I get the analogy, but after quite a lot of time making websites, I'm still not sure what I should do besides what is mentioned in this doc to improve organic listings. Perhaps you can take a small area of that ocean and give me an example?
Here's some actual helpful advice, for software companies: you should provide as many reasons as possible why linking to your website helps out the linker. There are as many ways to do this as there are ways to motivate people. One obvious one which non-programmers find difficult to duplicate is to provide some functionality for other people's websites via copy/paste code (called a widget), then promoting the widget. The widget contains a link back to the originating site, with anchor text that you pick.
For example, I have a client that produces something spiritually similar to help desk software. They should have a widget which lets you ask a question of BIG_CORP on BIG_CORP's website, with "[Help Desk] powered by $CLIENT." under it. The actual functionality is simple: submit a new issue straight into their help desk system. That's a triple win: BIG_CORP reduces support costs and gets higher customer loyalty, BIG_CORP's customers get a streamlined experience versus the traditional "email in a problem, get a ticket, pray a human sees it", and $CLIENT ranks higher for any help desk related keyword they care to target based entirely legitimately on their ability to convince BIG_CORP that they are the best help desk solution on the market.
While an SEO consultant might use this approach it is not quite the most proactive strategy. SEO comprises of so many things outsite on-site optimization.
I encourage you to read SEO Warrior, a book published by O'Reilly that covers different aspects on the topic.
We have also been using the #seo channel on irc.freenode.net in an attempt to build a collaborating SEO community. You are welcome to stop by and ask away.
Basically, Google is saying that if you build amazing content, and structure your website accordingly, you will get high quality backlinks.
If you've spent one day trying to get your site a better rank you know that it's almost impossible. Especially if you're a nobody.
You should be careful recommending books on SEO.
Google and other search engines tweak their algorithms daily, and many things can be outdated.
Join IRC-channels and forums - learn from others mistakes (know where it went wrong), and simply put - just do it.
The worst thing that could happen is if you get sandboxed (removed.)