Promote Your Squidoo Lens with MyBlogLog

Sometimes, you can forget to add your Squidoo Lens Profile to Blog directories and communities as it's easy to oversee the fact that it has a RSS feed.

MyBlogLog helps you to find out just where your traffic is coming from and how they're getting there. Personally, I don't think you can ever have too many traffic stats. The secret is to use it to your advantage. Why not visit Squid-Stats for more information about traffic stats via your Squidoo dashboard?

MyBlogLog is like any other (blogging) community: Yep! and that includes Squidoo.

You need to put into it what you would like to get back out.
Take the time to visit other member's blogs/communities and comment :)
Networking is key for MyBlogLog to work but it's all worth the hard work in the end.

For sure, you'll get some people that won't or don't visit your lenses but that could be said for any community like this. In order to maximise the traffic to your Lenses from MyBlogLog, you need to work at it!

Views have been mixed across the WWW about whether MyBlogLog is any good for maximising traffic but I tend to think this is because those who don't receive very much from it are those who don't use it to its full potential.

The Isle of Squid

If you have a blog (or a site that uses a RSS feed) then, it's a good idea to join MyBlogLog.com. For the reasons why, check out the What can MyBlogLog do for me? above!

Click on MyBlogLog.com. and sign in with your Yahoo ID (Yahoo will ask you to verify your password.) If you don't have a Yahoo ID, don't worry, you can still register without one.

Fill in your profile with as much information as you can. Your profile will display all the blogs/websites that you own, your contacts, yours and your contacts' feeds, recent visitors, your tags and any communities that you have joined.

Traffic Tip!: Join MyBlogLog Face Ads! Join the Mybloglog-News community and then leave a short message in that community with a headline and link to your news. You must have an avatar with a human face (yours!)

On the left hand column, scroll down to My Sites and Services and click on the link that says Add Website.

Add your Blog name - I named mine Inkserotica on Squidoo.

Add your URL display name (this will be filled in automatically as you fill in your blog name but you can edit it if you wish.) - E.G. inkseroticaonsquidoo

Add your Blog site URL - This is your profile URL on Squidoo, e.g. http://www.squidoo.com/lensmasters/inkserotica

Indicate if your blog is Adult rated or contains porn and enter a short description (I used 'Spreading my smarts and ideas on Squidoo')

Now, click on Add Blog/Site!

Traffic Tip!: Offer a free back link (plus additional description) to anyone that joins your community. Publish a blog post about it, then send a message to some members of MyBlogLog, linking to your post.

After you've added your blog, you will be given a tracking script which you will need to add to your blog html code. This can be placed anywhere between the Body tags.

If you've added your Lens profile page, unfortunately you won't be able to do this but as Squidoo tracks your traffic anyway, it's not a great loss.

Next, click on the Go to 'yourblogcommunity' link at the bottom of the page. On the next page, click on the Settings link at the top next to the screenshot image of your blog (you need to add this now, as it will be displaying a generic image from MyBlogLog.)

On the Settings screen, you will notice that your Blog Feed URL will already be added. Below that click on Upload Screenshot.

Now you're going to upload the screenshot of your blog:

I use FREE software, Screen Grab Pro v.1.5 which can be downloaded from Traction-Software - Screen Grab Pro. Edit the image so that it's approximately 400 px in width. I use Adobe Image Ready CS but if you want to use free image editing software, here is a list:

PhotoPlus

Gimp

Photobie

Picasa

Paint


Upload this image to your MyBlogLog account.

Next, add Tags to describe your Lenses content. For example, I've added Carietta White, Freelance writing, book reviews, dating, relationships, domestic abuse, domestic violence.

I've still got plenty more to add, though!

Traffic Tip!: Bookmark every blog that you come across that displays a MyBlogLog widget. Save that bookmark in a folder named "Mybloglog Blogs" or similar. Now, visit each blog regularly. Don't forget to leave a comment or two!

Widgets wasn't something that you could add to Squidoo as they're usually Javascript but MyBlogLog has fixed that!

You can now add a widget that doesn't use Javascript.

MyBlogLog says it only works on flickr.com, Yahoo! 360, wordpress.com and myspace.com so although it displays correctly, I'm not yet sure if it updates every time someone new visits or you refresh your page.

I've already fitted mine to my profile on Squidoo, so now you can see who has visited your profile. Go visit them back and leave a comment!

You can also add a button to your profile page like this one:



Anyone clicking on this button will be taken to your Blog community page where they can see how many members have joined, your latest feeds (this will refresh when you update your Lenses), tags and your profile.

