Gracious Seth Godin Shows Up Knol

In a social web, social skills are very much required. While Jason C at Manalo leaves a lot to be desired in that respect, Seth Godin has given us his usual and gracious response and created an insomnia page that is simply much better than Google's.

There is one other factor overlooked by Squidoo's competitors, and that is: FUN!

Squidoo is fun. It is fun to build pages, fun to be in that community, fun to read pages, fun to parody Squidoo, fun to build your little empire. It is a fun place to learn internet skills and to social network. Its a fun place to share, to help, to promote, to make friends. Its a real community. Its a fun place to care about and rewarding.

That kind of fun is spirit, something natural that can't be duplicated no matter what size of a corporation likes your ideas. Corey, Megan and Gil are fun to be around, keep Squidoo fresh and exciting, and they care very deeply about the members of their 'community' and the experience they have with it.

While Google's announcement is enough to give lots of people insomnia, in my humble opinion Squidoo has a certain panache that can't be copied- buried, maybe, but Squidoo has made the internet fun in a way that it hasn't been in a very long time.

Danger, Will Robinson! Google is Taking on Squidoo AND Wikipedia!

Perhaps you have heard, and perhaps not, but the big news is that Google is taking on Wikipedia and Squidoo with a new project they call Knol. Like Squidoo, it offers writers free pages and a share of ad revenue. It also is a social page, with rankings and votes by visitors, permits suggested edits by visitors like Wikipedia.

It isn't open to everyone as yet.

There is a lot that is unclear about this project like whether they will add revenue sharing modules as Squidoo has or not, for example. We don't know how those pages will rank next to the Google version. Google pay has rapidly overtaken Paypal, and there was the unfortunate coincidence of Squidoo going to the Ebay convention almost immediately after Ebay and Google had their big falling out. Who knows if the Google slap which lasted for months had anything to do with that? If Google overtakes the revenue modules that Squidoo offers, it is possible that the only remaining distinguishing module will be Ebay.

As to Wikipedia, since their information is public domain, and contributors/editors get nothing for their trouble, many of them may migrate to Google Knol pages to at least earn something for their contribution. Since all the information on Wikipedia is public domain (copyleft), even all the content they already have could be pillaged to make, not only Squidoo pages, but also Google Knol pages.

I was one of the folks that made a 'Google Page' prototype months ago and frankly, it wasn't much. It wasn't even close to the sophistication of Squidoo at the time. I don't recall any traffic of any kind to or from it. Google will have to do much better to overtake Squidoo quality- wise. The prototypes they're showing are really nice though.

Seth, Gil, Corey and Megan are quite bright. If anyone can 'pull a rabbit out of a hat', its them. We'll have watch and see what the big shooters do. For an admittedly far more expert take on this, visit a friend here.

I'm Back!

Hello friends, I'm back. Past the worst of the worst...

Janusz has kindly made a beautiful new header for the Mall on Squidoo for the Christmas season, and I hope that you will all take a look and compliment him on his wonderful work!

There are many things to get up-to-date with: SquidWho, SquidVids, SquidFlicks... too much to write about all at once.

My Apologies!

Sometimes life interferes with work, no matter how important. I've been in such a situation lately, where a person I care very much about was taken from lung cancer.

I was extremely preoccupied with this event and I have gotten even further behind, if you can imagine.

However, the bright spot is that there are so many terrific new lenses that have joined our group!

I wasn't ignoring you, though I surely neglected you.

I look forward to all the next phase of development in the Mall group, and looking at all these terrific lenses!

My Idea of a Top-Notch Commerce Lens!

Daoine is a favorite lensmaster of mine. Her commerce lenses are interesting, full of content and fun, and make great use of pictures.

In particular, Elsa won Lens of the Day with her Pirate Costumes for Halloween, and no wonder!

She checked on when the next pirate movie would be released (none coming yet, darn!)

She gives us a little history about Pirates (which explains why we like the rogues so much, doesn't it?)

She gives us details of a full and interesting costume for anyone, man, woman or child. She even gives us instructions on how to make the proper hat!

As a commerce resource, she includes a way to get everything, or nearly everything, we could need to have a GREAT pirate costume.

Yes, it is a seasonal lens, but it is one that is worth hanging on to and keeping fresh year by year. A little promotion at the right time and this lens will be a long-term asset for Elsa.

Very well done!

