I have that doubt, becuase I have some backlinks from high PR sites but with non related content, but I dont know if they are helping or not. Are they? Thanks!
It is actually better if the links you get aren't all really niche sites as that in of itself isn't natural. I recommend taking a look at www.receivelinks.com - it does a great job getting you links. Been using it for 4 years now with my oldest sites and ranking great. Good luck!
for me niche site backlinks are recomended. but if you got others with hi pagerank, im still use it coz the higher rank maybe can raise your rank too someday. cmiiw
It is not absolutely necessary. Backlinks can come from anywhere as it is not in your hands who would link back to you! If your content appealed to somebody not working in your niche, it is perfectly alright for him to link back to you, since he just wishes to share his liking with his readers/visitors. This makes such links perfectly natural! Regards, RightMan
A backlink from a related site is nice, but I have also a lot of backlinks from sites which are not related and they help as well.
It's natural to have some backlinks from related sites and some from non-related sites. Just make sure you dont leave links in those sites in porn, casino or spam sites.