Serve Your Readers Fresh Squidoo Lenses

The ad section of the Sunday paper this week is a whopper!  You probably still have Halloween candy left, but no doubt about it, it's Christmas shopping season.

So, how are your Christmas-related lenses?  Are they fresh? 

More and more, Google is looking for fresh content to feature in search results.  Truly, it doesn't take much time to update a product review lens or a Christmas menu lens or any other holiday lens, and it will be well worth the effort you take to do so when you're rewarded with both better lensrank and more traffic from the search engines.

I've brushed off this oldie, How Do I Keep My Lens Fresh?, to give you some suggestions for freshening up those holiday lenses.  Have other ideas to offer for how to update a holiday lens?  Feel free to talk about them in a comment below. 

Watch Out! Cainiac Loose on Squidoo!

It's no secret to people who know me that I'm a bit of a political junkie with a definite lean to the right. Politics is a topic I really enjoy debating on my Squidoo lenses.  One of those politically-oriented lenses even made Lens of the Day back during the 2008 election cycle.

Lately my political lenses have focused on one candidate, one I don't just write about but one I truly support. Last night, my husband and I were honored to get to hear him speak in person! My pictures didn't turn out worth a hoot, but thankfully I was able to grab this video from one of our local news station websites:



Did you see me in the crowd? Nah, I didn't either. But I know I was there. No apologies.  Just call me a Cainiac.

If you want to learn more about my current favorite candidate and why I've jumped on the Cain Train, you'll find information in my Herman Cain lenses, here.

Is there a political candidate that you support?  Have you made a lens about him or her, or about your pet political issue?   Feel free to drop a lens link in a comment below.

Another Month Bites The Dust

Can't believe that tomorrow is October already. I'm really not sure what happened to September except that it flew by faster than a colorful autumn leaf in a windstorm.

I hope your Halloween lenses are doing well. Have you noticed any difference in visits since the advent of the new Squidoo Happy Halloween magazine? If you have, I'd love to know.

The stores, of course, are full of Halloween things, but I expect to see some red and green crowding out the orange well before the month is over.  Have you started gearing up your lens list with new or updated goodies for Christmas/gift shoppers? Planning anything special to market to holiday shoppers this year?

I'd love if we could collect some marketing ideas here in the comments section. If you have a brilliant or even a basic idea for marketing holiday lenses on Squidoo, would you share it with us in a comment below? I'd appreciate it and I believe others would, too.  I'll be sharing a few of my own ideas in the coming days and weeks.

Thanks, and an early "Ho, ho, ho!" to you, too!

Housework Really Is Fun When It's the Lens of the Day

Housework really is fun, especially when my lens about it is selected Lens of the Day!

What a nice surprise this morning to wake up to lots and lots of comments to approve, a sure sign that something special is going on on Squidoo.  Today, my lens Housework - How to Make it Fast and Keep it Fun, is Lens of the Day.

I've had a couple other LOTD's, but the excitement never lessens and, in fact, today I'm feeling especially blessed by the honor.  What wonderful comments the lens has received already!

Thank you, Squidoo, and thanks lensmasters for visiting my Lens of the Day.  Here's wishing happy housekeeping for all of us!

Why I Appreciate Cows

It continues to amaze me how many people find my How to Make a Cow Costume page this time of year.  You see, this coming Friday is Cow Appreciation Day at Chick-Fil-A and people really want free food!  To get it, all they have to do is dress up like a cow.  To do that, they need instructions.

Not sure why I'm surprised about the traffic.  After all, the point of the page is to show people how to make or where to buy a cow costume.  And the spike in traffic every end of June/early July is certainly tied to Chick-Fil-A's annual event.  In other words, the lens is working as planned! 

Of course there's a spike in October, too, as people plan Halloween costumes.  But actually this is a fairly popular lens that gets traffic year-round.  I guess people have other, year-round reasons to dress up like a cow.  And I certainly appreciate that!

Do you have a lens that gets traffic spikes that surprise you?  Leave a link in your 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.

Happy Flag Day, USA!

June 14th is Flag Day in the U.S.  Are you flying the American flag today?

Ever wonder why the American Flag is red, white, and blue?  Ah, I've got a lens for that!

How about you.  Do you make patriotic lenses?  If you do and you've always wanted a patriotic lens theme, be sure to vote for the 25th Squidoo lens theme!

After you do, feel free to post a link to your favorite patriotic lens right here in a comment.

How Do We Look On a Smart Phone?

I do try to keep up with science and technology, but I don't have a smart phone - yet.  For that reason, I can't check to see how this blog looks displayed in its mobile version.