Seasonal preps: Mall on Squidoo & Squidoo Gifts Mall

Who wants to think about Christmas in August? I'm sure nobody does, but it really is the time for you and I to begin considering what we will be doing for the upcoming seasons.

The Mall on Squidoo page has a PR of 5, predicted to go to PR6 soon, and with the rapid growth of these two groups, I have no doubt that these will be VERY DESIRABLE pages for you to be featured on.

With such a high PR, I am told that it is best for the pages/links to be on there for about 2 months, for your lenses to get an increase in PR for themselves.

So, keeping this in mind, I will be setting up the Mall Groups for the Fall Season which will last from September through to the end of October.

There will be a brief time to promote Thanksgiving, but I will want to begin Christmas promotion as quickly as possible to ensure we have the two months we need to be sure we are getting found in the search engines and have a good and beneficial PR.

So until the end of August, please either leave a comment on the Mall on Squidoo page or on the About the Mall on Squidoo page that you want to be featured either in the Fall season or in the Christmas Season and leave your lens link in the guestbook. Those who do so will be given priority consideration for featuring during this most important selling season of the year!

I am seeking appropriate artwork for the Mall Groups for the upcoming seasons. Internet shopping still needs to reflect the society around us and the seasonal interests of shoppers. I think our Mall Groups will do best if our artwork can reflect those seasons.

Another Challenge! Giant Squids!

Squidoo is ALWAYS searching for quality lenses, and they are looking for YOU!

Seth and his crew have issued the Giant Squid Challenge, can YOU make 100 top notch lenses?

Yes, maybe it is a little much to ask of anyone who cares about the content and quality of their lenses.

However, he makes the most important point: now is the time to stand tall, stand out, be remarkable! Now is the time to build your best stuff!

It is the challenge that brings out our best.

You're the best! Squidoo is the best! You can do it!

Heads UP!!! A Warning From Squidoo Headquarters

Here we see something VERY IMPORTANT from Megan Casey:

"Squidoo does not endorse or recommend ratings swaps. Not only because it’s not in the spirit of the site, but also because it just doesn’t work. It doesn’t earn you loyal readers or customers, it doesn’t help people find you in search engines, and it doesn’t increase the quality of your content. That, and it’s risky. A star rating is only a tiny factor in our LensRank algorithm right now. You’re not going to win with even 500 fake ratings. And, in fact, if you spam people asking for them, you’ll assuredly lose.

Finally, remember: Squidoo reserves the right to change our LensRank algorithm at any time. We’re currently working on (unannounced) changes that will end up impacting swappers without warning. Building a so-called business on massive rating swaps or traffic exchanges could mean you did a whole lot of work for a whole lot of nothing."

Genuine rankings according to content and quality, and whether you'd send your best friend over to visit a page, is critical to how Squidoo operates.

Be warned!

MP: Woodturning Projects by Sewjr

One of the finest commerce Squidoo lenses you'll find has long been one of my favorites. It has been a member of the Mall on Squidoo group almost since the beginning. It has made the Most Profitable (MP) list, #1 position.

Woodturning Projects by Sewjr is one of many really high quality lenses. This page is an especially fine example of what a small business, artisan or craftsman can do to get traffic and build a relationship with visitors. He gives his best information, advice and inspiration and then creates opportunities for interested people to participate.

Stan has two woodworking groups, the Woodworking Headquarters and the 'As the Wood Turns' Headquarters. These are very attractive to new and to experienced woodcrafters.

Because of his great lenscrafting skills, Stan is one of the founding jurists of the By Invitation Only juried lens contest, helping jury the best Squidoo lenses for the People's Choice Lensmasters & Awards.

Stan is a real winner, a Titan on Squidoo, and a person to get to know and watch!

MP List: At Home Source- Mall Member

AtHomeSource has many lenses, and not all of them are in the Mall group. She has shared with us little baby Molly as her 'trademark'- a baby so cute that the planet should crack in half, and makes it a worthwhile visit just to get a look at Molly!

Many of AtHomeSource's lenses have managed to make LR and MP and so this lensmaster is onto something in her Squidoo commerce lensbuilding techniques and her marketing.

Platform Beds with Storage has been a regular on the LR. Most of the modules in this lens are for affiliate sales, which have beautiful pictures and LOADS of information for anyone who is seriously interested in platform beds. Her MP status is gained by having related ebay modules which clearly make sufficient sales to put her on MP on a regular basis.

