On the occasions that I have heard this topic discussed, both in real-life and on the internet, there always seems to be a few folks with the notion that their particular company/aircraft technique is an internationally recognized procedure. Hopefully, the varied answers to this thread will go someway towards convincing such folks that there is no universally recognized 'best-practice' just a variety of different ideas.
Most of my career has been spent operating 2 very different aircraft types for 2 very different outfits. Co-incidentally both operators checklists called for the landing lights to be switched on when cleared to enter the runway. I don't believe that this is intended to act as a signal to ATC or other aircraft, but rather it is the earliest convenient point at which they can be selected prior to the take-off roll. With its experience of low-flying, the military are sold on the idea of aircraft lighting as an aid to birdstrike avoidance and I'm happy to accept this as a valid reason to use the lights near the ground in daylight. I would also suggest that the configurations of landing lights, taxi-lights and turn-off lights on each different aircraft type is too varied for to establish common SOPs that mean anything to external observers.