What is a good tool to use to find the amount of competition for certain keywords? I'm not too swift with google places and am not sure exactly how to find the amount of competition I'm facing.

Google Adwords Keyword Tool.

Mitch, check out dotcomdesigns' thread. It has several good tools for checking citations and such of your competition.

Chad Kimball's software is pretty decent, but doesn't return proper results for a few minor fields. But citation list seems to be pretty accurate.

I second that on Chad Kimball's GP software it is very helpful as well.