Search Engine Optimization Tips for Squidoo

May 31st, 2010 Comments Off

In my last post I talked about Squidoo and how I have a lot to learn… I often don’t give myself enough credit. People have commented in previous posts (thanks Michelle!) about “not getting it” at Squidoo. It seems that generating traffic can be a problem and I do know about this first hand. Half my lenses right now really aren’t getting a lot of traffic but most of them are in their infancy. I expect the traffic to pick up considerably especially once I go through all my pages and make sure that I follow these tips:

Optimize for One Main Keyword

Each lens will always have one main keyword that I use to optimize the page. In this lens the main keyword is “make money writing”. Notice how it is in the URL and scattered a few times here and there in the lens? That’s exactly what you need to do. But don’t overdo it. Put the keyword in one of the module titles and once or twice in the lens and that’s it.

Use Other Secondary Keywords

I started using a tactic that I have good results with in terms of getting additional search engine traffic. I research a bunch of secondary keywords. I come up with about ten keywords (long tail usually with at least three words) and turn it into a module title. So, if I find a keyword such as “how do I make money writing” I will use that for the module title. I then put these keywords in the tags.

Make a Keyword Rich URL

One of the best places to optimize your squidoo lens is to use your main keyword or one of the good secondary keywords and make it the lens URL. This gives you a better chance of achieving a top spot on google. If the keyword is taken, you can use a variant such as make-money-writing-2 or something like that. You just need to get the keyword in there.

A Living Example

My make money writing lens follows this routine and is currently in the second spot in google for that keyword search. Upsettingly enough, I just noticed that I got knocked off from the top spot by own parked domain name. I need to get my act together and actually create the page. Ugh! But now you have a glimpse of my business model – create a lens, find a kickass keyword, and create a minisite about it and link to it from the lens.

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I Still Have a Lot to Learn at Squidoo

May 19th, 2010 7 Comments

A few days ago I decided to make Squidoo my number one online effort. I started a lens a while ago that I update periodically highlighting my adventures.  I’m completely done with trying to make some “extra cash” with those content sites. I slugged it through to make $52 at The Content Authority which is okay but for the amount of time I spent, I could have made at least one new lens a day and promoted and worked on the ones I do have. It was a wasted effort really. Wie Schade. (Too bad). But at least I know that now.

Learning from The Captain

I’ve been glued to the writings of Captain Squid and have made it my project to read every single article in that blog and take notes. I am going through my lenses one by one and trying to apply what I’ve learned. Sure, I’ve been Squidooing pretty much since the site started but I’ve started taken it pretty seriously this week. I WILL build this up to be my second income stream (with my first major one being eHow residuals from the articles I do have up). Once I finish with that, I’ll do the same on Squidoo Cool and any other blog or info that I can get my hands on.

A Glimpse at My Business Plan

Okay, so this is pretty much what I’ll be doing.

  1. Start a lens on a topic that I will enjoy writing about.
  2. Find a way to monetize it without being annoying.
  3. Use primarily Amazon module, Commission Junction, and Clickbank.
  4. Once I find a good niche, make a mini site.
  5. If the mini site does well, turn it into a bigger site or a blog.
  6. Rinse and repeat.

On the one hand, that looks simple. On the other hand, it’s an oversimplified view on what I’ve been doing with my time. My days are spent making lenses, updating lenses, analyzing stats, reading information, and overall trying to do what I can to make each and every lens a success.

As usual I’ll keep you posted. For now, I invite you to subscribe to my Squidoo lens RSS feed so that you can view all my lens updates and follow along on my progress.

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An Adventure with Constant Content

May 10th, 2010 4 Comments

I’ve had quite the adventure with Constant Content over the past few days which leads me to believe that it is a complete waste of time to write for them. I wrote and submitted two articles. They were both for “article requests” that users post. Writing the articles was the easy part.

The first frustrating aspect of Constant Content is that they take forever to review your articles. They were sitting there for a while and one of them was a “timely topic” (mother’s day) and I was seriously worried that they wouldn’t review the article in time. I’m sorry but a site that insists on micro-managing its writers should really consider hiring enough people to edit the articles in a timely fashion.

That’s Strike One.

I actually only gave them two strikes – I thought that was enough! I’ve been doing this writing thing for too long and I’ve learned that a little more money often equals a lot more hassle.

So anyway, onward with my tale.

I finally had my articles reviewed and they all needed work. One article had a comment from an editor explaining to me (I bet it was an automated message) that certain comments might offend some of their audience. For example, “Some people might find that a military career is not for them” would thus offend the members of their audience who are in the military.

What? You’ve got to be f’n kidding me. This is why it was rejected? (The military thing was just an example – I don’t even think I mentioned military service in my article but the concept is still the same.)

