Exchanging links with sites of a similar topic is one of the most effective free forms of advertising I have ever found. It really is the most direct way to improve your web presence. This is the nature of the Internet... The more paths you have to your site, the more traffic you will have. It is important to have an "Add URL" page. This article discusses the important elements of your own "Add URL" page.
What is an "Add URL" page? It is a page where you describe how you would like others to link to your site and invite them to submit a link to be listed on your site. Here is an example which illustrates most of the points I'll make here:
http://www.athomebusinessportal.com/links/addlink.html
It is a lot of work to get your first 200-300 inbound links to your site by finding and soliciting link exchanges from other sites. Once you do that work, you deserve a reward. Having an "Add URL" page like this one is part of your reward. After doing all that work, you will have enough traffic that you will start receiving link requests from your own "Add URL" page with no work to go find these sites. Pretty cool, huh?
Let's talk about the important elements of your "Add URL" page that will maximize its effectiveness:
Place a link to your Add URL page on every page of your site. This page is important enough to warrant it's own place on your navigation bar.
Make your link say "Add URL", not "Submit Site" or "Add Link" or anything else. Trust me on this. I have already performed all of the click-thru analysis on every combination of words imaginable. You will receive your best response if the links to your Add URL page use the words "Add URL". Once you have dozens of sites (if you ever do), you may want to experiment with other wording to make your sites more unique.
At the top of your "Add URL" page, use your major keyword in a large heading. The major keyword for the example page is "Home Business". You'll notice that it says "Home Business - Add URL" in large type at the top of the page. This will help the search engines know what your page is about. After some time, you'll start getting traffic directly to your "Add URL" page from the search engines for phrases like "[your keyword] add url".
Next, encourage your visitors to link to your site before requesting a link. Don't be tempted to start making your visitor jump through hoops to prove that they have already linked before going on. You want them to submit their link even if they don't immediately link to you. If everyone refused to provide a link before the other site linked to them... well... no-one would ever link up; would they?
Be sure to have a form. Do not require them to email you to submit their link. You will receive a lot more requests for links if you use a simple form. In addition, you will be controlling the format of the link requests. That way you will avoid having to email back and forth to get more information.
Guide them in how to link to your site, but leave it up to them to create a link of their own if they want. There are as many different kinds of webmasters as there are different kinds of people. You need to recognize that some are lazy and are only willing to copy/paste some code you provide... while others have a very specific format for links on their site and want to do everything for themselves.
Don't wait to put up your own Add URL page. Every inbound link means more traffic to your site. Having your own Add URL page will really encourage others to link to you and request a link from you.