the advantages. If the blog's topics are directly related to the primary topics of the website itself, put it in a subdirectory - save yourself all kinds of hassle while letting your main site authority help your blog, and vice versa. Paul [Updated to note:  those two articles you mention are referring to very specific elements of subdomains and subdirectories. Namely that geo-targeting is equally effective whether you're using a subdomain or subdirectory, that specifically within Webmaster Tools, links between subdomains and primary domains will be considered internal for reporting purposes, and that subdomains are no longer considered "seperate" sites when it comes to trying to get your site/subdomain to show multiple times in a SERP.. These should in no way be considered general claims that subdomains and subdirectories perform similarly in all other aspects]

I wanted to expand on what I said earlier as I feel I may have missed the nuance of the question. If the purpose of the rollover text is to enhance the user experience, then in that sense it not only is good for user but also 100% safe from an SEO perspective. Examples; tabbed content (product reviews, specs, manufacturer info ect.), or expanding images and displaying some captions. The purpose of these sorts of things are to specifically add to the user experience and give them as much information as possible. My first response I focused on more of what was said then what was meant. My original post still stands if the purpose of the rollover text is specifically designed only to make search engines rank you higher.

If you don't overuse "manipulative" anchor text (such as exact match keywords) and don't have these links site-wide, but on a select few pages, then they'll be absolutely fine. If you think as well, if you've worked with these companies and they've been happy with your work, it is only natural for them to want to link to you in a sort of testimonial page. However, If the link appears site-wide and in the footer, such as "Designed by LinkedCompanyName", then that could certainly trigger a penguin penalty.

I have several clients like this.  i have a client with 5 locations in New York City.  I built one website and setup one Google Places + account.  I then setup, registered and marketed the 5 locations under the one Google Places account.  Setup a Google Places account for the main location and you then have the option to add more locations. I build citations for each individual location and link build for each location.  I even do separate press releases for each location. Basically build one website and market each location/page separately.  You are correct in stating the obvious that you will lose domain authority by developing multiple websites. Hope this helps. Regards, Gary

I would not. Just build different sections of the site. An example of this would be an effective online retail store in automotive which has numerous makes/models under one roof. It can be done effectively, you just need to build out a good wireframe.

Thanks all. This is what I had recommended to the client to begin with. I just needed some backup from all you smart SEO's out there. Unfortunately the URL would not be for sale as it's a brick and mortar business. Thanks again!

I believe Google has, in fact, relaxed on the rules re. sub-domains. But I believe there is one caveat: that if you have too many sub-domains Google starts to apply less value. So be careful. If you use sub-domains for other reasons you may consider using a folder off the root.

Most of this is speculation based on the features and changes Google has been pushing out.  Taking into account the mobile initiatives Google has been implementing like GoMo, the mobile Googlebot and the different SERP's for mobile users from desktop users, I would have to say that it is important to optimize your mobile version as well. If you have a responsive design then your meta information may remain the same unless you simply serve up a different menu all together. Your CTR's are probably going to be different as well as your linking architecture.   Just make everything user friendly by considering the user's context and you should do awesome no matter the changes Google puts in place.

Thanks!

Directory submissions are a form of link building that may have worked before. Even before the Penguin update, directory submissions weren't helping much. You should try to get listed on the following directories: DMOZ (if that ever happens!) Yahoo paid (build trust) joeant, BOTW If there are relevant directories to your business, I would look at getting listed there as well. More to get your name out there for people that are interested in you services. Other than that, I wouldn't waste much time adding my domain to directories. They are not worthwhile links. If this was helpful, I would appreciate a thumbs up or a good answer

Hi Strathcom, I am looking into this for you. Trusted businesses are sometimes given the phone-only option, just as less trusted businesses are often given the postcard-only option. Let me see what I can find out for you. I will return. Update: Looks like you have already started a thread at the Google and Your Business Forum and received a good reply from Treebles: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/business/OXYk9JlWCCY/s8n4jpjN514J[1-25] Also, in case you didn't see this similar thread, here is one with a response from Jim Jaggers regarding making 4 verification attempts to cause the postcard option to appear: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!searchin/business/phone$20tree/business/mPIRxdm5vQw/iqcf5gh9--4J[1-25] Hope this helps!

You will need to check the server error log files for the new site in order to pick these up, if this hasn't been detected in WMT.

Hi StrathcomMedia, I'll answer the easier part of your question first, regarding missing reviews. Unfortunately, Google's handling of reviews has been one of the weakest aspects of their participation in Local. I could link you to thousands of posts and threads on this from the past half decade, but rather than do that, I'll just link to this recent post by Mike Blumenthal describing the current issues with reviews in Google+ Local: http://blumenthals.com/blog/2012/07/30/google-local-and-review-issues/ My advice to you about reviews and Google is that you should immediately copy any review you get because it's quite possible it will disappear at some point, at which point, you can put the copied review on your own website as a testimonial. Now to the more complex part of your question: your difficulties claiming your Google+ Local page. What is the exact error message you are getting. Please, copy it here and I will return to this thread. Thanks!

Thanks for the answer! I just needed outside confirmation. Cheers mate!