How have you reached the first page of Google for any keyword? The open discussion on the topic.

I personally am very interested to learn someones experience and I will appreciate any opportunity to try new techniques and hear new tipson this thread.

I just discovered that my site is on the first place of the first page in Google. I almost dropped myself from the chair. I was working on my site for two months using a special technique (not a promotion effort) but never expected to reach a 1-st page so soon. I am a newby in SEO because I am too busy with article writing business and don't have enough time for SEO but I found that doing SEO for my websites is more like an exciting game on my spare time.

Most of all I love finding great domain names which could be still found after hungry big guys bought all domains out and now sell them for 1000-3000 bucks each.

This is what I've done for my site:

Found a domain name using Google keyword tool
Created a Wordpress static site (I believe it's the best choice for new site's SEO)
Downloaded some seo Plugins
Uploaded more than 200 pinging URLs on my Wordpress
Left my site's links on more than 50 sites including social, .orgs, engines and doman selling sites.
And did some other things.

I know my keyword is not to much competitive but i am looking for new ways to reach the first page with other keywords and i feel it will be a tough task for me.

I feel there is a bunch of savvies on Warrior who can share some value. The discussion itself would be a great help for me and other newbies who will come across this thread.