Beginning backlink prior to site launch

I will be adding a nice template and such to a website of mine in a month or two.

In the meanwhile, is it okay if I work on backlinking to the site (to increase SERPs)? Or is it best to wait until I have my site ready?

EDIT: Sorry about the typo in the thread title

Start building backlinks now with your desired anchor text. Google takes time to 'trust' a new site (up to 3 months) and I have seen many sites ranking well without any content at all - simply because of the anchor text in the backlinks to it.

Sure, you can start with getting backlinks to your site right away.