One most important thing is blog commenting buddy . Do visit some niche related blogs daily and type good comments over there . By this you can get niche targeted traffic .
All-in-One SEO wordpress plugin is the first one you need to have for your blog. Then go with the methods you have mentioned. That's enough. Create a BRAND IDENTITY for yourself.
does where you make the back links count??? should it be a bunch of different forums or blogs you are commenting on ? or would just allocating your time to just one would be better?