I think the strategy of writing the article so Google will give you more link juice is definitely an idea that has died with the killer Google updates... but I'm sure a consensus of experts will tell you that writing it for the purpose of reaching out to that site's community and nofollowing it isn't a bad idea.

The strategy of primarily posting on your site is a good one, but I wouldn't necessarily rule out reaching out to parallel niches with a guest post regardless of the pagerank of the site.

If  you haven't already done this, consider the level of engagement on that site.  Consider whether the traffic meets the profile of your ideal client... if you aren't convinced of these factors, save your guest post for a situation where you could say yes in both considerations.

EGOL brings up a strong point.  Offering in your terms to bring strong SERPS to a client that can be measured by the day is not for the faint of heart.  You mentioned that it's a semi-competitive keyword and there is HUGE variance going on... here are some questions that should help us give you some more specific advice.

Are you watching what your competition is doing? (links, anchor text, etc)
Is there anything automated in what you are using for off page seo?  
What have you done to get the ranking for this keyword since you started on page and off page?

The short answer?  Yes.  Grab the same address Google Places is using.  On a side note you have created your Google+ page haven't you?  It took me the longest time to realize that Googe Places < Google+ Page.

http://moz.com/blog/finding-and-building-citations-like-an-agency

Hope this helps.

I'll concur that I don't give any money to Godaddy for this and other reasons, but if you are happy with them I hope this helpls:

When using a Windows server, you can redirect to a 301 page using IIS.

1. In the Internet Services Manager, select the file or folder you want to redirect.
2. From the right-click menu, select a redirection to a URL.
3. Specify the file name of the page to which you want to redirect.
4. Select The exact URL entered above.
5. Select A permanent redirection for this resource.
6. Click Apply.

I have a customer who had prior help on his website and I noticed a 301 redirect in his .htaccess

Rule for duplicate content removal : www.domain.com vs domain.com

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com [NC]
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com/$1 [R=301,L,NC]

The result of this rule is that i type MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com in the browser and it redirects to www.MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com

I wonder if this is causing issues in SERPS.  If I have some inbound links pointing to www.MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com and some pointing to MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com, I would think that this rewrite isn't necessary as it would seem that Googlebot is smart enough to know that these aren't two sites.

-----Can you comment on whether this is a best practice for all domains?
-----I've run a report for backlinks.  If my thought is true that there are some pointing to www.www.MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com and some to the www.MY-CUSTOMER-SITE.com, is there any value in addressing this?

I think the strategy of writing the article so Google will give you more link juice is definitely an idea that has died with the killer Google updates... but I'm sure a consensus of experts will tell you that writing it for the purpose of reaching out to that site's community and nofollowing it isn't a bad idea.

The strategy of primarily posting on your site is a good one, but I wouldn't necessarily rule out reaching out to parallel niches with a guest post regardless of the pagerank of the site.

If  you haven't already done this, consider the level of engagement on that site.  Consider whether the traffic meets the profile of your ideal client... if you aren't convinced of these factors, save your guest post for a situation where you could say yes in both considerations.