Squidoo and Lens Making

This was not some weird science experiment where I grow long tentacles and survive in the world's oceans and threaten wayward sailing ships. I'd like Jeff Goldblum to play me in that movie. No, becoming a giant squid on Squidoo means getting certain privileges.

I considered making a run for Giant Squid for the round which ended September 30, 2008, but I felt my lenses weren't quite up to par. I had more than enough lenses to apply, but I didn't think they would pass the test. I'd like to have more top lenses. By giving myself til the end of the year, I had time to polish my lenses to fine sheen and maybe hatch a few more gems.

Some of the newer Giants are posted in the forums about what they did to earn their badges. Yet another reason to visit the forums.

Here's a link to the latest Squidu thread where all the potential new Giant Squids have been posting links to their lenses. If you are considering applying for Giant Squid Status, it's a good place to start. There's always something interesting to read there.

If you are interested in becoming a Giant Squid, the NEXT deadline for application is June 30th, 2009.

There's always something going on at Squidoo and in the midst of pay at Squidoo, there's news about the Workshop being upgraded. Gil (aka Giltotherescue), the tech guy at Squidoo HQ, and Meagan Casey both commented over at Squidu about the change. (Have I mentioned that it pays off to visit the forum once in a while?)

Lensmaster ThomasC (he's also a Giant Squid Greeter), pointed out the latest info was available at the SquidBlog. Apparently, it will be rolled out in the next few days and will be called Workshop 2.0. More to come.

I've decided to set 3 goals for myself on Squidoo:

1. One Hundred Lenses in One Year

2. Becoming a Giant Squid

3. At Least $1,000 a Month From Squidoo

I don't know if I can do this or not, but I want to try. Lofty Goals, yes, but I am already on my way. I currently have reached my 1st goal of 100 lenses (make sure you visit them all *Shameless Plug Alert*) - my first lens Family Tree Climber was almost in a freefall in the lens rankings. I started it in mid-August and it is was in the top 1,000 for a while (a high of 737) - it slipped out of the top 2k to about 41k, but it has rebounded to 7K in rank. This lens, Squidoo and Lens Making, dropped from about 5k to 49k, but now is way down in the ranks and sits about 69K! My Halloween lens, Ghost Pictures isn't my number one ranked lens anymore. It's getting a fair bit of traffic and it has been flirting with the top tier (one day it's in, the next it's out) and it is sitting about 1,437 today. Very odd. I'm guessing it's like I thought, this is a topic that holds a lot of interest all year long. To meet my goal of becoming a Giant Squid, I need more zipping up the ladder.

One of my others is my lens about Rachel McAdams which is starting to really draw traffic! It has received over 1,000 visits over the last week and is currently sitting comfortably in the top tier at about 1,100. It's obviously a lens about actress Rachel McAdams. I'm surprised how well it's done (especially the traffic!) One of my newer lenses called Cobie Smulders was knocking at the door of the top tier, but traffic has dried up and the lens has dropped down to about 23k today. My latest, The Big Bang Theory looked like it might get into the top tier, but has been slipping and is about 5,200 today (still in 2nd tier!)

A bunch of my lenses dropped in lensrank, but I've been trying to recover my previous lens ranking. So now I have 3 in the top 2,000, plus 7 total in the 2-25k range. Altogether I now have 20 lenses in the top 50,000 and about 55 under 100,000.

I'm still trying to reach my goal to have 50 in the top 50k. Then I can try to update my other lenses and get 100 lenses in the top 100,000. I'd like to accomplish that goal by the end of June.

If I can just elbow my way into the top 2,000 with a couple more of lenses, that would be cool. Many thanks for the kind words and comments to all who have stopped by my lenses.

Well, I've got almost 150 lenses now! Although I gave myself a full year to put up one hundred lenses, I've been able to generate almost one hundred and fifty lenses. Whew! A lot of work, and the work is just starting.

Now comes the hard part - getting as many of them into the top 2,000 as possible. I hope to accomplish this by providing the best content possible for each topic I've covered. Having excellent content won't be the only thing. I'll need to increase my internet marketing skills in order to drive traffic to my sites.