I didn’t even read the comment on the second article. It was enough.

It was strike two.

I pulled the articles off the site and posted them on Associated content. I got paid for both.

So much for my grand idea of building a side income with this site. It’s not going to happen that’s for sure!

I purchased a product recently and I am going to review it soon. Stay tuned – I’m equally as frustrated with that product as I am constant content.

It isn’t worth the hassle.

Think about something for a minute. I’ve been writing happily at The Content Authority. I can write about four articles an hour which ultimately translates to $10-$16 dollars an hour. It isn’t much but it is a stress free situation with no clients, and I can watch movies while I do it. Since I don’t have anything else going on now, I thought it would help boost my income.

One Constant Content article takes an hour to write because believe it or not, I’m extra careful. I’ve been a writer since 2002 plus I was an English major in college and I know how to string sentences together, then paragraphs, and have the article flow logically. It is beneath me to worry about “offending part of my audience” and then spend an extra hour trying to edit the article based on this vague comment. The hourly rate just went down to $5 an hour (if I charge $10 for the article) and that’s assuming that someone will even buy it. That’s below minimum wage and absolutely not worth it.

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Focusing on a Goal – Make $500 Through Content Writing

April 23rd, 2010 5 Comments

In my last post I spoke about how I abandoned my plan of reviewing and using the Honest Income Program because it is outdated. Well, I still decided to go through the whole idea of making $500 in one month from writing. However, the eBook spoke of doing this every month and honestly, I don’t think I have it in me. I am making about that with my eHow residuals so after this $500 is earned, I am moving on.

These Sites are For Beginners

Most “pay for content sites” are really geared towards beginners. I’ve been a writer since 2002 and even though I’m reevaluating I can’t make the mistake of thinking of I am a true beginner. I’m not. So for these past few days, I’ve been working on writing – and getting partially annoyed. Most of those sites really weren’t worth the effort because for all the work I put in, I made pennies. Making pennies is bad – I have a goal to reach and one I’d like to get through as quickly as possible.

Sites I am Not Using

So which sites am I using to see this goal to the end? Well at first, I thought I was going to use Textbroker. I made approximately $10 with them in one day (one hour actually) which is neither good not bad (If I am making more than the average McDonald’s worker I’m happy – for now). Still, a lot of the reason why it took me that long to make that little is because the site is annoying and hard to navigate.

Helium is also a lot of work for little money. It took forever to get my “rating stars” and it takes forever to write the articles. I think I wrote 3 or 4 of them and I think I made $.50. I can’t see this going anywhere. They used to offer “up front” payment under certain conditions but I think they did away with that. So much for them!

Mahalo used to be great but then they changed things around. I  can’t believe how little they pay for how much they want you to write. Plus it takes forever to get used to the template system and to understand what they want. Still, they’re nice there. If you are just starting out and want a nice vibe this is a good site. Just not good for me because of the money thing.

Sites I am Using

I narrowed my search down to three sites that I will use to meet this challenge and then later use to fill in any gaps of income as the need arises.

The Content Authority is similar in concept to Text Broker however, I find them easy to navigate and work with. Instead of listing the titles in categories, you just simply see the titles. I can click once to submit an article – things are more cumbersome at Textbroker.  Since I find the site easy to navigate, I am able to write faster. I write in the window – if you do that too just make sure you copy it before you hit submit in case there is a problem (I had one problem where the site logged me out and I lost the article).

Constant Content is another wonderful site. I’ve been a member forever but just started to take it seriously. I haven’t made any sales yet. I’ve been answering the content requests. Once things pick up and I start making sales, I’ll write a proper review. I believe this site has potential. Plus, you can set your own rates which is also nice.

I’ve been a member of Associated Content for several years now but after a while, I stopped writing for them because I was getting a lot of rejections. But now, I am an accepted expert for two of their channels which means that I get a guaranteed $8-10 per article – seems that I get to write three articles per channel per month. I’ll take it!

Triond is another site I am using for these simple reason – it’s easy to use and it will give me some residual income. I’ve been a member for a long, long time but I never really paid much attention to them. What would happen to my overall income if I had a good stable of articles loaded in? I have a few hundred articles loaded in eHow and I make a nice residual income each month – hands free. What would happen if I have a few hundred loaded in Triond? I plan on finding out.

No matter what, I’ll always need to submit at least one article per month to AC to keep my status as an expert going. This isn’t bad as the articles are fun to write.

Stay tuned next time for my complete Constant Content review. I’m sure I’ll have lots to say!

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Update on the Honest Income Program

April 20th, 2010 4 Comments

I didn’t realize this when I selected the Honest Income Program to review but… the book is terribly outdated. I noticed one outdated point in the first section and contacted the author who promptly informed me that the product needs an over-hall as it is four years old. This makes sense – the internet was a much different place four years ago and as such, so was internet marketing.

