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Don't think this is a suitable alternative to securely hosting if you want rich snippets - because it isn't. While Yoasts plugin will allow you to get the rich snippet - it won't stop YouTube outranking you for your own video and also only works with a bit of a hack that YT may turn off at any time.

What about associations with other local businesses, any sponsorships and events? Are there any local events that the business gets involved in or are related to the business? Is there anything specific/unique about the different customers at different locations? How can you tune the content to target/engage this particular demographic. Are their any landmarks or well known places you can talk about (while you visiting x why not pop in for a y...) And as EGOL said, I definitely agree that you need to get the people who know the area and know their customers to provide (and maintain) the content. Can you do this in a way that raised their profile, boosts their ego and motivates them rather than just lumbering them with something else to do? It's a great opportunity to promote their business to their customers...

You should check this out http://www.seomoz.org/blog/penguins-pandas-and-panic-at-the-zoo

Maybe a Firefox extension that impersonates a mobile browser by changing the user-agent string? https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/mobile/addon/phony/ Haven't tried it myself, but if this one doesn't work, there might be another one out there that works.

I will further add, it is common for webmasters to report competition whom are actively engaged in or can be perceived to have participated in black hat tricks. If the report holds credence then, Google can and will "sometimes" manually ding the account. A GWT warning is one indication of that having had happen. In your case it could be further complications have arose due to the subsequent Penguin algorithm update.

If the blog has good DA I would suggest it does have good benefit especially if it is on topic for your website. I think its a combination of several factors such as: New audience that you wouldn't normally have access to. Related website giving you a link. *Author/Brand awarenes & trust. Not to mention I have had guest blog articles become extremely popular on twitter and facebook far more popular than I would ever been able to generate on my clients site alone.

Start by checking the number of indexed URL's. This can be accomplished by using the **site:yourdomainname.com **command within a Google search window. If no URL's are indexed then there is a high probability of a penalty, especially if your site used to be indexed. Also search for your exact company name and domain name. If you no longer rank for these terms, where previously you ranked well for your own brand name, a penalty is likely. Lastly check Google Webmaster Tools. Hope this helps.

Medlin04.  I agree with Robert, it's a cost-reward trade-off. Since it's the paving industry we're talking about, how many nice relevant sites can there be ? I doubt there are very many that carry substantially higher PA/DA.  Your customer's competition will face the same problem of available relevant links. Unfortunately, G's continuing attack "freshness", Panda, and now Penguin will continue to favor the sites Robert dubbed "PA-60" sites which have high "authority" but are usually written by content writers who, no matter how good they are, often do not fully understand the subject however experienced and skilled the writer may be. No matter how anyone characterizes it, G's culling websites.  Saves on search, helps sell adwords.   If there is a huge (intentional) weakness in G's formula, it's underweighting relevant small business links out to other sites in the same business.  I believe this part of the algo is intentional because the big sites often sell the advertising which directs the traffic to these small business.

Dr. Pete has a good post about just this at http://www.seomoz.org/blog/penguins-pandas-and-panic-at-the-zoo.

If you are providing affiliate links to another site, or anything similar, the links need to either have the "nofollow" attribute applied or be 302 redirected. The major affiliate programs I am aware of do such.

OSE is not set up to show every possible link. It is showing the more relevant/significant links and most state that it shows about a fourth of the total. So, the question re: reliable, is yes it is reliable; the links shown are there and the PA/DA, anchor text, etc. are accurate. What it will not show is every link.  Also, it won't show newer links but if you look after a recent update is published and a link is not there, look again after the next and you should see the newer link. Best

Absolutely. Don't just share them to be indexed (they will be indexed quite quickly anyway because blogs are usually caught up in no time) - share them to get more traffic and exposure. You want your guest post to be a powerful trust signal - and an actively discussed and shared article will give you a larger boost.

The ROI just isn't there. Not unless you stumble into a Chuck Testa video. I don't envy you, don't take this as criticism, but rather a rambling from someone who has been there. In fact, I'm interested to hear what you come up with . I tried: Linkbait Consistent content (mainly educational resources targeting 'local + kw' strings) PPC All local directories Videos Rankings, sure. No problem. However, the traffic just wasn't there to make it FUN. You know? Whatever you do, don't forget to promote your own brand and work towards non-regional clients. You're best bet is to think about offline resources and find ones you can leverage online. Most of it, it's going through competitor contacts/network, vendors, partners, distributors and lean on those contacts for content & links. Don't spend too much time on viral/linkbait, because it's expensive to create & I'm guessing these companies won't pay you for your time.. or appreciate it. The other thing we did that worked well, harvested all local blogs. From there, we identified non-direct competitor blogs and leveraged guest posting that way. It cut down on the cost of new content and earned us a few links. Not to mention, got me a couple of free lunches.