Archive for December, 2007

Someone posted a comment in my last blog entry about whether or not I’ll be teaching more about lens building and lens flipping. Sounds like a good idea, so let’s go for it! I get PMs and emails on an almost daily basis from people wanting to know how and where to sell a Squidoo lens.

Can you make money flipping lenses? Uh yeah!

Squidoo lenses get indexed (if they’re good and findable) in Google fairly quickly and many make it to the top in days. They’re good VRE (Virtual Real Estate).

Even my 15 yr old son sold 3 Halo lenses for $100 a pop - bought himself a paintball gun which he’s out using right as I type this. But why would I do this when I have a lens building service with Lewis Smile at BuildMyLens.com? Because selling the service and flipping a lens are two different things.

So I’ll start a series of lessons on building a lens for lens flipping purposes starting tomorrow. I’ll make video and textual lessons to help you find your way.

Tiff

With Halloween upon me, I began building Squidoo lenses the fast and furious way. Traffic built and built, culminating with the 70 or so Christmas lenses I built which did very well for me on Squidoo.

Nut now that shopping’s done, I wonder how my lenses will fare in traffic. The Halo lenses, which my son sold, saw an increase before Christmas, but have since died down. I expect as kids open their gifts and get into their new Halo games, wanting to know the tips and tricks to master the game, it’ll grow more.

I’m also experimenting with Hub Pages now as I build my eBook on that topic. Want to get lots of real case studies on it before I release anything. So how’s your web 2.0 traffic? Growing or Going South?
Tiff

Hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas Eve and Christmas Day!
Tiff

I have lots of passions - from helping kids who are mistreated to gushing over my husband. I don’t just use Squidoo for business purposes, and neither should you. In a web 2.0 world, people want to get to know the real you. They want to know more than just “how you said goodbye to your boss.”

I see some people recommending that you split your personal and professional lens creations into different accounts, but that could backfire on you in Squidoo and other social networks! I have lenses all about my PLR site, my eBook sites, and even writing.

But whenever someone finds me on Squidoo, they almost always check out what other lenses I’ve created. They like seeing my Tiffany Dow lens that tells how I went from (very) ugly duckling, to swan, and back to ugly again (LOL)! They like reading why I believe I have the best husband in the world. They join in when I help search for Madeleine McCann or another missing child, or when I talk about the Bee’s Colony Collapse Disorder.

Go ahead - showcase who you are on Squidoo. It won’t hurt, I promise. Become real to your customers and let them see that you’re not some shady spammer hiding behind a lensmaster name - you’re a real person with a conscience!
Tiff

Hi Squid Lensmasters - Do you Hub? I’m starting to hub and writing a detailed accounting of what I uncover, gathering tips and tricks from my fellow social networkers. It’s kind of neat, although not as aesthetically pleasing as a Squidoo lens to me. I know a lot of people are turned off by the organe hue of a lens and the layout of them, but I like it.

With Hub Pages, I almost feel like my content is out of whack - it’s pushed tot he left side, like I’m missing something on the right. Check out my first Hub about PLR Content and my second Hub about Toddler Toys.

They’re not pretty yet. The learning curve on HubPages is much longer than it is on Squidoo for me. Squidoo just caught me like wildfire, but that’s why I want to get the hang of this Hub stuff.
Tiff

Well here I was, all excited about a new Squid thingymabobber. After Squidoo, SquidWho, SquidVids, SquidBoo and Ever, I was chomping at the bit to see what would be released next. Seems the angels and citizens got a sneak pek of the next launch phase - SquidFlix.

SquidFlix is all about movies. But I’m seemingly locked out of the party! I go to SquidFlix and enter the title of my all-time favorite movie (I won’t tell you what it is but here’s a hint: I named my daughter after the main character). I get to the page where I get to choose if I’m a lover or a hater of the movie.

I click on, “No one loves this movie… yet - Do you? Start a page about it.” But then I get taken to an error page! Wahh!

And I know it’s working because others have SquidFlix pages. I feel like a nerd on the outside of a cool kids party looking in.
tiff

I created my Top Toddler Toys lens on Squidoo and it’s going magnificently! So far, in the past 7 days, it’s earned $74.58 in direct links to Amazon and another $20+ via Squidoo co-op modules, like the built-in Amazon or eBay modules.

I’ve discovered people are buying way more through text links than they do product image links. I don’t know why. Maybe they feel like a text link will just give more information, so they click it without feeling the pressure to spend money. With a product link, you have a Buy button and the retail amount posted right there.

I like them anyway. I use the product links that Amazon helps you build on my blog entries, but for my Squidoo lenses, since you can no longer use iFrames, I use SquidUtils to build the same thing. These are great because they give you built-in images for your lens, and I hate lenses that are nothing but text!

Yesterday, my toddler lens sold some direct co-op module products, but from my direct link I sold a LeapFrog ClickStart My First Computer, a Calico Critters NORWOOD MOUSE TWINS, and a Hasbro Playskool Mr. Potato Head Pirate Kit. It only earned $3.25 yesterday, but another day this week, I earned over $50!

Guess it just depends on who lands on your lens, and ya gotta love those consumers who buy a PlayStation 3 through your link!
tiff