Yeah, unrelated links are not as good as related, but they still count, and you can search on Google and see that websites with 101% unrelated links still rank very good, but I dont think it’s a good long term strategy – maybe you’d have a 2-3 month ride, but after that – hmmm, not so much 
What grinds my gears is that webmasters would have an automated tool, and still not use it. On my sites – I say it, email me and I’ll let you know; or link to me from such and such page – and I’ll link back.
But I would place their link, and then wait 2 weeks and still get no response…It’s just weird… I have been in this industry for 5 years now, and I have never seen such a dissregard for link exchanges – it’s like allofasudden there is some other factor that matters in long term ranking :banger:
I was just wondering if it’s just websites which rank “OK” and people think that by exchanging links they help the competition or something…