Consider using these tools to further boost your MyBlogLog experience:

Track MyBlogLog - 'This plugin identifies and tracks MyBlogLog readers on your website. The plugin will store the user avatar, location, website, twitter, technorati, etc.. along with the last visit dates.'
MyBlogLog Widget Colorer - This tool is created by Thin & Light to help you customize the colors of MyBlogLog "Recent Readers" Widget.
MyBlogLog module - This module provides simple and hassle-free integration with MyBlogLog services. MyBlogLog provides community-based services and statistics to web sites (not just bloggers.)
New MyBlogLog Community Widget - The purpose of this graph is to make it simple for you to see who exactly is visiting your blog and what other blogs they enjoy. This will benefit you greatly by allowing you to see what your readers enjoy so that you can provide more targeted content on your blog.
MyBlogLog is on Facebook

Here is a list of a few worthwhile Squidoo communities to join on MyBlogLog:

• Squidoo Marketing - A social networking community for people interested in marketing with Squidoo.
• Squidoo Magic - Tools and Updates for Creating Squidoo Lenses
• Squidoo Marketing Strategies: Help To Develop and Market Your Squidoo Lenses
• Isle of Squid - Free Squidoo Lens Directory
• Squidom.com - Bookmark and Vote on Your Favorite Squidoo Lenses
• SquidTop - Squidoo Blog Platform
• Squidoosphere - Aggregating Squidoo Blogs in the Blogosphere.
• Captain Squid - Squidoo Tips and Tricks
• SquidUtils Blog - Tools and Tips for Squidoo Lensmasters
• Squidalogue Promotion - Promotional successes and failures of Squidoo Lenses

Now this is the easy bit!

All you have to do is sit back and watch the traffic roll in :)

Though, I do recommend that you join communities, visit blogs and publicise your Lens blog on MyBlogLog in as many places as you can.

I.e. Stumble it! Digg it! Furl it! Bookmark it! Add it to search engines and use other promotional methods.

Traffic Tip!: Create a MyBlogLog meme. To get it started, ask bloggers to leave a comment on your blog requesting to be added to the list. Then create the rules! E.g. they must visit and join all the communities on the list, they must publish the list (rules and all) to their own blog and they must add new communities to the list by requesting comments.

• Don't forget to add each new service you join to your MyBlogLog account. This section can be found by scrolling down your profile page and clicking on the link: add service. You can use this feature to find forgotten accounts but I wouldn't recommend it. With me, it found accounts that didn't even exist, lol!


• Keep a track on all your contacts on MyBlogLog and the services they are joined up to by using the Friender feature. Again, on your profile page, scroll down to the section where your contacts are listed. Click on the link: add/manage. Now highlight and click on the Friender link. Follow the two steps to find your friends and the services they use and add them!


• Why not add a specific lens to your MyBlogLog account? If you have some lower ranking lenses that don't seem to be doing so well, try adding them to your MyBlogLog account to give them an extra boost! It can't hurt to try!


• MyBlogLog has partnered with Zemanta which means that it gives you the ability to 'capture the post that caught your fancy and set you up use it as the inspiration for your own blog update! Pick a quote; add some tags, maybe a photo or two and bingo! There's your post.'


• If you get a pending contact request don't just add them straight away to your friends list. Check on their profile to see if:
  a) Their interests match yours
  b) They're relatively new to MyBlogLog but they have a vast list of contacts. This smacks of a spammer. Avoid like the plague.
  
  If in doubt, add them to your followers list. This way, they can still follow you but you don't have to read their updates or messages if you don't wish to.


• Occasionally, MyBlogLog will add you to a community. This is okay providing it's a community that interests you. Don't feel obliged to stay as a member to this added community if you don't wish to.

You're probably already aware that, if you wish, you can go Pro at MyBlogLog, but is it something worth doing?

Find out here!

MyBlogLog has to be one of the services on the Internet that going Pro doesn't really achieve much in the way of additional features. Plus, you would need to go Pro for every blog or website you have registered, not just for your account. Tally how much that would cost you if you had, say, the amount of websites I have registered!

A Pro account costs either $3 a month subscription or an annual fee of $25, both payable through Paypal or a credit card if you wish to purchase the annual subscription. The monthy fee will be automatically paid every month and the annual fee would have to be renewed by you every time it expires.

Here's what going Pro would give you on MyBlogLog:

When you first register a blog on MyBlogLog you are given a 3 day free trial which will enable you to see just what you will be getting with an upgraded account. However, unless you have more than 10 members in your community already, it really doesn't give you any useful information.

MyBlogLog themselves say that many people do not feel they need a Pro account, so why bother having the option to go Pro?

I suppose if you need real stats and want to download your traffic stats log to analyse yourself then by all means go Pro. MyBlogLog state that if your site has a lot of links and a lot of traffic then going Pro would be very useful. I think it all depends on what you feel you need and what kind of information you require.

How do I go Pro?:

1 - Click on the Settings link of the Blog you want to upgrade.
2 - Scroll down to Account Status
3 - Choose either MyBlogLog Pro Monthly Subscription ($3 monthly recurring, PayPal) OR MyBlogLog Pro 12-Month Service ($25 for 1 year, credit card or PayPal)
4 - You will be taken to your Paypal account. Check that all information is correct and Click Submit.
5 - All done! You will now have live traffic stats :)

So, is going Pro worth it?

I would say, no, it's not. If you decide to go Pro you wouldn't receive any additional features or services than if you kept your account free.

Save your money and enjoy MyBlogLog for free! :)