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Yes it is a good idea to redirect the non-www to the www as long as the www has more links, otherwise I would suggest the opposite (www to the non-www). You just have to make a file named ".htaccess" and placing this in the document:

RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com/ [NC]

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [L,R=301]

Then just upload it to the server.

If your server supports .htacess files, this is what I use for redirecting one folder to another.

Redirect 301 /section.php/ http://www.ensorbuilding.com/section/

Aside from adding the +1 button to your sites I doubt it will be that big. Most of Google's attempts at adding social features don't ever take off like they do for Facebook or other sites. I imagine the effect will be similar to that of how Facebook likes affect search engine results. It will help but not too important of a factor.

One problem that I have seen in the past is that if you are claiming a listing and you change either the address or the phone number before you claim it it can screw with the verification process and sometimes create a duplicate listing. I would claim it without changing either of those and once its verified go back and change that info (if it needs to be changed).

Also, if you pay for any of Google's paid services sometimes you can get support for Google Places and they will manually edit a listing. However we have only been able to pull this off once.

My guess would be that it is coming from an external site.

Between those two I would choose the second, the first one just seems like you are trying too hard to stuff those keywords in the URL.

Did you try what Mike suggested? Submitting it as a phone verification and then once it calls your system and fails to reach a person you go to get another pin and then it offers the verify by postcard option.