Squidoo is a social site that is known as an authority portal. In many ways it’s like Wikipedia, only far more interactive. Squidoo is made up of lenses (content pages) that are created by members on a wide array of topics. This Web 2.0 resource is especially good for business people because it’s all about learning and sharing content.
Squidoo is a little more high brow than most social networking sites. What I mean is this portal is all about sharing and gaining knowledge so the average visitor quality is very high.
There are two big reasons you should join this site:
1. Squidoo lenses often come up high in the search results of the major engines because the site is well optimized and the lenses tend to be very keyword relevant. So if you have a good lens a searcher could find you even if you don’t have a well-optimized site of your own!
2. Many people come to Squidoo every day in search of quality information. This type of Internet user is far more likely to end up making a purchase than a person who is just looking to socialize.
Once you register with Squidoo you should immediately create your first lens. You are allowed up to five lenses per account so you can actually create portals for multiple ventures if you like.
Think of a good title for your lens as this will be part of your Squidoo URL. After your title you will be able to create a description, which should be at least a few paragraphs of good material explaining what your lens has to offer.
Here are the links to two of my Squidoo lenses:
http://www.squidoo.com/smokefreereality
http://www.squidoo.com/Get-Your-Articles-To-Stick-to-Google-Like-Super-Glue
Look these lenses over to get a feel for how you can set yours up. I use them to capture traffic that is targeted to the appropriate niche and drive them to my business sites and blog.
Important things to add to your lenses are a picture and a good bio. Don’t just leave the generic bio, take the time to add a few paragraphs about yourself and why people should trust your content.
As you will see, a Squidoo lens is made up of many modules.
You can easily add text modules that let you enter articles, and you can upload photos with each article. The text module will be the base of your lens so be sure to add plenty of these.
Plus you can ad Amazon and Ebay modules that display products and auctions relevant to the niche your lens is about. And you’ll get a commission on any sales that result from your displaying these product and auction links on your lens!
You can even add video, or links from your social bookmarking sites.
There are plenty of options, but two things I definitely recommend in addition to your text modules are the RSS modules and the link modules.
The RSS module allows you to plug in the RSS feed from your blog, so each time you post on your blog your Squidoo lens will be updated. This will keep fresh content coming into your lens, create links back to your blog posts, and bring targeted traffic from Squidoo to your blog.
And the link module of course allows you to post links to your favorite resources. You can give your link module a title like “Check Out My Websites For More Quality Information” or “Have A Look At Some More Cool Resources” or whatever, and then add the links to all of your sites, blogs, ezines, and affiliate programs. This will generate quality visitors to your sites, and give you link backs from a high PR site to help with your SEO.
In addition to your lens modules, Squidoo gives you the options of commenting on other lenses, adding other lenses to your lens roll (links list), and joining groups or inviting other Squidoo members to join your friends network. Bear the same general rules in mind that were covered in the MySpace section above when interacting with other Squidoo users.
I believe Squidoo is set to explode in the near future. There are already many thousands of users there, and since most of these people are either in business or honestly looking for answers and solutions the caliber of people you can meet through this social site is superb.
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