I found that buying home page links on niche related site just push me to page one for alot of search terms. You cant just get it on any related site you need tool like majestic seo and or opensite explorer. I usually check out the sites anchor text profile to see if it has niche related anchor and the quality of the backlinks which reinforced the sites high pr and authority. I usually slap up a few of these bad boys up and 2 weeks later page 1. Many might disagree with this strategy but HEY IT WORKS! Go off these metrics when shopping around -Domains authority above 30 -homepage mozrank above 5 -backlinks that has authority and pagerank -aged domain -obl <25 -niche related anchor text profile -site not penalized "check to see if it pops up #1 position when typing it in into google. good indicator. -trust and citation flow over 20 "majestic seo metrics" This is what I normally follow before placing links. This shouldnt be the only thing you do. Always build general links such as web 2.o, social profiles, articles, pdfs etc. to create a natural looking link profile for your website. and stick this this anchor text ratio 10% main k.w "this is where i build my exact match anchor text on high pr sites" 20% k.w variations 60% branded 10% misc. "click here, more info, etc.." hope this can enlighten atleast 1 person. And again this is my own strategy that works for me so please don't feed me crap.