Build an Appealing Lens, Then Promote It
So, you want to learn how to build successful Squidoo lenses (or any sort of webpage), attract web traffic, and get your Squidoo lens found by Google! This three-part tutorial covers:
- Learn the Secrets of My Squidoo Success!
- Part I: Ten Steps to Build an Appealing (and Effective) Lens
- Part II: Ten Steps to Help People Find Your Lens
- Part III: Search Engine Optimization -- Getting to Google Page 1
You attract visitors through links from other webpages, which I teach you how to build in Part II, and through search engines, which I teach you how to master in Part III. But before you can attract web traffic, you have to have excellent bait -- an appealing, effective, interesting, useful Squidoo lens!
I use the following ten steps to create Squidoo lenses with hundreds of visitors a week -- including a Lens of the Day within my first three weeks, several Squidoo Top 100 Lenses, many lenses in the highest-paying lensrank tier, and many of my Squidoo lenses on the front page of Google!
BONUS! See my Squidoo Performance Polls below. Old Squids, please share your best lensrank, days on the Top 100 list, and typical traffic. New Squids, this will give you an idea of what you can accomplish on Squidoo.
Logo based on photo by: Binary Koala - Some Rights Reserved
Choose Keywords -- The "Catch Phrase" For Your Lens
Keywords, the Key to Search Engine Traffic
Use your keywords for the URL of your lens, which you pick when you first create a lens. Also use those keywords for the file name of your lens photo, a few module titles, and a few links. Repetition and use of keywords in "key" places on a webpage tells search engines, "Hey, this is what my page is all about... so send me visitors searching for this topic!"
Keywords Tip: For image filenames and your lens URL, separate multiple words in a phrase with hyphens. For example, "golden-retriever-puppies".
How to Name Your Squidoo Lens
Hook Visitors AND Search Engines
The title needs to: a) sound catchy and memorable rather than generic b) tell HUMAN visitors what your webpage is about and c) tell SEARCH ENGINES what your lens is about using your keyword(s).
For example, Yes, I Love My Hybrid Car! grabs the reader more than "hybrid car review," and tells search engines your lens is about hybrid cars.*
*Keywords Tip: Now that I know more than when I created that lens, I try to use plurals instead of singular keywords. A search engine can find the word "car" in "cars," but not vice versa.
Ten Steps to Build an Effective Lens
Make It Readable, Informative, Engaging... and Tasty to Search Engines

3. Write a brief introduction, telling visitors what the lens is about and what they'll get out of reading the rest of the page.
To help you figure out what your lens is about, you might write a "lens mission statement" on a post-it note, telling what questions your lens should answer, or what visitors should get out of your lens. Adapt this mission statement for your introduction!
The introduction is like a television episode teaser. You've got to "hook" your audience; don't waste time on anything that doesn't achieve that goal! At the same time, use text that contains keywords/search terms for Google. For example, I packed several keywords into the first sentence of my introduction module, and told people what they'll get out of visiting the lens:
So, you want to learn how to build appealing Squidoo lenses (or any kind of webpage), attract web traffic, and get your Squidoo lens found by Google! This three-part tutorial covers...
4. Research your content. If you don't know what you're talking about, how will your visitors know? And why would they stick around?
Pick a subject you know, and share your enthusiasm and knowledge! Keep in mind the "questions to answer" or "mission statement" you chose in step 3. Do the necessary research to answer those questions or satisfy that goal. As you write, keep checking: did what you just write answer one of those questions, or contribute to the mission of your lens?
Tip: Be brief, but make sure you cover the most important things to know about your topic. Remember the famous "And Then a Miracle Occurs" cartoon. Your readers don't know what you've left out!
5. Add links to related content, videos and images. This includes webpages you consulted for your research! Clickthroughs boost lensrank. And links to "relevant" pages help your lens rank better in search engines for the words and phrases you use as the link.
For example, if you're writing about potatoes, say "For more info, check out this website on Potatoes and Tubers" not "Click here for a website about potatoes and tubers."
One way of adding links to related content is to bookmark lenses related to your topic in a lensroll in your sidebar.
6. Proofread. Grammar and spelling still matter, even if people don't consciously realize why some pages seem sloppy. Obama won the last election largely because he sounded smart and polished -- use the same trick to "put the best face" on your lenses. At least run your text through a spellchecker.
