Your first step in building a link popularity strategy is to develop content that is "link worthy".  Here are three important keys you should consider.

1. Ease of accessibility 

Foremost, the content you want other sites to link to should be free.  That is, you can't usually expect another site owner to readily link to a for-fee product you have in your shopping cart, or content that requires paid membership (ie., a password) to access.

You'll also want to be careful about using registration barriers to access the content.  For example, if you are offering a down loadable PDF special report, and would like to capture email addresses from site visitors before they can download it (sometimes called a "squeeze page"), consider that other site owners may not readily link to you with this barrier to access. You'll have to make a decision on what is best for you, but the easier your content is to access, the more likely another site will link to you.

2.  Value

The content you want another site to link to must have value to their site visitors.  To put it another way, the link they provide to you must ADD value to their site.  It is unlikely that a quality site in your marketplace will provide a link to you if your content is not relevant or useful to their own site visitors.

3. Uniqueness and/or originality

The more unique your content is, the better. Ideally the content pages you request other sites to link to should not be easily found elsewhere.  Granted, with millions of sites on the Internet, this can be challenging, but it is wise to develop the most unique content you can to demonstrate to other site owners that you are "worthy" of linking to.   If you're struggling of how to be unique, think of original ways to present helpful content using your own expertise on the subject.

Some examples of unique or original content that you could develop might be:
- a special report that describes new trends, technology or techniques related to your marketplace
- an on line calculator or other tool that helps a user make decisions about an important topic
- a valuable collection of resources that will help a site visitor achieve their objectives

One example of this is a recruiting service that hires teachers to teach English in South American schools.  Most of the candidates are from English-speaking countries, and would like to live in a foreign country.  One of the primary concerns for these candidates of this program is what it will cost them to live in a foreign country.  While there are many sources on the Internet for cost-of-living (COL) in foreign countries, this recruiting service offers a free downloadable PDF of COL, and presents in a way that is original and unique for teachers.  This PDF makes it much easier for the recruiting service to attract inbound links to their site.

Once you've developed at least one (but preferably a few more) easily accessible, valuable and unique content areas on your site, you'll be in a better position to contact other site owners and ask for a link to your site.