Adsense/Amazon | Mini Niche Sites vs. Authority Sites

Ok, so I got a question or two about creating adsense / amazon sites.

Well, not so much amazon sites, but adsense sites.

My current model is to produce mini sites. Generally I am starting with one page sites. If the site "proves" itself, I go back and build another 5 - 10 pages. So once the sites starts making a few cents a day, I add another page. I keep adding pages as long as the money earned each day keeps increasing.

However, at some point in time the site starts to seem, I don't know, not appealing. Since these are micro sites the domain names are generally exact match or exact match with hyphens. So they are either thisismykeyword . com or they are this-is-my-keyword . com.

This way seems to really limit the amount of related pages I can post on my sites. It seems pretty difficult to build a 100 page site, if my domain is bestmanualfruitjuicerfororanges . com.

The biggest advantage of these sites for me is that they are very low competition and generally can fly up the SERP rankings pretty quickly.

So I am wondering about the drawbacks of building more of an authority site from the beginning. How is that going to affect the speed the site's pages can climb in the SERP?

1. So I was thinking of experimenting. What I want to know is if any of you think this will work or any pointers you guys have that can make this work better.
2. I would find a niche with lots of good low competition long tails, probably means they are lower search volume too. Probably based on a physical product, but not necessarily.
3. Then using Google related searches or wonder wheel, I will find some good category keywords. Probably a little higher competition, but also higher search volume.
4. I would arrange the site silo style. Only I would build it in reverse.

So an example would look like this.

My target niche is this widget. I can get either this-widget . com or thiswidgetguide . com as my domain name.

There are 5 category keywords I find electronic this widget, this widget comparison, this widget reviews, this widget uses, and this widget brand A.

Then there are at least 10 keywords that can fit under each category. There is more room of expansion later.

So when I build the site, first I put up my home page. Then instead of putting up higher competition pages, I put up a page for each of the long tails and promote each page. After I get 6 - 7 pages up that are ranking well, then I would write the category page. I would link to the pages from the category page and take the links off the home page menu.

I think that doing it this way would give me the benefits of building pages for long tails and at the same time, let me build logical authority sites. I would just lose the EMD bonus, if there actually is one.

So do you guys think this would work well, or am I missing something important here.

Thanks for any help you can give me.

JBP