7. Make pretty graphics. I added title graphics and dividers like this to my Greece page:

Tip: See my Where to Get Graphics (Legally!) tutorial, or my Fancy Table of Contents tutorial for all sorts of slick-looking HTML code special effects like my inset paragraph with the rounded corners!
8. Vary your content. Huge blocks of text lose your reader's attention; so do masses of ads, icons or images. Unless you're extremely good at holding people's attention, you should shape your lens more like a variety show than a four-hour documentary.
9. Be interactive. Guestbooks and polls invite people to participate and come back. Clicks help boost your lensrank. Updated or changing content boosts your page's placement in some search engines.
10. Tag your lens (see "Tags" in the sidebar), classifying your lens with general topics like "cooking" and "lord of the rings" rather than "brownie recipes" and "Boromir family tree." Outside of Squidoo, tags can (again) help search engines figure out what to file your lens under. Inside Squidoo, tags are used by visitors using the search box and by the Discovery Tool (see below) to create links between lenses on the same topic. Crosslinking between lenses attracts traffic in two ways: by bringing you visitors from other Squidoo lenses, and by boosting your Squidoo lens in search engine results (only a little, but every bit helps).
Squidoo Tags Tip: Have you seen that blue "Explore related lenses" section near the top of many lenses? You turn it on in the "Discovery Tool" section of your Introduction module, which simultaneously adds your lens to the "Explore..." section of other lenses! It works by looking for lenses with the same tags as yours. If you find it's recommending unrelated lenses or ones that are just plain lousy, go find Squidoo lenses you think belong there, and use their tags!
Tip: CONTENT MATTERS.
The web is huge. Ask yourself: would you read your webpage if you ran across it elsewhere? Your readers will leave if they don't find your page worth reading. Remember: be informative, entertaining, and brief.
Part II Of "How To Get Your Lens Found"
Next Lesson: Building Web Traffic!
All right! The first step in attracting visitors is to have something attractive! Now that you've built a great lens, it's time to get the word out. Here's how...-
Squidoo Tips: Building Web Traffic
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Welcome to Part II of Greekgeek's Squidoo Tips: How To Get Your Lens Found! This tutorial focuses on building web traffic with social networking. I'll also recommend some simple tools to improve your lens, so that visitors stick around...
Featured Lenses: More Squidoo Tips
Here's some great Squidoo lenses to help beginning lensmasters learn How To Squidoo!-
Greekgeek's Top Ten Squidoo Tips
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Psst! Want some free Squidoo secrets? At the risk of losing some footholds in the top ranks on Squidoo, here are my Top Ten Squidoo Tips! I've already taught you How to Get Your Lens Found using proven techniques such as SEO. I've given yo...
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How To Create A Quality Lens
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The word "quality" has come up a lot lately on Squidoo, particularly when it comes to the Giant Squid Program. In order to be accepted you need 50 quality lenses, but what constitutes a "quality" lens? Here's what I think defines quality and how you...
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Squidoo Payday Questions & Answers
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It never fails, every month on payday the same questions are being asked in the SquidU forum. Most of them by new lensmasters, but surprisingly, there's also quite a bit of confusion among some who have been around for a while. Figuring out how the...
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Squidoo Traffic Tricks: (how to get more visitors and a better search engine ranking for your Squidoo lens)
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Do you have some lenses that don't get as many visitors as they deserve? Would you like to learn how to get more people reading your lenses? Wanna know how to make people come back to your lenses again and again? Would you like to rank higher in G...
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Basic HTML for Squidoo
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Before you start reading all this, you may want to open Advanced HTML in a new tab, because you'll be wanting to check it out as soon as you've finished this! You can use basic HTML in a few of the lens modules. Mostly used to create hyperlinks (the...
Tip: Your Lensmaster Profile Is Your Business Card!
Complete your Squidoo profile. Include an interesting photo and bio that quickly tells people who you are, some topics you write about, and links to some of your best lenses.
SquidBits Blog: More Squidoo Traffic Tips
Search Engine Optimization, Boosting Lensrank, and Other Squidoo Tips
I keep a blog where I share free Squidoo tips on how to boost your visitor traffic, lensrank, and get your lens into the highest-paying tier onto Squidoo. So check out my weekly Squidbits Squidoo Tips!