There is a mobile version available now (I love you, Blogger) and I just updated the blog's settings so that if you view this blog on your phone, you'll see that version. 

Anyone want to check it out for me?  Go to www.isquidoodoyou.com on your phone and see what you see.  Then let me know how it looks, would you?  Thanks!

(One more reason that someday I will be able to justify having a smart phone!)

Summer Sale on Kindle Books

I should be writing and updating my lenses, but instead I'm reading.  Reading and buying books, in fact.  Kindle books, of course.

There's a Sunshine Sale going on right now in the Kindle store with over 600 titles selling for 99 cents, $1.99, or $2.99.  I just bought three.  Or was it four?  These are terrific titles, too, not unknown books by unknown authors.

You do know that you don't have to own a Kindle to read Kindle books, yes?  If you didn't know that and don't own a Kindle yet, read this.

I really do need to get back to work, writing, but I'll be visiting the Kindle store again before the Sunshine Sale ends on June 15th, and chances are good that I'll be spending more money there.  Sales on Kindle books are few and far between, so I'm going to take advantage of these low prices. 

How about you?  Do you like book bargains?  Do you read Kindle books?  Tell me what you've been reading recently.

New SquidU Leadership Council Elected

The new SquidU Leadership Council has been elected, and a fine lineup of nine lensmasters they are!  I have to admire their courage for volunteering for an as yet undefined job that obviously isn't going to be easy. 

I really like to be positive about things, but this time I'm going to make an exception and mention the very uncalled-for comments by several lensmasters in what should be a pure "congratulations and thank you" thread.  Don't these complainers have any idea how they sound?  If I were starting a "three strikes and you're out" SquidU scorecard, there would be several on it with one strike already.  For the sake of the council and the future of SquidU, I hope those who complained will leave the forum and take their bad attitudes with them.  (End of negative comment.)

My best wishes to the nine council members, thank you in advance for serving, and many thanks to those community members who voted. 

Another Reason to Choose a Great Intro Module Photo

Have you noticed that now you can choose SIX related lenses to feature in the right side margin of each of your lenses?  List them in the "Related Lenses" tab of the intro module in the lens workshop.  After your lens is published, check that right sidebar for the "Explore related pages" section and you'll see all six lenses displayed there, along with their intro module photos.  Very eye-catching and very cool!

If you don't specify six lenses, Squidoo will use your tags to choose the lenses that will display in that space.  If someone else who has a lens with a similar topic doesn't specify six lenses, it's possible that one of your lenses might show on that person's related pages section. 

So . . . Make sure your intro module picture is a good one.  You never know where it might show up! 

Weigh In On the Latest Round of Changes on Squidoo

How are you liking (or not) the new lens layout, new themes, and this week's other changes on Squidoo? 

I'd love if you'd leave a comment here and/or on my Facebook page to share your opinion. 

If you don't know what I'm talking about, this page will enlighten you. 

So, comments?

Squidoo Tags - Have You Noticed?

Tags on Squidoo lenses are much more noticeable now.  Have you noticed? 

You'll find the "Related Tags" section on the right-hand side of each lens.  Each one is linked to a tags page, consisting of a list of all lenses that use that same tag. 

This week, Squidoo changed the display of the tags, making them much more noticeable.  The format practically screams, "Click me!"  And people will click.  I know I've been clicking on tag links, on my own lenses as well as others', ever since the change just to see what I can see. 

So, what will visitors to your lenses see when they click on your tags?  I already told you that they'll go to a tags page with a list of lenses.  So, why is this important to you?  It's important because when a visitor to a lens on a topic similar to yours clicks out on that lens's related tag, you want to be sure that your lenses on the same topic show up on that tag's page.   Why?  So those visitors will click on and visit your lenses. 

Make sense? 

Update your lenses with the right tags and see if you notice an increase in the number of visits to your lenses.  I'll be updating my tags and watching my stats, how about you?

Monthly Squidoo Profile Tune-Up

Here's a quick Squidoo tip for today.  It's a new month.  Time to update your profile.

You can feature up to five lenses on your lensmaster profile page.  Last month you might have featured Easter lenses.  This month, change the lenses to reflect the calendar by choosing topics related to Mother's Day, Memorial Day, or summer vacations.   Go to the "Profile" tab on your dashboard and look for "featured lenses" to update your choices. 

While you're there, take a look at your default lensmaster bio.  Is it up-to-date?  If not, take this opportunity to freshen it up a bit, too.  Not sure what to write?  Click here to learn how to write a Squidoo bio.

Ahhh.  Now your profile is fresh as a May flower.  Doesn't that feel better? 

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!