Lensmastery by Linda

There’s an infinite amount of money available, and we’re all entitled to a share of it.

“An INFINITE amount,” you say?

There’s a lot of money tied up in BANKS right now, as we all know. …But there’s PLENTY left for us. We just need to leverage our time and efforts to be able to get money flowing in our direction. (Or, for you who are here for charity, to get the money flowing in the direction of your dearly loved charities.)

Money, however, likes to flow. It is like a fountain… the water moving, changing, refreshing itself constantly. When held tightly in one place, water stagnates. Money does the same - and that’s not what we need. We’ll all be better off if we can help get that money flowing in all directions… to make a fountain of money… something beautiful to look at, be refreshed by, and to share.

There’s one great way to help that happen, and that’s to work hard at helping each other succeed.

A few days ago there was a phone conference for Giant Squids to talk to Seth Godin and Megan Casey. BDKZ (Bonnie) moderated, and we Giant Squids who could attend gathered in a chat room while listening to Seth and Megan answer some of our questions. A question I asked prior to the phone call was answered - it was “What can we do for Squidoo?” I wanted to know if there was something we could do to help make Squidoo a better site — to give back to this wonderful site and community that helps us so much. Megan’s surprising answer was that we should take a few minutes each day to promote someone else’s lens.

Someone else’s lens? Why????????

LOL

Seth explained that people tend to tune out a lot of self-promotion. I’ll bet you do that too. I know I do. But when someone plugs someone else’s site or book or Squidoo lens, people listen. When someone takes the time to point out someone else’s work, it is a signal that it is worth looking at.

He said that when the recommendation comes from someone else, it is much more likely that people will read it. When he promotes someone else’s book on his blog it sells three times as many copies as when the author promotes his own work.

This brings into play a whole alternate awareness of how prosperity happens. Too many people think that shouting “Look at me! Look at my lens!” is the answer, and it really isn’t. Self-promotion is boring! We all know that.

But this place, Squidoo, is a wonderful community adventure. A place where we can come together to help one another in many ways. Promotion is one of those ways that we should be helping each other.

I’m so excited about this. I like to promote other people’s lenses by Twittering about them, or adding them to Tagfoot. Ohhh, how I LOVE Tagfoot! I’ve also been known to plug other people’s lenses on my blogs. I really need to do that A LOT more.

I intend it, and so it is…

follow my footsteps

There’s a new Senior Center in town… right here in the Squidosphere. All lensmasters age fifty or older are invited to participate. Our new logo is the creation of Drifter 0658. I was surprised how many of our Senior Squids have artistic talent!

Quite naturally I’ve made a lens for the Senior Squids, though most of our networking takes place in a Ning.Com community. It is all explained with a link on that lens.

Fortunately lensmaster Katherine, another artist, is helping to make the community warm and welcoming as she’s administered other Ning groups and knows what she’s doing more than I do (this is my first Ning admin experience.)

So why do lensmasters over the age of 50 like to hang out together? Well, there’s some comfort in knowing we’re not the only ones of our age group getting into this Squidoo thing. Also it is fun to share with others who have the same world-view as you do . . . and anyone not born that long ago won’t have the same perspective of the world as it was in the fifties and sixties, and how much it has changed since then.

We’re a fine group of old-timers who are still very young at heart. . . . young enough to appreciate all the opportunities Squidoo gives us. We’re embarking on a new series of challenges and will be thrilled to welcome new members to our “older but no less bolder” group.

I couldn’t believe how fast it was to put together a Twttrlist lens. Fun. Easy. Fast.

I made my first Twttrlist the day I first heard about it: Great Writing Resources, Tips, Twitters, and Inspirations. Today this lens is #2 on the Twttrlist Top 100!!! I’m so excited about that!

The #1 Twttrlist is Fluffanutta’s amazing The Best Tweets Are From Space! He’s collecting the tweets from astronaut Michael J. Massimino who’s out in space right now! How trippy is that?!!??

I can’t tell you about all the cool Twttrlists, but I can point you to the Twttrlist Top 100. I highly recommend the Twttrlist experience. It is lots of fun.

Today I made my second Twttrlist, which is also about writing: NaNoWriMo News, Tips, & Resources on Twitter and Squidoo.

One problem a few of us encountered is that when making a Twttrlist you’re invited to enter your search term. Then you go to a page where there’s a list of Twitters using that term. From there it is just a tad confusing as there are no instructions on how to turn that list into a lens.