(Silly me! You're all making more competition for me! :))
Fetching RSS feed... please stand bySQUIDOO PERFORMANCE POLLS
Here's your chance to share your Squidoo experience with the Squidoo community -- anonymously!
BE HONEST. This will help us get a sense of where our lenses fall relative to others.
Wait at least 3 months to vote, or three months of Squidoo Pay Day. You can click "View Poll Results" below each poll if you're a newbie.
There are three Squidoo Polls below:
- Best Lensrank Achieved
- Days on the Top 100 List
- Typical 7-Day Web Traffic
Poll: Best Lensrank You've Achieved
Dance With the Squid Stars
Lensrank for each lens can be found on your dashboard. It is NOT the same as the number listed on the upper left of an individual lens you're viewing -- that's just its rank within a single category. Lensrank is among all Squidoo lenses instead of just in one category.
Poll: Days on the Squidoo Top 100 List
That's top 100 by lensrank, not all the other Top 100 lists!
"Days on the Top 100 List" is found by clicking "stats" in your Dashboard for each lens. It's listed under Lensrank near the top left of a lens' stats page. If you've had more than one lens on the Top 100 list, pick the one that's been there longest.
Poll: Seven-Day Lens Traffic
For your good lenses, not your superstar lenses
This question is subjective: which lens should you use to gauge your "typical" traffic? Usually you'll have one or two special lenses above the rest which are atypical overachievers. So go to the next level down, to your "bread and butter" lenses -- those five or so that never make a huge LOTD-style splash, but are a steady, reliable draw week after week.
I've overlapped poll options slightly to reflect the ranges I've seen.
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Feel free to leave feedback, critique or observations to help fellow lensmasters! If you found these Squidoo tips useful, how about a click on the magic widget?
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- Novice-CopyWriter Novice-CopyWriter Nov 14, 2009 @ 6:26 am
- well geek ,good stuff to build better squidoo lense man
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- KarateKatGraphics KarateKatGraphics Nov 14, 2009 @ 1:03 am
- This is excellent! The only thing I don't understand is why to use broader/more general tags (e.g., "cooking" instead of "chicken soup"). Doesn't that pull up unrelated lenses in the discovery tool? When I see that, I usually think the lensmaster forgot to use enough tags, or specific enough ones--but maybe this is on purpose? I'm a little confused on that one point. Appreciate the wealth of insights here, though--lots of tangible advice to follow up on.
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- Greekgeek Greekgeek Nov 16, 2009 @ 8:04 am
- You don't want Squodoo tags so broad they tend to pull in lenses that are totally unrelated. But if you pick a tag that is so specific only 3 lenses have it besides yours, you're missing out on Squidoo's ability to send you traffic -- there's so few chances for it to try! So you have to balance getting totally unrelated lenses in the tool (won't help you or them, and looks sloppy) with narrowing your tags so far that you segregate your lens from the rest of Squidoo.
Squidoo tags are a bit like the signs over the aisle in a grocery store, or the Dewey Decimal system. If you're interested in chicken soup, you might be interested in other cooking lenses, too-- even if you were actually looking for soup. (Heey, i see a recipe for bruchetta...there's a thought! *click*). I'd probably choose "soup" for my primary tag, and include both "chicken soup" (most specific) and "cooking" (most vague) in my range of tags.
I am actually not the most brilliant expert at Squidoo tags, though. You know who is? The creator of SquidUtils, which I use all the time. Google for "SquidUtils Blog" and check out the second-to-last entry. He gives a good overview of tags.
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- Wednesday_Elf Wednesday_Elf Nov 12, 2009 @ 10:38 am
- Such great hints and information for this 'baby squid'. Thanks so much for compiling all this helpful advice and great 'learning' links. Off to read Parts II and III.
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How To Get Your Lens Found -- Advice from Squidoo HQ
Psst. Have you seen this blog post from Megan Casey, Editor-in-Chief (and, basically, second-in-command) of Squidoo?
SquidU Review Blog Post:
The Basics of Getting Found
by Greekgeek
Part-time Latin tutor, art history instructor, artist and writer puttering away at a PhD in mythology and depth psychology.
My lenses currently inclu...
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