Squidoo Secrets for a Residual Income

You've now decided that it's time to make some money online, and that Squidoo lenses are the way to go - good choice. Why is it a good choice? Well, because they're quite straight forward to setup, easy to look after, and, more importantly, Squidoo gives you plenty of options for making money. In this article we'll focus on a 'set it and forget it' way of picking up a residual income while doing something you enjoy - talking about your hobbies.

The ways of making money on Squidoo can really be split into several sections, but the easiest one is ad revenue, because all you need to do is to write about your favorite topic on your Squidoo lens, and have them show Google Adsense ads that are relevant to the topic you're talking about.

For example, Squidoo will already be placing Google Adsense adverts on your lens, that's part of the way that they get money coming into their business, and why you can sign up with them for nothing. You'll actually get a cut of that money too, but you'll get it as part of the overall Squidoo co-op. This'll work quite well for you if you haven't had too many people visit your site so as to click on the Adsense ads, especially when starting out, because you'll pickup a small amount of the money that other people have been able to generate.

Squidoo breaks it down like this: They take 45% of the money generated by Adsense in order to keep everything running and provide you with a free service, 5% will go to charity and the final 50% is spread around the Squidoo cooperative. This money will show up on your dashboard and you're free to either take it, however there's a minimum amount you have to have in your account first, or you can designate a charity to have it sent to.

When it comes to the Adsense ads you don't need to do anything other than provide a lens with good quality content about your subject - You aren't going to need an Adsense account, because it's all shared anyway, so Google and Squidoo take care of everything for you.

To get the best ads, or at least the ones that are the best match for your site, you're going to need to have content that really is relevant to your topic. For instance, if you're creating a lens on fishing, and then suddenly go off on a tangent and write a large piece on how GPS isn't always as reliable as it should be, and you may not get to that new fishing ground before 6am, if at all, then you're going to start picking up GPS related ads from Google as well as the odd fishing related ad.

Now, the GPS ads may turn out to be a high earner if people click on them, but, you'll find that 95% of the people are only there to read about the latest tips and techniques on fishing and have no interest in anything else - so you've missed out on having ads placed that they may have been only too willing to click on.

So, in conclusion on ad revenue, it's not something you have to take time to learn or setup, it's already done for you, but if you want to get as many people as possible clicking and bumping up the co-op pot of money for a greater return, keep your content as tight as possible on the subject and fill it with lots of useful information.

Now that you know you can have a revenue stream on your lens as soon as you start, with no additional effort required from you, let's look at another excellent way of making some money using some of the tools Squidoo already provide you with.

The next thing you can do is to add modules to your lens. Modules are a far more flexible option when it comes to making money with Squidoo. There are several types of modules, ranging from text through to video, but the one's we're interested in at this point are the commercial modules.

As far as the money you make from the lenses is concerned it's split in a similar way to the ad revenue, but with one major difference - the 50% that doesn't go to Squidoo and charity goes directly to you. The 50% isn't distributed to every other lens owner; it's yours to do with as you please!

What you'll discover with the commercial modules is that you can find one that will have products that fit quite nicely with any niche you may be involved in. Take for instance travel. You may have just built a wonderful lens about the joys of going to Disneyland, and some of the fun things you can do while you're there; now, wouldn't it be great if you could actually setup a travel program for the readers? Show them how they can get flights to and from L.A, car hire and accommodation - after all, you've told them about the good time they could be having, and you want to help them out as much as possible - plus you get to make a bit of cash along the way - so everyone's happy.

Does that idea sound too good to be true? Being able to offer a product that will add so much to your lens in terms of it's usefulness to the reader, as well as your bank balance? Well it is possible, and the module you'd need to do that is called 'Orbitz!' With Orbitz! the reader can input information on flights, car hire and accommodation and they'll then be given all of the options for booking their vacation.

Of course that's not the only module you can place on to your lens so as to make money with Squidoo. The people visiting your lens on Disneyland may want to know a bit more about it before they arrive i.e. what there is to do if they ever manage to venture out of the gates, what attractions to head for first because of the queues, and so on. What they're going to need is a handy little book that they can take with them that gives them all of that information and more - and guess what, you can save them from having to search for one because all of the best books on the subject of Disneyland are preselected by you in your Amazon.com module!

With the Amazon.com module, and many of the others, you can pick out specific items that you want displayed on your lens. You have the choice of books, DVD's, anything Amazon.com offers in fact.

Now, how about getting them to rent a Disney DVD so as to get them in the mood for their impending vacation? You can drop in a Netflix Movies module and let them select the one's they want.

They're also going to want to have a few Disney items dotted around the house, courtesy of your eBay module, of even some personalised items to wear when they get there, via your CafePress.com module. You may not be aware of what CafePress is at the moment, but you'll definitely want to check it out. CafePress is: "...a popular design-it-yourself network online. Pick from over 22 million original designs on tons of customizable products--tote bags and t-shirts and mouse pads and more!"

Now, from just one small visit to your lens they've heard all about Disneyland, booked the vacation, bought a few guides, rented a video or two to get in the mood - and they may even be wearing some t-shirts courtesy of their visit to your lens! That's just an example, I'm sure your head's probably swimming with the possibilities by now.

So now you can see the power of adding modules, and remember you don't have to do all that much to get this setup, I suggest you visit here for further Squidoo help and also a number of other Squidoo secrets, like adding affiliate links or links directly to your main site's homepage into the lens so as to increase your Squidoo profits.