Updating and expanding my lenses will take a lot of time, so I don't expect much in the way of returns for some time. I've read from other lensmasters that 6 months are needed before you make anything money-wise. Meanwhile, I'll edit, re-write, and edit and re-write some more.

Some of my lower ranked lenses need some TLC and get buffed up into something that will draw people to them. Several are a little weak in the content department and need to be updated and expanded.

Also, I think most of them have too many ads running on them and I should be relying on my content to fill those empty spaces rather than slapping on some more Amazon or eBay mods. Feels a little too spammy to me, and would probably feel that way to my visitors too. I need to work on the WOW factor.

Great content=search engines=more visitors=more money.

It's really a simple formula. The first step "Great Content" is the kicker. I've always thought writing something you can improve on is better than writing nothing at all.

I was totally shocked about this. How the heck could I be chosen LMOTD? I haven't been on Squidoo long enough to warrant such high praise when there are so many other lensmasters who easily run rings around me as far as skills go. Take a look at LENSMASTER OF THE DAY Headquarters. It's true!

If I'd known I would get this honor, I would have probably done a clean sweep of all my lenses. Sort of like when you get unexpected house guests and quickly sweep up and throw stuff into cupboards so they won't think you live such a messy life.

I think what I'll start doing is rather than using the haphazard method I've be using lately is that I'll become more systematic in my lens maintenance. What I'll try to do is that when I get to my dashboard, I'll immediately update my bottom 5-10 lenses, and then update my top 10 so they'll keep their rankings.

What I've done in the past is to spot one or two lenses that I haven't worked on in a while and do some overhauling. The lens gets an immediate boost in the lensrankings, but then slips again. That's why I have so many lower ranked lenses. Like anyone else, I want my top performers to continue to do good, and the others, well, I'd get to them when I could. Which leads to overall slippage in quality.

By continually updating, my group of little squidlets will get better and stronger (and will earn better rankings, more visitors and maybe some money too).

I've been updating my blog and it seems to be getting some traction. I have visitors every day, and it already has a Google Rank of 2, which is cool when you consider it is only about 5 months old.

The blog is called Squidoo Land over at Blogger. It has more posts now and I'm trying to get 1-2 a day about life as a Squidoo lensmaster. It's another way I can "get the word out!" I've added some more articles and I'd like to hope it develops into a good source of information about succeeding with Squidoo.

My Squidoo blog posts are showing up in Google almost as soon as I write them. I'm heading towards my 100th post at Squidoo Land, and should hit that milestone in March 2009. It's so cool when you see something you've created get found.

What I want to do is drive traffic to my own Squidoo lenses (of course) and other lenses that someone unfamiliar with Squidoo will find interesting. After I get past the "making money on Squidoo" introductory articles, I'm hoping to blog about making better lenses, providing tips for increasing traffic, just about anything that new and old lensmasters will find interesting.

There are some really good Squidoo-related blogs out there, Captain Squid's blog springs to mind. Also, I like Squid This. Of course I see the merit of having my own squidoo blog driving traffic to my lenses and from my lenses to my blog. Hey, I almost forgot SquidBlog! Gotta give props!

I think this will help me reach my goals outlined above. Writing about various aspects of internet marketing and building more lenses and maintaining those already started will help. Stop by and leave some comments on what you would like to see.

I've reached and surpassed my 1st two goals of creating 100 lenses on Squidoo and getting Giant Squid status. Now for the most difficult part... $1,000 a month from Squidoo.

How do I generate $1,000 a month?

There are several people making a fair chunk of change on Squidoo. Loyalis is one of the more successful lensmasters and he wrote up an excellent lens which will serve as motivation for you to do the same.

One Month, One Lens, $1,000 Profit describes his impressions of what someone trying to do better should be doing.

