Top Website Tips > Web 2.0 Sites > Squidoo Lens SEO

Squidoo Lens SEO

Squidoo is one of the more powerful Web 2.0 sites on the internet today, a page you create on Squidoo is called a Squidoo Lens. While it is pretty heavy with spam, it is also loaded with good content that the search engines like. Squidoos continual work to weed out the spam will likely keep it in the good graces of Google and keep it from going the way of the content farms that Google is trying to weed out.

Squidoo Lensrank

Much of what makes Squidoo work is its internal Lensrank. Why is lensrank important? Lensrank is Squidoo’s internal measurement of how good a page is. In theory a spammy, low value lens will have a low lensrank while a good page will have a high lensrank.

While Google really doesn’t care what the lensrank of a lens is, it does care how often a lens is linked to by other pages on Squidoo and how strong the pages are that link to the lens. High ranking lenses are linked to more frequently in Squidoo and by the more popular and higher PR pages of the site. This does two things, 1) Diverts more of the Squidoo traffic to your lens and 2) Raises your lens’ Google PR due to the higher PR pages linking to it. In turn this more powerful page is able to pass more PR and more authority to the other websites you link to.

Creating a strong Squidoo Lens

Choosing the right URL: Squidoo lenses do extremely well in long tail keywords, Therefore try to choose a URL that is specific. If the site you are trying to promote with the lens is about Vacation homes in Hawaii, choose a topic like Oahu Vacation Ideas or better yet Waikiki Vacation Ideas and develop that theme strongly, linking back to your site as a place to stay. You have a much better chance of getting both Google’s and Squidoo’s attention with a specific topic. Be sure to do a Squidoo search to make sure that topic has not been beat to death before you start.
Choosing the best tags: Tags are very important with Squidoo. It puts more of the specific keywords on your page, but more importantly these tags put you on specific Squidoo search pages. You want your lens to be put on pages where you will be able to get the lens to be on the first page of the results if at all possible but you also want your lens to be on result pages that have PR, this will help pass PR to your lens. It’s worth the effort to research what the hot tags are for your subject and see if it is likely you will be able to get your page a good enough lensrank so that it will be on the first page of the results.
Module Titles = Headings: Name your modules with phrases that are used in Google searches. Headings have greater weight in telling the search engines what your page is about, choose your words carefully.
Use a Table of Contents module: Yah I know it’s pretty ugly, but Google knows what it is. The links created in a TOC will often show in the Google search engine results under the page listing. That means your one page in the results will have one or more links underneath it making your page stand out in the search engine results and increasing the change someone will click on your link.
Use Images: I like to host my images on the site I am trying to promote and use html and css to put the image on the page. Be sure to add height and width to the image as well as an alt. Google is more likely to put images with Alt tags and Height and width in its image searches and can also help in having Google link back to your website.
Add an image to the Lens intro using Squidoo image uploader: Make sure this image is an attention getter. This image shows up in several locations in Squidoo and will help get people to click on your lens and increases the change they will “like” the lens.
Use the modules that provide reader interaction like the Duel Debate and Guestbook: These help keep the page fresh even when you don’t have time to update it much. It also increases the chance someone will click the like button which helps increase your lensrank.

Promoting your lens

Point a few links at the lens: as with all other webpages the more quality links that point to the page the stronger it will get. But you really don’t need to do much. If your lens starts to get a decent lensrank it will likely move up to PR 2-3 pretty quickly. That doesn’t mean you don’t need offsite links, you just don’t need that many to make the page successful. That is what makes Squidoo lenses so useful.
Update the pages regularly: Abandoned lenses lose their lensrank, I like to try to update and republish mine at least once a month. This also gives you a chance to check what searches are going to the page so you can reinforce successful keywords.
Spend a little time each month: visiting other lenses commenting on and “liking” ones that you like. The more involved you are the more often you will get others to check out your site and “like” it. Don’t spam the comments by putting a link in with every comment.
Use the Squidoo Forum: Put a couple of your lenses in the footer and participate in the forum. Squidoo is actually a pretty good community and they go to peoples lenses that that are active members of the community. It’s also a good place to get some new ideas on creating better and more productive lenses. If you lens isn’t getting the results you want ask and take the criticism well. They are only stating what others are thinking as they leave you page. Knowing what is turning people away from your lens will help you make your next one more productive the first time.

Promoting Your Profile

It's a good idea to also promote your profile. Doing so opens up new tools to better promote your lenses. You do this by doing things to get more points so that you will reach higer levels. As you reach the higher levels new modules are made available as well as new ways to promote your lenses, there is even a LensRank Turboboost. Here are a few of the ways you can promote your profile:

The biggest one is to write new lenses
Add Polls to your lens, you get points for adding a poll as well as each time someone uses it. The same goes with Duels, comments and other interactive modules.
Comment and participate in duels and polls on other peoples lenses.
"Like" other peoples lenses
Participate in the Squidoo Forum (SquidU)
Login to Squidoo frequently
Complete Quests (you will get these as you level up)
Write book reviews at Squid literature
Get an Angel blessing. This is done by creating good lenses and participating SquidU so you get noticed by the Squid Angels

Increasing your Level Quickly

With each increase of your squidoo level you unlock new features. Some of these features are very useful in promoting your lenses like lens boosts, lens ads, new widgets, themes etc. Bottom line, the more lenses you make and the more you participate in other lenses the faster you increase your Profile level.

One good way to participate in squidoo and get the most out of your time is to look for lenses with polls and quizzes. Each time you take a poll or quiz you get more points, just finishing all the polls and quizzes on one lens will often be enough to increase your level. You don't actually have to get the answers right, you only have to participate.

Here is a list of some of my favorite quiz and poll lenses

Don’t expect huge monetary gains from a Squidoo lens. Yes, we do get a few dollars each month from Squidoo, but we also get a lot of referrals from the lenses and a strong lens does make a good authority link back to your main site. Just remember that NOTHING is free. You only get out of it, what you put into a lens. Quickly made and forgotten lens are a waste of time. If that is all you are going to do, don’t bother making a lens. Put some effort into the lenses and you get something with value.

Squidoo Squidliking

Getting people to “like” you lens is a very important part of promoting your lens. First step of course is to create a lens that is worth “liking” but unfortunately that isn’t going to be enough. Next you not only have to get people to come to your lens to read it, but get the right people to come. Not everyone is in the habit of liking good lenses. That being the case, you need to find the ones that are. Squidoo is nice enough to help you in this endeavor; they provide lists of some of the more active members, List like the Squidliking Marathon, Squid Angels, and Giant Squids etc.

So, how do you get the attention of these members so they will come to your lens? Pretty simple, participate on their lenses. In particular you need to comment and Like their lenses. Polls and other modules give you points but don’t let the owner of the lens know who you are. Both Liking and Comments lets the owner know who it was that participated on their lens.

I usually go to a members profile page and go to each lens of interest and comment on and “like” the ones I find interesting. This brings up another point. Most people only go to the lenses that look interesting; therefore it is very important to have good lens titles. In addition it is a good idea to have a variety of lenses. At times I will come across a lensmaster that only writes on one topic or theme, if I am not interested in the theme, I usually move on to the next lensmaster. By having a variety of different topics you greatly increase the chances that one of the topic will be of interest to anyone that comes to your lensmaster page.

Here are some of my favorite Squidoo lists

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