I'm sure she would tell you that VOLUME of traffic is much less important than QUALITY TARGETED TRAFFIC, the kind of traffic that is seriously shopping this niche, and is very interested in a good selection of quality at a good price.

She also provides a series of really good links for addiitonal information, resources and ideas for the shopper that could use a few.

Currently on MP is her lens Nitro RC Trucks | Gas Powered Monster Trucks for Sale, which makes great use of ebay auctions for this very specific niche. It isn't a long lens, but it has a very tight selection of exactly the items that the title offers. Customers get no surprises here by diversionary tactics, she gives them EXACTLY what they came for.

New Lensmaster: JonitasKalimpo

As a Citizen Squid and as a committed lensmaster, I spend a LOT of time at SquidU. When an up and coming lensmaster shows up and immediately begins helping and making themselves useful, I notice.

One such is JonitasKalimpo, who came onto the scene in June of this year, and has been an incredibly committed and talented lensmaster.

Joao has created a lens Samsung Blackjack i607 Smartphone Guide, and it really does epitomize what I hope to see as a 'personal shopping assistant' commerce lens at the Mall.

This lens has a very logical layout, with loads of useful information, all with the eye to helping the visitor know whether this particular type of phone is the one for them or not. Joao offers technical details, instructions, and all the accessories, enabling anyone interested to take a good look and make a good choice.

There are beautiful and detailed pictures, a table of contents (or menu) and surprisingly relevant videos!

Extremely well done and I will be proud to feature all of Joao's lenses!

New Lensmaster: Mariane

Mariane is one of our terrific commerce lensmasters, who has found a way to create and promote items of interest and importance to her, using Squidoo. Like the rest of us, Mariane has high hopes that all of her work will rate high in Google, and bring to visitors her unique and important perspective.

I really like her lens Spanx Shapewear With the Celebrities, and her knowledge about Spanx, and the celebrities that wear them, is impressive.

Using Squidoo as an economic development tool, for all of us, is a specific principle to be dedicated to and apply.

What this means is that lensmasters can increase the economic prosperity of all lensmasters, and all of Squidoo, if we purchase from one another FIRST.

Since I was present at the very beginning of the new studies and teaching of micro- economic development principles (think Grameen Bank), I want to point out that it is known that any community that purchases from within itself FIRST actually generates $7 of income for every $1 spent!

How is this possible? By spending within the community FIRST, as each member does the same, it enriches each member that gets a purchase BEFORE the money leaves the community. Squidoo is a community. We are, hopefully, all on the same team, all on the same page.

Had America stuck with this principle, purchasing locally before purchasing with international or even foreign corporations, we wouldn't have the debt and job losses we have now.

We can enrich ourselves and each other if we purchase something we need from each other's lenses before we look elsewhere to purchase.

So, if you need or want Spanx, my suggestion is that you help Squidoo, help Mariane, and help yourself by purchasing Spanx from her lens. She, and others, will do the same for you!

Be Smart: Enter the Lensmaster Contest

A GREAT beginning for a lens that has moved from 3 modules (wip) to 4, and wants to become eligible for the 'featured lens' list, is to add it to the By Invitation Only Lensmaster's Contest.

First, MAKE A GOOD LENS.

Second, decide whether the focus is on content (ala Michelangelo's David) or Commerce (ala Amish Quilt Racks) and enter your lens on the appropriate monthly plexo.

Look at, and vote for, all of the lenses in the contest.

Then, LEAVE A COMMENT!

Lensroll the contest lens to your own lens!

You will receive traffic from:

1. Other lensmasters who will also visit and vote on the lenses.
2. Jurists who look at the lenses to vote.
3. Visitors who are looking for good lenses.
4. Others who are seeking lenses for some reason or other (eg. LOTD)

You will also get a link to your page. With the comment, you will get a link to your lensmaster's roster. With the lensroll, you will have a reciprocal link.

If you are one of 6 winners, your lens and your lensmaster's page will be blogged and so you will have additional external links.

I am LOOKING FOR YOU THERE!

WIP: Exactly, what is the definition?

There is a LOT of debate in the lounge as to whether WIP lenses are 3 modules or less than three, not including the introduction or the guestbook. Headquarters, after their original posting, has not clarified this issue.

I don't think it needs more clarification, because the proof is in what shows up as wip and what doesn't.

Lenses with 3 modules or less have dropped off the list of the featured lenses, AND have dropped out of my visibility in any of my groups.

If all you have are the intro, three modules and the guestbook, then your lens is STILL undeveloped.