But for now, here’s what I am going to do. I sort of got these ideas from the program, but since it is outdated I don’t consider this a review by any means.

Phase 1 is to Focus on Writing

Since completing a major move affected my earnings, I think I need to start by bringing in some immediate income that is beyond my residual eHow earnings. So I vow to make an extra $500 in the month of April through freelance writing. And since I don’t want clients, I am limiting this to online sites such as

  • www.textbroker.com
  • www.constant-content.com
  • www.contentauthority.com
  • www.helium.com
  • www.associatedcontent.com
  • www.mahalo.com
  • www.dailyarticle.com

Then after April’s earnings are over, I will scale back on this goal and make $150 per month from those content sites. So that brings me a total of $1600 for the remainder of this year. This isn’t a lot, but it will certainly help contribute towards my business expenses because the next leg of my program will be to start a PPC campaign.

What will I do about the PPC campaign?

I am not sure exactly what I’ll do yet because the rules have changed since I last investigated PPC. I’ve never done it so I feel that I need to tread carefully. I absolutely don’t want to get banned from Google because I accidentally messed something up. I actually read through all the instructions last year but I don’t remember anything. Plus, the rules may have changed.

Once I have this system all set up, I will move on to the next product. I am not sure what it will be yet but I’ll let you know.

***Note — I simply am not doing the PPC campaign stuff. I’m a bit intimidated by it so… I’m just focusing on writing for now and one other thing, which I’ll talk about in my next post.

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Taking Some Internet Marketing Products out for a Test Drive

April 19th, 2010 2 Comments

I remember that Tiffany Dow had a section on her blog when she reviewed Pot Pie Girl’s product in a detailed way and said what she really thought about it. I LOVE that idea. Since I’ve purchased an almost staggering amount of products, I thought I’d take on a similar task – however, I am going to eventually do it for all the products I’ve ever purchased.

** Disclaimer **

Not all of the products have an affiliate program but when they do, I am going to include my affiliate link regardless of whether or not I liked it unless the product is total crap – and I can tell you that the products I’ve purchased are not total crap. Though they were numerous, I did put some care into my purchases. In some cases, just because I don’t like something doesn’t mean that it isn’t good.

** End Disclaimer **

There, now that I got that over-with, I can talk about this in greater detail.

Basically, I often feel as if I am spinning my wheels. I start something, then I don’t see it through to the end. This includes purchasing products and not following them, coming up with a routine and stopping before I reach my goals… as a result I am not exactly where I want to be.

The theory is, if I finally stick with something, I’ll make the income I want. Common sense, right?

I’ve also realized that I’ve not entirely found my grove yet. Yes, I do have money coming in. I’ve heard that making your first dollar in internet marketing is always the toughest. That’s a good start and I do recognize that. Since I no longer have income coming in from client work I’ve decided to pay even more attention to internet marketing. This “review challenge” that I’ve set for myself is the perfect way to do that.

And the reviews will help you, too – so everyone wins!

My first choice may seem a little off-beat. It is Steven Waggenheim’s Honest Income Program.  I initially purchased this because like me, Steve started out as a writer before he transitioned into internet marketing. Sound familiar? This is where my journey begins.

So for this month, my business routine is as follows:

  • work on making this blog successful

How are your online business efforts going? I know that you can achieve your goals. Just stick with it! :)

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Being a Cause Related Entrepreneur

April 16th, 2010 1 Comment

Wikipedia calls Wendy Diamond a “cause related entrepreneur”. This term seems to resonate with me. I’ve learned the hard way (and by taking the long road) that if my business isn’t tied to my values then I have no motivation at all to even do it. That is one of the big motivations behind me ceasing my work with clients. That just simply isn’t my path.

I look at “Cause Related Entrepreneurism” from two different perspectives.

  • The first perspective is that the business itself “gives back”. I look at this blog as a “giving back” from all the help I’ve received over the years concerning my business. Some of those people are long gone, but this blog is a sort of thank you.
  • The second perspective involves using a portion of your earnings, at least 10%, to give to a cause you find worthy. This can be anything – your church or any organization or charity that you want. The only requirement is that you fully believe in and support this idea.

I gave my business some thought and these two concepts are very important to me. I’ve learned that I love explaining to people how to make money online and start their own businesses. So, I’m going to be revamping this blog over the coming days and weeks to reflect that.

There are also a few projects in the works. I have a few resources that I am developing – e-books and courses – that will help you make money online and have a successful business. While I enjoy providing this free content and will continue to do so, I feel that trying to sort your way through somewhat disorganized content impends progress rather than helps forward it.

And of course, I’ll be writing some free e-books too, just to mix things up.

