I agre, link trades usually dont work for digital related site, people who do them generally are in the know. Why would they want to help you? More then likely, those who are not fair will get your link on their site, let you see it. Then you place theres, then without you knowing it they remove it off their site.

I dont do business this way, but there are those who do.

have a great day!

I would recommend automatic article submissions, that's very good for back links, but you should know that only some of them will be counted as original material ( duplication ).

About directories, I would pay for a manual directory submission. Don't waste your money on automatic directory submission because their IP will be probably blocked by the directory websites.

And don't forget Web 2.0 websites, a free place to easily put your link in.