You will need to have a 4th module to be permitted to be featured, and without traffic of any kind your lens may still not be found in Squidoo search results.

The Mall groups have 5 modules as a requirement to be featured.

Once you have your 4 modules, and can become part of the featured lenses, then you will need to do some extra things to generate other links to your lens and hopefully some traffic.

I have several projects that will help you to do that. I will begin discussing those next.

Giddy Gabby: Squidoo's Friendly Soul

Giddy Gabby is another one who makes herself known around Squidoo, one of the friendliest and most open, warm human beings you could want to know. Along with me and a few others, Giddy Gabby has been a citizen squid since May.

She has joined our Mall on Squidoo group with My Quiche Pan Store, a page that will make a quiche lover out of you, even if you have never tried it!

Welcome to the Mall on Squidoo group, Giddy Gabby! You're a real pleasure to have around!

Small Business Ebay Seller at the Mall: A High Point!

Karendelac has been participating in Squidoo, by visiting and leaving a comment on many lenses. She has created a beautiful niche page: Thomas Kindade on Squidoo.

Her page is truly beautiful, not only because she shows so much artwork, but also because she gives important information about her business, her ebay page, her power seller status, her shipping policies, and even details about the art that you don't often find.

She has brought to our attention the symbolism used by Thomas Kinkade in each of his pieces, and because of this we feel we know the artist a little better.

Karen's page is rich and inviting, a terrific 'front door' to her small business and her ebay presence.

She understands how to use her Squidoo page and does it to great advantage.

We are delighted to have Karen in the Mall on Squidoo group!

Squidoo Featured Lens/WIP: What this Means

Squidoo has implemented the Featured lens function into its algorithm. All lenses at Squidoo are affected by this, including yours at the Mall.

This is not the same as the 'Featured Lens' on the Mall page or other group pages.

Group membership now cuts off at about 90,000 LR, automatically. Evidently no lens can apply to a group unless it has a higher lensrank than 90,000.

Lenses that WERE in the Mall group but are no longer were not booted by me, but by the new algorithm.

WIP lenses are 'works in progress' meaning that they have 3 modules or less, NOT including the intro and a guestbook.

If you have upgraded your lens so it has 4 modules or more, you still may not qualify to be in any group, until you have raised your lensranking to over 90,000.

How can your lens be upgraded to a LR high enough to be in a group?

There are several ways.

1. Traffic. If, by blogging or external linking, you can draw some traffic to your lens, it will do a LOT to increase its lensrank.
2. Email. Email your lens to as many people on your email list as possible.
3. SquidAngels. Ask the squid angels to visit, rate and bless your lens.
4. Sales. If you make a sale from your lens, it will help your lensrank.
5. Google ranking. A good google ranking automatically brings in traffic.
6. Visit lots of lenses and leave a nice comment and rating. Your lensmaster page is automatically linked when you do that, and all of your lenses benefit.
7. Get a reciprocal link by adding your new or upgraded lens to the plexo at Name the Squid. Lensroll the Name the Squid lens to your new lens, and your new lens will be lensrolled to Name the Squid.
8. Request that I blog or add your lens to upcoming featured Mall pages by adding it to the guestbook on the Mall on Squidoo headquarters guestbook. If I see you are participating in Squidoo by leaving comments on member's lenses, I will add you to the lists.

There are other means to improve your Squidoo lensranking to bring you into the 'featured lens' category. You might try writing an article that links. Build a hub page. Ask someone to blog your lens.

If you have been permanently featured on a Mall on Squidoo page, and your lens has dropped to wip status, you will still be featured on that Mall page.

Huge Pile of Lenses! Over 1500!!!

Despite what our black hatted friends are doing, our group now has over 1500 lenses!

I have stepped up the work on organizing and permanently featuring your lenses, and so you will see great progress over the next weeks.

Build MORE MORE MORE commerce lenses, and get them all linked up- the more of this you do, the better for Squidoo, the better for you, the better for your PR.

Whoa! Black Hats have YOU in their sights!

In the SquidU forum, one of our group members followed a link that showed up in his stats. He posted this link to a internetmarketingguru's forum.

Probably because of MP, this leading lensmaster was found. The group explored his lenses, dissected his techniques and content.

Conclusions?

1. Black Hat SEO people are using MP to find 'profitable' niches that don't take too much work, in order to duplicate content.

