Upon reading an article entitled "What role does social media have in SEO?" on the Best SEO Company website. I was somewhat heartened to see someone actually understands the subject. Of course people will have great discussions about social media, argue with their college lecturers and concoct magnificent theories about it.
But the fact is it's only the same sheep in the same clothing, nothing more amazing than simple good manners and articulate requests albeit sent over the latest craze technology has dreamt up to employ people!
Dale Carnegie wrote a famous book way back in the early 20th century called "How to win friends and influence people", I would despair that people hadn't quite got it yet - but I have to confess neither have I. Take a look at the divorce rate, can nobody see the correlation between that and the challenges of getting links?
I will scream if somebody sends me another email telling me my site and theirs have something relevant in common and that swapping links will be of valuable use to both our visitors. Oh really? In 95% of cases this is nothing but a flagrant nonsense. How do they think I'm going to take this? The short answer is they don't think - if they did they wouldn't have started out by effectively offending my intelligence!
Manners, intelligence and the respect to not waste peoples time should be the first way to try in obtaining links. As Nick Usborne said somewhere in his excellent and professional writings - you wouldn't expect a kiss on the first date, so why expect someone to give you a link on your first communication.