Another stat that should catch your eye is 72,000 visits. That is the number who stopped by this lens Sarah Palin, after the governor of Alaska was chosen as the republican vice-presidential candidate. Imagine if you had 72k visits to your lens!
It can be done. You just need to make a lens with great content that people are looking for.

I had a mini brainstorm at work today for 4-5 Squidoo lenses I am going to create. It's quite a nifty little idea. Basically instead of trying to find a niche to write about I'm going to create my own niches. (Sounds kinda cryptic right?).

Basically I will combine two or three somewhat unrelated niches into one niche that I know is being looked for and is underserved. I don't expect them to soar into the top 100 list on Squidoo, and the majority of people won't be interested in these topics, but for a certain tiny target market I'll be the only game in town.

One by itself would not generate much traffic, but together I think they might bring in a few shekels. I'll write up all my content offline and when I feel ready I'll get it on lenses. This won't make me rich, but these lenses will lure readers.

I don't know about you, but I am starting to feel like the guy on the right. Just when I get one site starting to round into shape, One of my other lenses starts wobbling so I dash over to it and tweak it some more, add content, and get it going again, then run over to the next one.

I can almost hear "Flight of the Bumblebee" when I'm updating them. Still even though there's a lot of work involved in getting all these lenses up to a good standard, I'm loving it! Updating and adding to my sites is generating a trickle of visitors and my overall lense rank is improving. Still, I've got to get more of them into Google and the other search engines, I'm pinging like crazy, and doing other stuff to get some more folks to visit.

Just need to make this trickle into a flood. Hopefully I won't drop any plates!

I set up a Facebook group called Squidoo Land to try to direct people interested in Squidoo to come here. We now have 65 members so far in the group. Let's get the group up to 100-plus members! I guess we've gotta get the word out!

Join up and put a link to your best lenses. Use Facebook for some of your marketing.

Here's a breakdown of how my lenses are currently doing rankwise. I have almost 150 lenses, some going up, some declining. Too many declining if you ask me. I finally have some success getting some lenses to rank higher, but a bunch still are dropping faster than the Dow Jones! What I need to do is to take a more systematic approach rather than updating one here and one there. That's the only way I'll be able to get the group to move as a group.

Lensrank

Lenses in Top 2,000 (1,001-2,000) = 2
Lenses in Top 5,000 (2,001-5,000) = 1
Lenses in Top 10,000 (5,001-10,000) = 2
Lenses in Top 20,000 (10,001-20,000) = 3
Lenses in Top 30,000 (20,001-30,000) = 3
Lenses in Top 40,000 (30,001-40,000) = 5
Lenses in Top 50,000 (40,001-50,000) = 4
Lenses in Top 100,000 (50,001-100,000) = 35
Lenses in Top 150,000 (100,001-150,000) = 19
Lenses in Top 200,000 (150,001-200,000) = 20

Hey! I have 3 lens in the top tier. My newest lens to enter the top tier, Rachel McAdams is sitting at about 1,100. I'm not happy with having the number of lenses sitting so low in the rankings, so I'll have to tweak them some more and write a lot more content too. I guess it's time to begin ignoring lens rank and concentrate on sales alone. Lens rank probably should be only considered as a bonus anyway.

Step one is to get 50 lenses in the top 100,000 (okay I want ALL of them in the top 100k) but that will take time and effort.

I was trying to figure out how to display how my lenses rank and how much money I earn (so far little, but then again, I've only been doing this for 3 months) and found a couple I thought I'd mention.

One is by Trekkiemelissa who seems to be doing pretty well. She shows how her lenses stack up in the overall ranks at Trekkie Melissa Stats. Maybe I'll do something similar.

Another one you should look at is Squidoodling with Noadi. Noadi is a Giant Squid and has some great lenses you should look at too.

I'm starting to see traffic make it's way to several of my lenses. I hit one of my first goals of 50 visitors over all my lenses during a 7-day period and then shot up to 130 over 7 days. I know alot of the top lenses can get 200-300 unique visitors a day and that's where I want to be. Hey, I'm starting to get some traffic from MSN, AOL and YaHoo! Finally, they've found some of my lenses.

