Networking Your Website Using Squidoo

By Rita Wilhelm, Contributing Writer     Rita's Bio        Email article to a friend

Squidoo is a very interesting and unique type of social networking site, and it happens to be a great way to network your website, and market your business. I’ve noticed that many Squidoo ‘lenses’ rank very high in the Google’s search engines.

Squidoo was designed by Seth Godin, who is an internet marketer. As an internet marketer, he came up with a unique social networking concept that would help both business people and charities.

I was fortunate to have Megan Casey, the Editor in Chief at Squidoo agree to do a short interview with me to learn more about Squidoo, and how a business person might use Squidoo as a way to market their business. Here are some excerpts from that interview:

Rita: What are the demographics of Squidoo, and what type of person do you typically attract?

Megan: When we launched Squidoo to the public in 2006, we thought we'd get the early adopter geek types. Surely, since most of them have blogs, they'd want a free Squidoo page (called a lens) to work in tandem with it, right? To highlight their best posts, go deeper on a particular topic, spread their RSS feed far and wide, and get more traffic? Wrong.

The people who really started to dig Squidoo were the Long Tailers. Niche people, passionate about topics we never could have imagined, such as a grandmother in Milwaulkee, a teen at Cornell, small business owners, eBay sellers, nonprofit volunteers, teachers, authors, marketers and hobbyists. Basically, our demographic is: anyone who wants a free page, has an idea (or product or service or passion) to spread, doesn't want to do (any) tech lifting to create it, and likes earning a royalty for charity.

Rita: Can you explain what Squidoo is?

Megan: Founded by Seth Godin and a tiny team of 3, Squidoo is a place for passionate people to spread the word about something they care about. It's your signpost for getting found online. It's 170,000+ hand created lenses and growing fast. It's more than 5 million visitors a month. It's 75 nonprofits getting donations from our members every month. It's the incredible community of lensmasters who teach and inspire each other (they're the ones who really run the show). It's the glue of the Long Tail.

Rita: What is a Squidoo lens?

Megan: A single, free page online. Your focus (hence, lens) on the best stuff on a particular topic. A lens is a marketing tool, an addictive toy, a social networking element, a recommendation engine, a way to make the web, and your presence on it, a better place.

Rita: What are the first 5 things a person should do when they get started on Squidoo?

Megan:

1. Make a lens. It's easy, free, and takes 5 minutes. Just start.
2. If you want to earn a royalty, try the Amazon and eBay modules. They're gangbusters. (If you want to do us a favor, leave your royalty setting to charity. That way people like you and me can make a difference, little by little, without digging into our pockets).
3. Stop by the www.SquidU.com/forum to meet other lensmasters and get help and ideas.
4. When you're ready, don't forget to hit Publish, so the world can find your work.
5. Email your lens to 5 friends. Ask for feedback. Invite them to make their own.

BONUS: Add your lens to del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, and Digg. (It's not spam...those sites exist to help others discover cool stuff!). Then post your lens on your blog, Twitter, your Facebook profile, or any other community you already participate in. You're well on your way to creating a mean little traffic economy.

Rita: For a person who is using Squidoo as a way to market their business, what are the 10 top recommendations you have?

Megan: Whoops I think I covered a few of these in 5 and 6 above.

1. Create content worth talking about. This goes for your business as well as your lens.
2. I have to quote Seth here: don't be boring.
3. One of the coolest things about Squidoo is how media rich it is. We make it deadly easy to put Flickr photos and slideshows, YouTube videos, Amazon books, eBay auctions, RSS feeds and Google maps and link lists on a lens. Use this stuff to help tell your story.
4. Get your friends and clients and happy customers involved. Imagine what could happen if THEY started making free pages about your product or service, sharing testimonials about you, or highlighting the top 3 reasons they enjoy doing business with you. All of a sudden you have 100 pages pointing to your site and sending you recommended, focused traffic. Not just 1 or 2. Decentralize!
5. People are always more willing to help than we give them credit for. Just ask.
6. Know any bloggers writing on your topic? Shoot them a note. Ask them (politely!) to review your lens and your product. Worst they can do is say no thanks.
7. Get found: Insert what I said in the question above, about using social sites and other communities to create your own recommendation economy.
8. Remember, there is no SEO trick to Squidoo. Yes, our lenses often show up on the first pages of Google and Yahoo and AOL. Why? It’s because they're handbuilt by passionate people, and because we've harnessed the Long Tail and given it a megaphone. Make something great, and Squidoo will help get you found. Make something sloppy or spammy and be prepared to sink to the bottom.
9. Tell a story. Don't just share facts and stats and quote studies. Talk to the new potential customers who will be landing on your lens. Try to fit their worldview, not yours.
10. Don't feed the mogwai after midnight. And never ever get them wet. ?

Rita: Squidoo has a charity component built into the system. Can you explain how this works?

Megan: Squidoo is one of the fastest growing philanthropic platforms of web 2.0. We make it easy for you to set up a page on your niche topic, earn some royalties (from AdSense and affiliate sales), and automagically donate those royalties to any of 75 great charities every month. So, "giving" is no longer about digging into your pockets, or the nonprofit race to hit up the rich guy down the street. It's about getting everyday people to share their voices, while earning a little for charity. Just for doing or selling or making something they were going to do or sell or make anyway. 'Cause that feels good. And it scales, big time.

Rita: Megan, thanks so much for your help.

So be sure to go to Squidoo.com, create a lens, and network your website. It’s a fun and exciting way to promote your business, and help your favorite charities.

 

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Contact Rita Wilhelm at RitaW@TheNationalNetworker.com or Post a Comment on TNNW Blog.