website strategies? advice needed

Hey, thanks for opening this thread and attempting to help me.

Right now I am targeting a rather competitive keyword(keyword 1) term that is the foundation of a website I am building right now. My website is going to be a place full of relevant information for people who are interested in this niche. Along with having a lot of free information, I am building a review section where I will have several key affiliate products that I think would help people in this niche.

Should I keep the free information on a separate site and link it all to a smaller review site?

Also, there are some much less competitive keywords that I would like to target, however I would rather keep my main site targeting the highly competitive term.(keyword1)

Should I build smaller websites specific to a much less competitive keyword linking to my main site? Would it be better just to have some squidoo lenses targeted these less competitive terms instead of small website? I don't really know if I should spend time promoting squidoo lenses? It seems it would be better for all my promotion on this one main site.

Here is kind of what I am thinking

Main site(keyword 1)
mini site mini site mini site mini site
(less competetive keywords. only 1 or 2 articles each. All linking back to main site.)

Should I just use squidoo lenses in place of the mini sites.

Thanks alot
I would appreciate any comments