how do i get referrals by making a website and using search engine optimization?

this guy with like 10000 referrals told me to make a website and use search engine optimization. but i dont know what that means! so what? do i make a tumblr article and then have people search for it and get referrals? i dont get it. someone help please.

A referral traffic is that traffic which comes from a site where our link is. Like we do various link exchange with other sites and off page techniques example: article submission, social bokmarking, forum posting, question answers, press release, classified ad and many other techniques.

For 1000 referral traffic, your website will require a lot of SEO to be done to give a huge referral traffic.