I actually prefer subdirectories over subdomains.

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/understanding-root-domains-subdomains-vs-subfolders-microsites

There is a good resource on the topic... there were a couple of good instances to use a subdomain, but it also said you wouldn't necessarily get the authority of the root (which you will with a subdirectory).

Are they getting any traffic? Redirecting url's has zero SEO benefit (as far as I know), especially new domains.

If you are getting traffic, yes, redirect. If not, does it really matter? I guess if you already built links it wouldn't hurt to redirect with a 301.

This is a tricky space Leslie.

I went through something similar with a fence contractor and we ended up with a bunch of worthless sites with exact match domains for various towns around the area.

In my case I found it easier to carry the authority of the existing site to rank for new keywords on a "blog" in a subdirectory rather than a new site.

Also, looking briefly at your sites, it looks like you are linking back and forth anyway so one doesn't really help the other. Because those links under "Latest News" flow through a feed proxy, they aren't really adding any SEO value to your blog as well (I could be wrong here, but I think there is a way to change the way those links show from a feed).

I guess if it were me, I would install the blog on the main URL. Seems like the whole site could work towards the same goals then....

Hope this helps, I look forward to seeing other responses.

I would echo Doug's response, get involved in the community of auto website owners, write soem of the very best articles you can come up with and start submitting them to the best sites.

It may take some time for it to propagate to Google if that is what you are asking. Are you trying to block the pages/posts completely from search engines?

I wouldn't consider myself an expert on this one, but I would have most likely created internal pages that have yoursite.com/keyword-phrase and optimize them, especially if the site already has some authority on the topic.

Pointing the new domains to internal pages won't do anything as they don't have any rankings yet, and you can't get any if they don't have any content (I don't think).

Just my .02

Did you try to generate a new sitemap after clicking update options and then submitting it to webmaster tools?

Generally it will only update when you add/delete pages on it's own.

Using directories for SEO is probably not the best way to spend your time, and if you use a submission service getting a ton of submissions at once will most likely result in negative results.

The ONLY time I use directories is when I have a client looking for "local" listings. And even then I use it with the concept that it will help us get more traffic from visitors to those directories.

The links aren't worth the time in my view....

Great question, and WP really should make this easier!

http://businessaccent.com/2009/06/08/what-is-my-wordpress-post-id-number-and-how-can-i-find-it/  This article explains one way to see it, also if you open up the post/page in the admin panel to edit it you can just look in your browser to see the url which will have the post ID in it... IE: www.yoursite.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=615&action=edit (615 is the post ID)

Hope that helped