Link farms and quantity of back links

[flanok]

Hi there,
This is my first post, Great forum. I am very green to search engine placement. So my questions may seem obvious.
I have read in your forums that backlinks are a major key in page ranking. My site www.shopbam.co.uk has, a PR of 3. My competition is fierce. I think the number one spot has something like 113,000 links to it. I think link farms (directories) are excluded from this equation. How on earth can you raise anything like this amount of backlinks? Do I just give up?
I have paid for 750,000 listings but I think these will all be deemed as link farms and not help my rating.
I have read a lot of posts and have tried to maximise my site to the words "shopping" and "shopping uk", from the advise in these forums.
Under "shopbam" I have the no 1 spot only because of its unusual name but for shopping,-nothing. can anyone help?

Thanks
Mark

[clasione]

Your going to need to start being more pro-active with your link building...

FFA's and Short cuts are a waste of time....

Start gainling listings and links in directories and sites targeting your items in the store...

[oceanmajk]

First of all, like clasione said, forget about FFA's or any other large link farms. And DEFINATELY don't pay anyone who offers to put your link in a million search engines or whatever. They don't produce visitors, and they they definately won't improve your search engine rankings just because they link to you. Most search engines nowadays are even penalizing sites for being listed in these directories. I've even had a threat of a lawsuit from one very unhappy individual who was being spammed by one of the directories I just happened to be listed in, without my knowledge.

If you're just starting off, I'd focus on developing a good website, with good content and good products. The few visitors that do visit your site will come back and remember you if you have something worthwhile.

One thing I always try and remember is, if I wouldn't buy my product or use my website for myself, why would anyone else?!

Quality will eventually equal qauantity in visitors in the long run. Just keep working hard and build quality business relationships to get the word out about your site and products. It's not going to happen overnight, and don't pay anyone who promises it will.