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Jacob  is correct is his advice regarding link strategy - as well, there is some strong research on -- unnatural linking patterns --  As for the www vs. non-www, it doesn't matter much at all. As Jacob suggested, I'd redirect the non-www to www or vice-versa (via .htaccess).
You can also (try, as I think the option still isn't working) to set your www or non-www preference in Google Webmaster Tools.

Andy

It is against Google's TOS to have more than 1 Places listing. If (as is the case in some countries) there is no 'Report A Problem' link on the Place page, you may (as suggested by a Google Places rep (I have the link somewhere) claim the duplicate and then delete the undesirable one: follow the steps as Storwell Self Storage has laid out.

If the Places page/s is in the USA, you'll want to follow Jacob's suggestions, as well as #5 from Storwell Self Storage

5. wait a couple days, if that listing is still showing up in the search results, go to its places page, and click the Report A Problem link, and select “Place has another listing”. If you can, include a link to your claimed place page in the comments section.

Here is the link to the Google Places help page for duplicate issues:

http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=183009

I concur with Ryan's assessment - I've switched to and from VPS setups; there are no SEO repercussions. Ryan's advice to prepare everything ahead of time... and then change the address on the nameservers, should have everything propagating over (it varies from site to site) within 6 to 72 hours.

I don't think you understand what I'm asking, however I do appreciate your suggestions I know how to optimize, what I'm really looking for are site architecture suggestions that will help with the issue/s I noted in my original question.

"services" broadly speaking, keywords like "website creation", "ditch digging", "private tutoring"...

Thanks Richard

however... this is the tricky part:

I'm quite good at optimizing locally for this type of thing. However, many of the "service" keywords are not yet 'localized' by Google, I'd want to have my client webpages show well in the SERP's. for these 'non-localized' "service keywords" as well.

Sorry, I meant David Mihm -- oops!

I suspect having the settings in WMT set for the USA "might" hurt your performance in other areas, however the small company website (that gets 90% of its business from the USA) I mentioned in my prior response has the setting set to USA and it ranks #3 for it's main search term in both .ca and .com. Having claimed a Local Places account might also be an issue. I'd suggest you contact either Todd Mihm (http://www.davidmihm.com/blog) or Mike Blumenthal (http://blumenthals.com/blog) for an answer to that question.

I have a client who is expanding his business locations from 2 cities to 3, and working towards having 10+ locations across Canada. Right now we're building location based landing pages for each city, as well as keyword targeted landing pages for each city. For example, landing pages for "Vancouver whatever clinic" and "Calgary whatever clinic" as well as for "Vancouver specific service", and "Calgary specific service". This means a lot of landing pages will need to be created to target each of 10 or so desirable "service" keywords for each city's location. I've no issue with this, however I was wondering how other companies go about this? What's the best way to be relevant for certain "service" based keyword searches in each city?

• Many of the "service" keywords are 'localized' meaning they will show Google Places results for local brick and mortar businesses for each location. I'm quite good at optimizing locally for this type of thing. However, many of the "service" keywords are not yet 'localized' by Google, I'd want to have my client webpages show well in the SERP's. for these 'non-localized' "service keywords" as well.

• the new site will be built in WordPress

The competition is usually stronger in the USA (.com) arena than in Canada (.ca). I have a little company site (with little work done in the way of SEO) that ranks #3 in both .ca and .com for "wheelchair trays". You may want to adjust your settings on Google WebMasterTools to ensure your site is set to United States rather than Canada. As David Kauzlaric has mentioned, you will definitely benefit from having more links from US based sites - I'd focus on that as a first step.

I'd leave them in, however I'd want to make sure you don't have more than 10 or 12. I'd also add some misspellings for important keywords as Bing 'used to' use the keywords meta tag data for misspellings. Having said this, I agree with Richard Getz's response in that it should be the very last thing to deal with. Both Google and Bing have clearly said they don't use the keyword meta tag data for search anymore... however, it wouldn't hurt to leave them in on the premise they might be using them for some other signal (you never know). The one downside is that you might be making it easier for competitors to know about the keywords you're focusing on.