2. As our favorite SEO Expert said in his blog: "Black Hat SEOs know what they are doing is defined as BAD, and do it anyway for specific reasons (not usually including “get banned”). I like to think of Black Hat SEOs as opportunists. They see an opportunity to gain, and take it, managing the associated risk. Please don’t confuse ignorant SEOs with Black Hat SEOs… the ignorant ones are those who execute on Black Hat (evil) tactics without managing the risks (either out of ignorance or folly doesn’t matter to me here)."

3. The opportunists aren't particularly thrilled with the flood of like-minded individuals they have brought to Squidoo with them, so they have thousands of other lenses and lensmasters using their same tricks. Gil has done great things to diminish the motivations to spamdoo Squidoo. So many of their antics up to now won't work anymore. What's next?

Now they are looking at YOU and your work, and which are making money.

Lady Bird Johnson

A few weeks back I acquired a Texas Wildflower lens that the lensowner was no longer interested in keeping. It wasn't a well-visited lens, there wasn't much interest and as a commerce lens there simply isn't much to offer except seeds and guidebooks.

However, Texas Wildflowers have been a passion of one of our Former First Ladies, Lady Bird Johnson, for all of her life. So, I decided to add this information to the page, which enhances the understanding of our inheritance of incredible wildflowers. Connecting Lady Bird to the wildflower lens didn't increase its commerce value, but it certainly improved the value of the page in other so many other respects.

Lady Bird Johnson did so much for this country, beautifying the highways with medians, wildflower plantings, and limiting the hideous roadside clutter of too many billboards. She was a civil rights pioneer, one with INFLUENCE, and a formidable businesswoman. When her husband, Lyndon Baines Johnson was elected to Congress, but also served in the active duty military, Lady Bird manned his political office in his absence, helping him to serve our country in two critical ways at one time.

I didn't anticipate this right away, even though she had aged, I understood she was still very healthy; but Lady Bird passed away on July 11, 2007. Because of her importance, this page was selected as Lens of the Day.

I hope that, in honor of an incredible First Lady, who served America all of her life with passion, grace and loyalty, that you'll visit this page and leave your respects. I suspect that her family and those who love her will find this page at some point. Perhaps your comments will help console them in their (and our) great loss.

Dealing with Spamdoo: Guestbooks

Recently some internetmarketingguruwannabees have promoted signing guestbooks with your links as a very nice way to promote your lens. This guru was evidently totally unaware of the hideous problem such activities have caused the blogging community and the enormous uproar all over the web over such practices. When asked, one of the 'gurus' said: "well, I didn't tell anyone to spam!"

Yes, our guestbooks have been getting heavily spammed. Frequently I check my guestbooks for spam, and have been getting so much, from irrelevant comments to huge pictures left to suck up space.

We already have a lot to do to properly maintain our lenses, and this new task was another time consuming waste.

Gil has added some functions to the guestbook modules to help us, and I hope you will use them! This will eventually reduce the spamming we see, until these people find another way.

You will now see a 'ban' function, which means you can ban any lensmaster that leaves a spamdoo in your guestbook. In the group version of 'ban lensmaster' that person is banned from every group a groupmaster may have (I have 41). I don't know if you ban a lensmaster from leaving guestbook comments that they will also be banned from leaving comments on every one of your lenses or not.

Your guestbook still has the other options: you can have only signed in squidoo members to leave comments; or anyone can comment; you can disallow ANY html in your comments, or you can still allow links.

When you visit other lenses, which I strongly recommend that you do, don't be afraid to leave a comment and, if allowed, a link to a lens. However, I do recommend this:

1. READ THE PAGE! If you read the page you will be able to leave a relevant comment. Lensmasters LOVE that.

2. Find something (not a headline or title) that you liked and mention it in your comment. This proves you were actually interested in the page and aren't spamming.

3. If you can and do leave a link, try to leave one that is relevant in some way to the page you are on. Many of us have LOTS of lenses, and one of them may actually be relevant.

Remember that it isn't necessary to always link to a page of your own, because when you leave a comment, your entire lensmaster roster is automatically linked.

This isn't rocket science, and our lensmasters are terrific and gracious people. Let's set a high standard and example for others as we make our rounds and visit each other.

Iframes are OUT 7/12/07 D Day

Many of our merchants in all the Mall on Squidoo groups use iframes to bring their affiliate program offerings to visitors.

All that will be over with on Thursday this week.

