Man, Machine, and Better Squidoo Lens Titles

What do "man" and "machine" have to do with choosing titles for your Squidoo lenses?

You'll find the answer in The 2 Most Important Elements of a Great Lens Title, a post I wrote yesterday for the SquidooHQ blog.

I mentioned recently that SquidooHQ is the place to find great Squidoo tips, and this post is no exception.  Pardon me if it appears that I'm tooting my own horn, but I'm basing this statement on the excellent feedback this man/machine post has received.  So if you want to learn how to create a better title for your lenses and (most likely) get more traffic as a result, then just go read the post.

Then I'd love if you'd come back and leave a comment here to let me know your thoughts on the subject.

What's New On Squidoo?

Hard to believe we're headed into the fourth week of the new year.  My year's been busy and seems to be flying by.  How about yours?

I've been spending a lot of my time hanging around on Squidoo, visiting lots of lenses and checking in regularly with SquidooHQ.  I especially appreciate the weekly SquidooHQ Friday Round Up, a great place to check in every week to make sure I haven't missed something new.  If you don't visit daily, at least check in on Fridays to keep up with all the great news, tips, and information that's been provided during the week. 

Full disclosure and not meant to be a shameless plug, I've also been doing some writing for SquidooHQ, so you might run across some of my articles, too, while you're there playing catch up.

So, what's new with you on Squidoo?  I'd love to know, so hope you'll take a moment out of your busy year to leave a comment!

How to Generate a Spike in Your Squidoo Lens Traffic

Kimberly wrote at SquidooHQ today about Lens Ideas for July.  Good suggestions there to get you thinking outside the box a bit, but more importantly to get you thinking about niche topics/holidays that not everyone is writing about. 

There WILL be people searching for those topics when the day comes.  Know how I know?  Did you ever look at logos that Google displays on their main page?  Frequently they will display special logos drawn to commemorate a holiday or event.  A recent favorite was on June 9th, Les Paul's 96th birthday.  Take a look at the Les Paul logo - and strum the strings!

Now, take a look at this graph that shows the Google search trend for Les Paul:

See that huge spike?  That was June 9, 2011, the day Google displayed their special logo and millions of curious people googled "Les Paul" to find out more about him.

While I won't promise you a Les Paul spike in Squidoo traffic, I will promise you that people will be searching to learn about unique holidays and topics they hear about as they happen.  No reason in the world it shouldn't be your lens that they find when they do their search!

So, what niche holiday or topic are you going to write about in the coming month?  Have you had a lens spike in the past?  Tell us about it in a comment below.