All you have to do is start choosing Twitters to use on your lens. There’s a bright orange “Add” button next to each one. As soon as you start adding, you’ll see the other link pop up at the bottom of the page: “Done Adding”. That’s the link that gets you out of Dodge and makes your list become a lens. Have fun with it!

See you on Twitter!

My Twitter page: Linda Jo Martin. Feel free to follow me. I follow back!

Me? An angel? Wow! I was so excited to get an email from HQ asking me to serve as a Squid Angel! Turns out there’s more to it than just sporting a pretty yellow shield. I’ve been given five categories to monitor - and my goal is to explore all top-100 lenses in each of the five categories each month. Busy, busy, busy! But fun, in a way, as I’m learning so many fascinating things from you wonderful and creative lensmasters along the way. My Squid Angel lens has lots more information: Helpful Words From a Squid Angel. The lens contains a contact link so you can request a possible blessing for your favorite lenses.

Speaking of creative lensmasters… I recently created a lens called Creative Lensmaking. I could use your help here, folks. I need to know where your favorite creative lenses are. Did you make a lens using some fantastic technique that nobody else seems to know about? I would sure love to include your creative lens. Please send me a link!

And now for the heavenly music… I just updated my Mountain Music lens and renamed it Mountain Music Elevates the Soul. It features dulcimers, drum-circle drums, and guitars, with videos and more. I believe now, during the recession, home-grown music will help thousands of people get through the dark days and develop their talents.

The last thing I want to mention today is my new niche… and I know, this has been done before by some talented people, but it is something very dear to my heart. I’m going to start my own online herbal on Squidoo. I’ve been studying and using herbs for more than thirty-five years, and have lots to say about them. I’ll start with the ones I’m growing, and the ones I can harvest locally in the wild.

That’s it for now… thanks for reading!

You’re invited to use and join the Squidoo News Room - a room I set up at FriendFeed. If you’re not familiar with FriendFeed yet, take heart, it is very easy to join and be part of.

FriendFeed provides a place for all your RSS feeds from a variety of online activities, plus interactivity options such as comments and special-interest rooms. I’ve collected all kinds of FriendFeed ‘how to’ information on my lens, How To Use FriendFeed.

In the Squidoo News Room I’m adding dozens of Squidoo blog RSS feeds. Pass your cursor over the little orange RSS graphics at the top of the page and you’ll see a tool tip box pop up with the link represented.

Please Note: If your blog isn’t included in the Squidoo News Room yet, please let me know! You can send me a note via my contact link. Nobody with a Squidoo-focused blog will be intentionally excluded… everyone is welcome!

Did you know you can offer a subscription option for your lens visitors to receive your SquidCasts in email? Recently I wrote a lens to explain this: Offer Email Subscriptions to Your SquidCasts.

In my lens I give step-by-step directions for setting up these emails using a SquidCast feed from SquidUtils, and FeedBurner, a service that provides RSS feed services for bloggers, including email services.

This may sound complicated, but using my step-by-step guide, it is very easy!

You don’t need to worry that this is spamming because the emails are sent with the permission of the person requesting them. Lens visitors will click on your link and be sent an email notification. In that email they will click again giving permission for FeedBurner to send your SquidCast emails. Every email also contains a link for the person to unsubscribe.

On my lenses I mention that my SquidCast emails will update them on ALL my lenses, not just the one they’re looking at.

If you have any questions, please let me know. I’ve experimented with this and found that it works great!

By the way, I put this information together because someone was asking for an email subscription method over at SquidU, a great place to find lens ideas!

Today I’ve been having fun adding my lenses to my MySpace. I just discovered that our MySpace links in the “Bookmark and Share” section of each lens now put Squidoo links directly onto the front page of our MySpace - and you get a choice of what section to put them in. I think last time I tried that link (the one on our lenses) it went to a MySpace blog posting.

Honestly, I’m not a big fan of MySpace for a number of reasons. Most important is that the links there are cloaked. Though people may see them on our profiles and click on them, the cloaked links don’t do a thing to add to our search engine rankings.

In case you’re wondering what a cloaked link is, this refers to a link that directs the click to a secondary URL set up by the site owner, in this case, the owner of MySpace. That secondary link at MySpace directs the click finally to the correct destination which would be my lens.

You can see the cloaking in action. Go to my MySpace and run your cursor over the links in the left-side column - the ones that look like they’ll go to Squidoo lenses. Then look at your status line. You’ll see the cloaking link there, not the Squidoo lens link.

