Get a Higher Placing in Google's Search Results

If someone searches, using Google, they're more likely to click on and visit your site if you're towards the top of the list of sites. Google puts the best sites at the top of the list.

To work out how good a site is, Google looks at how many other sites have links on them, that go to the site in question. It views these links as votes of confidence. If there are lots of links on other sites, that go to a site (especially from good sites), then Google will rank the site higher.

These days, it's very difficult to get links. Everyone wants them, and no one really wants to give them.

The Basics

Google is smart. You can't fool them into thinking your site is good, by working out ways to get non-genuine links. They're looking for people genuinely linking to you, because that person thinks your page is relevant and high-quality. A link to you in the middle of an article looks genuine. A link to you on a page of a hundred links, where you've also linked back to the site that links to you (this is called a link swap), is not going to be valued very highly by Google.

A good site will receive links "naturally". These links will accrue gradually over time, come from a variety of sites (websites, blogs, forums etc), largely be one-way (i.e. not link swaps), and be in a wide variety of contexts.

In the long run, this is how you'll have to get links. By having a site that's as big and high-quality as possible, so that people will link to it without you asking them.

This article will help you get some easy low-value links, to get you started.

General Advice

Don't bother dealing with "link farms", or other small-time or new sites.
Don't mass-email people, asking for links or link exchanges. Most significant sites are bombarded with such spam, and they ignore all of it.
Stay away from "bad neighbourhoods". These are scammy, spammy, or otherwise valueless or illegitemate sites. If you link to dodgy sites, Google assumes you're dodgy too. And then they ban you.
Don't spam forums with your website link, or post comments on blogs, with your link on it. Like email spam, it doesn't work. Google will ban you for doing this.
Never pay for a link from anyone. It's not worth it.
Don't bother with sites that say "link to us first, and then tell us, and we'll link to you". These places rarely give you a link. They'd much rather not do anything, and hope that you never remove their link from your site. This way, they get a free one-way link from you.
In general, don't do anything cheaty or spammy.

Only exchange links with (or ask for links from) sites that are relevant to the topic of your site.
...and only do a small amount of link-exchanging, just to get you started. The value of link-swapping (with the kind of sites that want to swap links) is so low that it's almost not worth doing.
Do ask your site visitors to link to you, even repeatedly or in a prominent place.
If your friends have half-decent websites, ask them to link to you. (Preferably from the front page of their site.) This is a great boost.
Many sites are abandoned, so there's no point trying to contact them or submit your site to them. Assume a site is abandoned if the copyright year is last year or earlier, or if the site is broken in any way, or if its layout looks old-fashioned.
Have all your site data (site name, address, description, your email address, your name etc) saved somewhere, so you can easily cut and paste it into forms and emails.
Right-click a page, and view its source code. If you see rel="nofollow" on the links therein, it means the links pass no ranking benefit to the page they link to. This is very common now. It removes the incentive for people to post spam that contains their link.

Where to start looking for links

Directories - Search in Google, for directory and the topic of your site. There will likely be numerous relevant directories you can submit your site to. Directory links are low-value, but they're (usually) one-way, and easy to get. Start with the Open Directory Project. They take time to review sites, and are fairly picky.

Local Resources - Search for directories or resources in your city/state/country. They're likely to be receptive to a site created by a local.

Links pages that accept submissions - Do a search for your site topic plus a phrase like "submit a resource", "useful links", "useful resources", or any combination of "submit your site", "suggest a resource", and "add new link".

Contact people - This is time-consuming, but it's really the only way to get links from the medium-sized sites. You need to write a very short, relevant, personal email to the webmaster of a site, suggesting your site for their resources page, or for some other feature. The email must be specifically tailored to this person/site, and should be very informal and chatty. It helps if you actually have something else to say, other than your link request. Remember, anything generic will get binned with the rest of the day's link-begging spam. To succeed at requesting links like this, your site actually needs to be useful and high-quality.

Page Rank and the Google Toolbar

You can tell how good Google thinks a site is, by looking at its Page Rank. Page Rank is a scale from 0-10, with each point on the scale being around six times greater than the previous point.

Getting a link from a high Page Rank page will increase your site's Page Rank far more than a link from a low Page Rank page.

Click here and install the Google Toolbar, and you'll be able to see the Page Rank of pages you go to.

Another feature of the Google Toolbar is the ability to see what other pages are linking to the page you're looking at. Go and visit your competitors, and see who's linking to them. You might be able to get yourself a link too.