How tough is it to rank top 20 in Google for competitive keywords? I used SEOMOZ to check out some keywords and many are quite tough. What is the strategy when you have low link popularity and are trying to get people to come to your site? Target keyword phrases instead? or work for years getting one word keywords?
Create good content, deliver high traffic to your site (it seems that Google counts traffic as I noticed lately). Also create quality inbound links to your site...
It is all about inbound links. Not there are two ways to get inbound links one is to build high quality website and start link building campaign and in the same time you will get "natural" inbound links. Other way is to get inbound links by paying or thru different networks.
Buying one way links is a good way to kick start things. Once you get a relatively good PR from buying links... you will slowly gain links naturally... as people will start to link to your site
I'd suggest that you focus on getting your site ranked with less competitive keywords to start. Once you have, and you've established some credibility and authority, you'll find it easier to gain backlinks from other sites, which will in turn increase the odds that you'll be able to rank for more competitive keywords. HTH, Sam