Squidoo has been continually flooded with spamdoo lenses, and even a hideous number of spamdoo groups, and since our Google rankings and traffic are suffering, as well as our reputation all over the internet, something must be done.

This is one more thing we have to thank the spamdooers for. God bless them, each and every one.

For the Mall on Squidoo groups:

This slows down my own work renovating the Mall on Squidoo groups because of the many iframes that I use, and I really don't want my lenses to lose their visitors because of the dead space that will show up once iframes are stripped by headquarters. So I have to work on my own lenses.

You will need to prepare for this too, and work on your own pages. I won't be able to feature any lenses that have the iframes stripped from them that haven't been adjusted. I'll give you some time.

If you have any suggestions as to how other merchants can substitute for iframes in their lenses, feel free to leave that information in the comments, at the SquidU lounge, or email me and I'll post it here with a link to your page.

Featured Lenses/ Works in Progress

Wow the changes since I last blogged! They also will make a HUGE difference in how I see and promote YOUR lenses in the Mall on Squidoo GROUPS.

There is almost too much to write about for weeks on end.

The first change that is good to talk about is the Featured Lenses/Works in Progress lenses.

On your new dashboard you will see little green checks or a grey - sign. This will tell you if your lens is a Featured Lens or a Work In Progress lens.

We had seen the adsense revenues for even the top lenses dropping month by month, due to the increasing number of undeveloped lenses also sharing in adsense revenues.

Headquarters has rectified this and has established a tight tier system for lenses which awards the adsense pool based on quality, traffic and other factors. Unpublished or undeveloped lenses will no longer share in the adsense pool and dilute it for the performing lenses.

Now the top tier of lenses received $3.80 in adsense revenues alone, making such a page worth approximately $900 on the open market! This is without considering the value of additional revenues the page may be generating.

Squidoo has graduated from a purely fun site with lots of potential to a serious investment grade site.

As I continue to work on updating the Mall group, this new system restores the usefulness of lensrank when I consider how I will feature and promote the Mall on Squidoo and its member lenses.

NOW is a great time to work on your Works in Progress lenses and make something great out of them~

Hair Raisingly Busy!

Last posting was that stats 2.0 is done! There is a LOT of information to go over and I have been doing so. I want to begin to discuss some of that information and a LOT of other things, like the eBay conference, what we know about lensranking, welcoming new people and discussing some interesting and wonderful things our lensmasters are doing to reach out to people and sell to them once they are at their lenses.

Brush ups on tips and techniques and how they are being used at the merchant lenses is a great topic, and the developments in the mall group itself.

I plan to begin posting with more regularity again next week! See you then!

Celebrate!!!! Squidoo Stats 2.0 Launched!

What lensmasters isn't ABSOLUTELY DELIGHTED with the launching of the new 2.0 stats!

Eye candy to the committed lensmaster!

Great features, great information, great function.

Corey Brown and Gil did an outstanding job. Its no wonder that Seth Godin, in his book 'The Dip' acknowledged them as 'THE BEST', along with Megan Casey.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts, Gil and Corey.

Your work is absolutely remarkable!

#6 Lensrank: Janet21

Janet21 has a great lens on the top 100, #6 today! Her 50 Kids Birthday Party Themes: Cake & Cupcake Ideas and Supplies is a very hot seasonal topic!

This is a lens that she can continue to work with, and even alter the title and contents to observe which is the most successful and productive for her in any season.

She has an incredible collection, with all the great names to use as keywords, if you are interested in kids stuff. She has Spongebob Squarepants, Winnie the Pooh, Batman, Barbie, and a huge list of other popular and fun cakes and supplies.

She seems to be very successful at drawing oodles of traffic this way.

She also has two lenses in the top Most Profitable line up.

We know that Janet is starting to earn some income on Squidoo! How about you?

Another Squidoo Success Story!

Director Tom writes to me:

Greeting from Tom :-)

Here's some quick news to keep you up-to-date on my latest happenings. Feel free to forward this email to those who might benefit from it...thanks!

1. I will be re-joining Moving Pictures in Middletown, CT, starting June 4.

This is an exciting opportunity to help shape the future direction of corporate television. The recent emergence of social media and web video outlets will propel personal stories captured from employees in corporate videos to even greater audiences. Corporate stories captured on DVD will now be just the beginning of sharing that story.

2. "Director Tom" website: "Bringing Brands to Life"
In an effort to help others "bring brands to life" through min-documentaries and to acknowledge the power of employees as "heroes" and "storytellers" in corporate videos, I launched DirectorTom; Branding with Remarkable Corporate Videos nine months ago.

