Which Holiday Are You Gearing Up For?

My Easter lenses performed rather well this year, overall much better than in years past.  (I'll never understand Google, but this year I like the way it treated me.)  Three of them should qualify for tier one earnings this month and had several sales, so I'm happy about that.

So, on to the next holiday.  "And which holiday would that be?"  Glad you asked!

It isn't too late to make a lens for Mother's Day (though likely it will perform better next year than this), but it isn't too early to make lenses for back to school or Halloween or Christmas either.  Those are the three top selling seasons, so I hope you'll start planning lenses for one or all of them and get them published soon in order to let them "age" a bit.  Don't forget occasions such as weddings or special birthdays, though.  Those occasions occur year-round and it's a great idea to add them to your lens collection in order to keep lensrank and sales figures up all year long.

Making lenses for holidays and special occasions is a good idea, but always remember to make them with your unique spin.  You're probably tired of reading it, but I will never tire of reminding you (and myself) that unique, useful, updated, passionate lenses perform best. 

Happy holidays!

Choosing a Squidoo Theme - Which is More Readable?

Squidoo offers some awesome themes for our lenses and they're adding more and more.  Specialty themes for holidays and seasons are great for certain lenses.  I've discovered that on some of my lenses, though, especially those that are more "wordy" and educational, I really want to emphasize module titles - and sometimes it seems that the ads get in the way.

Recently I've been switching some of my lenses from a standard theme (such as Big Lucid) to the Highlighter theme.  This makes it really easy for visitors who are scanning through to see the main parts of the lens.  Also, at the top of the lens, it brings the eye to the module titles rather than to the ads.  Earning money with ads is great, but I really do want people not to miss the contents of the lens because it blends in with the ads.

Here's an example.  Look at these two pictures of the same lens, one with Big Lucid as the theme, the other with Highlighter.

 

See what I mean? Do you agree that it's easier to see what I've written when it's highlighted and that the ads get in the way of my text otherwise?  

I'd like to know what you think.  Which themes are your favorites?  Do you vary your choice of theme depending on the lens topic?  Let me know in a comment below.  

Spelling and Grammar Errors on Squidoo

What do you do when you find a lens on a wonderful topic, passionately written, but with multiple spelling or grammar errors?

Do you contact the lensmaster and point out the errors?  Do you "like" the lens anyway and ignore those pesky apostrophes?   Do you just grit your teeth and hit the "back" button? 

Or do you even notice grammar and spelling mistakes?

This is an area I have a hard time with because I really don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but I'll admit that poor grammar and repeated misspellings drive me ABSOLUTELY CRAZY!  (Sorry for shouting.)

What should I do?  What do you do?  I'd really like to know.

Photo by crazytales562 (a fellow grammar greek) via a Creative Commons license

Interview's Up!

Kimberly has been interviewing "successful Squids" on the SquidBlog for the last couple of weeks.  My interview is up today!  {blush}

I hope folks can take something productive away from it, something they can apply in their own Squid lives.

If you read it, I hope you'll leave a comment to let me know what you found that was helpful.  Thanks!