I've recently hit yet another new high as far as traffic is concerned - 2,647 visits! Woo-hoo! Now I have to try to get it up to 5,000, then 10,000 visitors! Traffic has been holding steady at about 1,200-1,300 but traffic is increasing more and more as my lenses become more established, I'm sure more traffic will find its way to me. I'm seeing broad, thin traffic to all of my top lenses from Squidoo and elsewhere which is cool. I've got to work to deepen my traffic.

Still, not much, but then again, this is only after 6 months on Squidoo. Maybe it will become a torrent like the lens I mentioned earlier about Sarah Palin which was getting swamped with 72,000 visitors!

Not holding my breath, but if you dream, dream big!

Great Content=More Traffic. Sound's simple doesn't it?

I'm trying to find different websites to submit my various lenses to in order to get some people to stop by. I found an excellent Squidoo lens written by a Giant Squid called Social Bookmarking Sites which lists over 150 different social bookmarking sites you can submit your lenses to. Some I've used, but 150? Holy smokes!

In the meantime, I'm pinging like a madman and trying to write more content. Some of my weaker lenses need some more work.

I just received news that I have been paid by Squidoo. I made $21.45 for February! The big blue blurb appeared on my Squidoo dashboard (I thought I was in trouble the first time I saw it) and they said that I had been paid $21.45. I actually think that my next couple will be even more. I've had 2 lenses in the top tier since the end of February and more in the 2nd to go with the bunch floating around in the 3rd tier.

I am always surprised to have seen anything at all and although it was just a smallish sum, I am happy to have received that. By the beginning of September I'd decided to make more lenses and as you can see I have many more lenses and some hovering in and near the top tier. Through most of October my lenses were well out of the top tier, so I wasn't expecting to have very much. April is shaping up a little better, so I'll have to wait get my next payday, likely around June 10th or so. Thanks Squidoo!

But to be honest, it is not about the money. Even though some lensmasters report earning four figures, most lensmasters receive less. Anything I get from Squidoo is welcome, but I just enjoy making lenses I find interesting and maybe are also interesting to others.

This table shows what each lens could conceivably earn through lens rank. Remember that you don't get paid for 2 months at Squidoo. The January payout arrived March 11. The December payout, around the 10th of February, and so on.

Tier 1 lenses are those ranked an average of 2,000 or higher. Those in Tier 2 would be from 2,001 up to about 8,000 (approximately). Tier 3 would be those ranked about 8,001 to about 60,000.

Month

Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

February '09

$11.44

$1.85

$0.08

January '09

$11.43

$1.81

$0.08

December '08

$11.56

$1.82

$0.08

November '08

$11.63

$1.82

$0.08

October '08

$12.00

$1.94

$0.08

September '08

$11.75

$1.96

$0.08

August '08

$10.75

$1.81

$0.08

July '08

$11.04

$1.72

$0.08

Those above 60,000? Well, polish them up and get them drawing traffic. Relying on lensrank alone will not build your fortune on Squidoo. You need to make some sales if coinage alone is what motivates you as far as Squidoo is concerned.

Have you had a chance to check out The Big Bang Theory? It's a show that's been on television for 2 seasons already and just got the green light for 2 further seasons. Basically it is about two roommates, Leonard and Sheldon, who are brilliant physicists at CalTech and their pretty blond neighbor, Penny. Sounds simple enough, but the show is very well written and very humorous.

Leonard Hofstadter is played by Johnny Galecki and Sheldon Cooper is played by Jim Parsons. Penny, the pretty, blond neighbor is played by Kaley Cuoco (from 8 Simple Rules). Galecki was on Roseann as Darlene's boyfriend. The funniest character is Sheldon, an alpha nerd and constant source of intelligent putdowns and witty phrases on the show.

The lens contains an episode by episode guide from the pilot to the latest episode that just aired.

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The Simple Money-making Secrets of Online Millionaires

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You may pre-order it now and Amazon will deliver it to you when it arrives. Ships from and is sold by Amazon. Gift-wrap available.