Really, there's no competition between seasonal and evergreen lenses. Every lensmaster needs to have both.
My evergreen lenses are the meat and potatoes of my Squidoo business while the seasonal lenses add spikes of interest at various times around the calendar. This is the week every year that my How to Make a Cow Costume lens peaks (thanks to a certain restaurant's annual Dress Like a Cow promotion). The interesting thing is that the cow costume lens then continues to get traffic through the fall and all the way to Christmas I'm thinking state fairs followed by Halloween of course and then nativity plays at churches. For whatever other reasons people like to dress like cows, I am certainly grateful.
It's good to introduce an evergreen component to a seasonal lens. Of course Christmas or Valentine gift lenses should be easily adaptable to birthday and other year-round gift-giving occasions. And it should be easy for costume lenses to be adapted to a dress-up play for kids topic, or for a gypsy costume lens being made to appeal to belly dancers or fans of the Bohemian style, both of which are popular all year.
Just as we enjoy an unseasonably warm day in February or a break from the heat in August, that touch of evergreen in a seasonal lens can send us surprise sales now and then. But why not work a bit to make a seasonal lens perform all year long. A good investment of time? I think so.
Do you have any secrets to making seasonal lenses perform as evergreen? I'd love to read your comments.