Off Page Optimization of New Websites

[Optic]

I highly recommend offering some sort of widget, tool, unique article that is useful to others in your niche, and let people know about it. You just may find that others will do the the initial hard work for you.

[offshoreally]

Better look for strategies which your competitor are applying on their website that can be also very helpful.

[InternetHBO]

Off-page Optimization:
• Directory Submission
• Articles Submission
• Press Release Submission
• Squidoo Lens Creation
• Hub Pages Creation
• Social Bookmarking (Digg, Delicious, Stumble, Reddit etc.)
• Blog Posting
• forum participation
• Classified Ads
• Social Networking (Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, LinkedIn etc.)
• Guest blogs/posts

I like this list it gives a good variety.

The main thing would be the competition for your keyword, This will determine how quickly you will get to #1
Check how many back-links the #1 position has for your key word to see if you can compete

[blings]

Off-page Optimization:
• Directory Submission
• Articles Submission
• Press Release Submission
• Squidoo Lens Creation
• Hub Pages Creation
• Social Bookmarking (Digg, Delicious, Stumble, Reddit etc.)
• Blog Posting
• forum participation
• Classified Ads
• Social Networking (Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, LinkedIn etc.)
• Guest blogs/posts

For directory submission, don't forget to have your site listed at dmoz.org.
For blog posting, you can do this through your site's official blog. Additionally, you can build category/microniche specific blogs hosted under different platform such as vox.com, blogspot.com and wordpress.org (there's more of course which can find over the net through searching "free blog", "hosted blogs", etc.). If don't like the idea of maintaining a blog yourself, you can hire bloggers or ask (paid or free) link inclusion on their blog's sidebar. Or, if your an excellent writer and confident enough to submit your post as a guest post on a well established blog, you may do it as well. Just don't forget to insert your link everytime.

[weblover50]

You could also try video marketing and answer type websites (something like yahoo answers) to gain more backlinks & traffic. Depending on the niche these two sources of traffic can work your way.