My main reason for having a MySpace page is to keep in touch with my five children. They’re all on MySpace. Even my mother is on MySpace! And as you can see, I’ve got other friends there too. If you’d like to do a friend request, be my guest. I like Squidoo people no matter where.

Lately I’ve been wondering how to get my lenses to rank higher. Sound familiar? I’ll bet 90% of you are also wondering the same thing! I was focused on this question enough that I took time to go through the entire top 100 list and analyze it. I didn’t look at every lens there (yet) but I recorded the name of the successful lensmaster and the general topic of the lens.

Here’s what I can tell you: There are four political lenses, and no religious lenses (unless you want to count Christmas.) There are twenty-one holiday lenses and that is bound to be a popular topic during the next few months. There are twelve entertainment lenses and none of those are about books. There are nine fashion lenses - two of those are about hair. There are nine lenses about Squidoo and four about animals.

Now that we know the hot topics of the day, we might want to know more about why one lens about animals makes the top 100 list and 99% of the others never will.

This week I made two lenses that may help answer that question. The first one focuses on what works: Website Content Writing Tips for Squidoo, Your Website or Blog. This has three lists: how to choose the right topic, how people read websites, and how to build your credibility, plus a host of other tips and links to more information.

The second lens I made this week is My Least Popular Lenses and Lessons I Learned From Making Them. I got this idea from Spirituality’s blog here at SquidTop. In this list I looked at each lens that’s not getting site visitors, and thought about why. At the bottom of that lens you’ll find a list of conclusions I came to about why these lenses are failing.

While I agree that we should make lenses that reflect our interests, it is also good to make them wisely keeping our readers in mind.

Recently someone left a link on my lens, How to Promote Your Squidoo Lens. The link was to a new blog that claimed to be the best source of information on how to use Squidoo. I had to move the link to a different area of my lens and while doing so I took a look at this new blog.

I was surprised by one of the headlines that claimed that SEO (search engine optimization) is not important for Squidoo lenses. There’s a thought that never crossed my mind. I had to read the short article and then had to wonder who was writing this blog. The “about” section of the blog gives no clue.

I’m not of the same mind as this blogger. I believe that SEO is vital for Squidoo lensmasters, just as it is for any other dedicated content writer and webmaster on the Internet. Whenever I have a lens that does especially well, it is usually because of success in search engine optimization. With very few exceptions those search engines send a lot more traffic my way than any of the links I’ve been leaving around the Internet.

Search engine optimization is easy to learn. It includes the following elements:

1. Choose keywords wisely based on the number of searches for the term balanced by the number of sites that compete for the term. For example, the term “web design” sounds good but since there’s a gazillion other people wanting to rank well for that term, it isn’t really a good term for SEO purposes. Something more specific like “Oregon flash web design” might be easier to compete for.

2. Use your keywords in the title of your web document, in your headers, in your meta description tag, in your alt and title attributes, and in your text - but don’t do it to the point where your writing sounds unnatural or stilted. Your text must still be very useful and interesting to read or you will lose the respect of those whose business you wish to gain.

3. Reduce the clutter in your pages by hiding javascript and CSS (put them in separate files) and by using the most recent version of HTML, XHTML, or PHP, etc.. Of course, with Squidoo, you don’t have to worry about this one!

4. Write the best article you can. Remember, the more you write, the more text Google can index. Be sure your keywords are totally appropriate for the article you’ve written. For more information, see my newest lens, Website Content Writing for Squidoo, Your Website or Blog.

And whatever else you do, think twice before believing everything you read. You’ll find a list of credibility criteria in that new content writing lens I just mentioned. It is worth giving some thought to!

I’m wondering if I’m the only one with a secret lens - one that is for my eyes only - one that will never be published. My secret lens is called, simply, “Lens Ideas,” and that tells you exactly what I use it for.

I’m still developing myself as a lensmaster, even after publishing fifty-one lenses. I’ve made the mistake of creating a lot of WIP (work in progress) lenses that throw off my cumulative lens stats. I would like to stop that habit.

Now, when I have a new lens idea, I usually don’t rush to get a lens started. Too often they sit there undone for weeks or months even. That’s depressing to see day after day! Instead I open my “Lens Ideas” lens and use one of the blank text boxes to jot down my newest lens brainstorm.

I’m sure as time goes by my secret lens will find other uses, but for now, I’m gratefully keeping it all to myself as a tool that helps me cope with my lensmaster inspirations.