I leave you with this. I’ve been working my way through a great book called “One Minute Millionaire” which is the first time I learned of the idea of building wealth conscientiously and with the idea of contributing rather than taking. It’s where I got the idea of donating 10% of my earnings. I like that.

Check it out: The One Minute Millionaire: The Enlightened Way to Wealth

Happy earning!

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Heart Marketing Challenge – Getting Right to It… Finally!

April 15th, 2010 Comments Off

Okay, okay I know I have been slacking a bit. (Gosh, how long was it since I last posted?) but I had a good reason. We’re setting up our new house (boxes are still everywhere) and I have since been to Portugal and back. Gorgeous country by the way.

Now that you have your list of things you want to make lenses on (things you like) it’s time to make the magic happen! I have a Squidoo lens on making $400 a day by building my internet marketing business using Squidoo. If you scroll all the way down to the end, you’ll see the method behind the Heart Marketing Challenge in black and white.

Click here – $400 a Day on Squidoo – in order to find the lens.

Total, I plan on making 52 lenses. How many do you want to make? I am not going to set this number for you. I think it’s best to just set it yourself. I think you should make it no less than five though. The more lenses you make the better off you’ll be I think.

Check back on that lens now and then, too. As I change my mind about the best “method” on squidoo I’ll be posting it there. Plus, it’s my go-to place for tracking my Squidoo progress.

Wanna see some of my lenses that I made with this routine in mind? I’ve made 4 so far and I think I’ve deleted two already because I decided I didn’t have enough interest in the topic. But hey, if this happens to you, it still counts towards your goal.

These are the ones I have left:

Feel free to share your “masterpieces” in the comments once they’re finished. :)

Oh, and one more thing. You can look at all my lenses if you want to get ideas. I love looking at other people’s creations – it helps give me new ideas for how to arrange things on my own mini-sites.

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I’m Doing the Heart Marketing Challenge With You

March 22nd, 2010 Comments Off

I just thought I’d let you know that I am doing the heart marketing challenge with you because I think it will be fun and helpful for you to see how the process evolves. I know I personally learn more by analyzing how others do things an I’ve learned some great tips just by looking at other people’s lenses.

So far, I told you to do some housecleaning and to think about five things that you like. Here’s a look at the things I’ve done.

Do Some Housecleaning

For my housecleaning step, I thought seriously about all the things I was trying to do and realized that there is no way I can do them all - at least not at once. So I picked two tasks to focus on.

  1. Working on my blog here at Path to Success
  2. Squidoo Lenses focusing on the Amazon affiliate program

My goal is to build this blog up to have an even stronger audience, to be more consistent, and to do article marketing and other methods of promotion to spread the word about the blog.

For the Squidoo lenses, my goal is to create 52 lenses that focus on Amazon. And the method I am using is the one I am outlining in the heart marketing challenge. So if you want to follow along with me on this goal, you can certainly do that!

Think of Five Things

I thought it would be fun to share my “five things”.

  1. Pink nail polish
  2. Red Lipstick
  3. My Dell Laptop
  4. Hat Boxes
  5. Journals

You can share your list if you want! :) But you don’t have to.

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Heart Marketing Challenge Step 2 – What do you like?

March 21st, 2010 2 Comments

Yes, I know it’s been a while. But I’m happy to report that I will be posting more regularly simply because I realize that it’s a good thing. SO you won’t have to wait for weeks in between my next post!

Anyway.

We’ve been talking about putting some “heart” in your internet marketing efforts and only talking about things that you truly believe in. For example, I truly believe that Squidoo is a great place to learn how to do internet marketing. I’ve been a member a site since around the time when it has started and I’ve watched it grow and evolve. And yes, I’ve made some money, too…

See what I did there? I made a recommendation and put in my affiliate link. Since I really believe the things that I say about Squidoo, I don’t feel bad. If I had said Squidoo was great but didn’t have a lens to my name I wouldn’t have even said anything. I may have seen, “some people say Squidoo is a great place to learn, but I have not tried it yet.” See, that’s also honest. But would you click on the Squidoo link if I said that? You’re more likely to click if it’s a positive review.

So the assignment today is to think about the things that you like. Pretty broad statement, huh?

  • Did you just buy a great shower caddy? Maybe it’s on Amazon.
  • Are you impressed with your new Plasma TV? I bet it’s on Amazon, too.
  • Buy a new eBook that was really helpful? Join the affiliate program.

You get the idea. I’d say for now, find five things that you like (heck, how about your laptop, or your cell phone?) and check if you can find the product on Amazon or on another affiliate network like Clickbank.

And that’s it for today. Give this some thought because you’ll have a few days. By the end of the challenge you will create Squidoo lenses based on these 5 items you find. Just a side note, it would be easiest if you could find items on Amazon because you can just use the Amazon module that Squidoo provides.

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