This is competitive intelligence - the kind that SEO firms shouldn't be sharing because it reveals a considerable portion of the value they (we) provides to clients. Thus, it's the perfect topic for an SEOmoz post.

The best way to do this is by example. I've picked one lucky website - EvoGear.com (based here in Seattle) and one of their primary keyword phrases "snowboard equipment" (which they should really put in their title tag) to illustrate how you should perform searches that will result in high quality link acquisition targets.

A Few Basic Rules:

  1. You should perform all of these searches at each of the major engines (Google, Yahoo!, MSN & Ask - yes, even Ask, as they often link to some very valuable and achievable link sources). I'm illustrating using Google for simplicity and brevity.
  2. At Google and others, it often helps to show 100 results per page and have the maximum "grouping" of results from the same site. That way, you can find all of the most relevant pages on a particular domain with ease.
  3. This process is only half the battle - the other half is identifying the sites inside the SERPs that would make good targets; I'll try to cover that next week.

The Obvious
Basically, we're seeking every possible permutation of the term/phrase - links from any of the top ranking sites (#1-100, depending on competitiveness) will provide high value. As you go down the list, you can also use these modified terms/phrases to get extra results from the other sources.

Advanced Operators
Then use the engines' advanced query parameters with the basic phrase. As we refine in this manner, the number of pages that still provide value shrinks - I'd probably look at the top 30-50 results maximum.

Alternative Search Sources
The main indices are great ways to define value, but adding in some alternate sources for link searches can help to diversify. The engines might not always consider these sources as important (which is why I'd stick to only the highest profile sites/pages in these results), but they can often be great sources for traffic.

Directory Search Terms
Appending the word "directory" and other similar terms can help to dig up valuable hubs where you can submit your site for inclusion. Note that many of these use advanced operators and will generally have a short list (top 10-25) of valuable targets.

Blog & Forum Searches
The goal here is to find places you can participate. You don't want to spam, but a quick link drop to highly relevant content once you're already an accepted member is perfectly reasonable. Having a presence in the UGC sphere also means you can quickly step in and manage reputation, save face or recognize trends to leverage.

Submit-Type Searches
These are often the most valuable searches (thus I've saved them for last). The idea is to search for sites/pages that are accepting submissions or additions. I tend to run pretty far down these SERPs just because it can be so easy to obtain the links.

And now, I hope to get your secrets - if you've got more to add, please don't be shy. You can use my example or create your own.