That first month had only four readers! Thankfully, with a lot of help from folks sharing and spreading this conversation, the readership has soared! It's incredibly rewarding to know that people across the globe have been touched by this concept. The "heroes" in my films over the years have certainly taught me, in fact, that each person's story can change the world for the better.

3. Award-Winning Videos are Changing the World with "Heroes."
Speaking of "heroes" and "changing the world," the four teen "heroes" in the two videos I recently produced for the Epilepsy Foundation are, indeed, changing the world.

The two videos are used thoughout the junior high and high school national public school system to help change the misperceptions many people still have towards those with epilepsy.

Both videos were entered in two film festivals. The film, "Take Charge of the Facts," has already recieved two awards; a Telly Award and the Ad Club of Connecticut Award.

"Out of the Shadows," a day-in-the-life of documentary featuring four teen "heroes" with epilepsy, just received a Telly Award, as well.

The stories of these "heroes" are truly remarkable and are, indeed, changing the world.

That's it for now.

The conversations are happening...the stories are spreading. Feel free to jump into the pool (you won't get wet...promise!)

:-)

Thomas R. Clifford
Corporate Documentary Filmmaker & Story Katalyst
"Let's see that again!"

Pocahontas, Her Majesty the Queen & Squidoo

Dear Margaret,

I wanted to drop you a line to tell you about this amazing cameo order and my recent trip to Virginia. My original enquiry cameo via my Squidoo lens on gemstone portrat cameos. So Squidoo really works - Go Figure !

This has been such a busy two months. I was contacted in late March and asked if I could make a copy of a cameo brooch first given to Pocahontas 400 years ago by the King while she lived in England.

I was flown over in early April to examine the original which is at the Jamestown museum in Virginia. I stayed in Virginia for a few days and made time to visit some previous customers who live near Washington D.C.

I then returned to Wales and made the cameo brooch. This was carved out of natural layered agate and set in a Palladium frame set with natural American seed pearls.



I flew over to deliver the cameo to the museum in early may. It was given to the Virginian Indian nations who performed a ceremonial blessing and then presented it to the Queen on May 3rd in Richmond.

I saw the Queen during her visit to the Jamestown museum on friday 4th, May. This is an amazing museum and you really must visit it if you are ever in the area.



I had bought over my family and we had a short break in the Shenandoa national park and then re-visited my previous customers around Washington D.C. We also made time to visit the Capitol buildings, the Smithsonian natural history museum and the air and space museum near Dulles airport.

It was such an amazing time and now I have the satisfaction of knowing that one of my cameos is in the Royal collection in Buckingham Palace, England.

I have put up a quick page on my website that has a picture of the cameo. Visit it here: Queen's Cameo

Thanks, Gareth Eckley.

1001 Members! Very, Very Busy!

I'm sorry I haven't posted in a few days. As you can see, I've been very busy. We have 1001 members in the Mall group, and I'm working on some new projects to promote you all.

You will begin seeing some real differences between all the ecommerce groups as Squidoo grows, and I hope the Mall will stand out more than most of the others, in its own unique way.

We're all hoping to make a living with our internet merchandizing, and my projects are just for that purpose.

If you have any suggestions, please email them to me. We will all need to stand out more and more as time goes on.

Congratulations to all of you for a successful group so far. The proof will be in our incomes as we move forward.

I admire and enjoy all of you!

New! Live Dashboard Traffic Stats!

Wow, thanks to Gil, today he announced in the squidu lounge that the traffic stats on our dashboards are LIVE! Now when you sit starting at your dashboard, you may have something to see!

It seems the upgrades were an enormous project, perhaps that tiny staff bit off more than it could chew for a little while! However, it seems that they've gotten a handle on all of that and provided us a new surprise. Well done, Gil!

He reports that there are three people per second looking at a Squidoo page, which is awesome, and that there are some new dashboard design plans in the works.

Stats 2.0 is STILL ON THE WAY.

Read it for yourself. We have a lot to look forward to.

953 Lenses in the Mall Group Today

Yes, I'm VERY behind! Today there are 953 lenses in the Mall group, and I expect it to be 1000 by next week. Since I look at every lens that applies to the Mall, this huge number of new lensmasters is keeping me very busy.

This month I'm a Citizen Squid, doing what I can to help out in the lounge, and various small projects that headquarters would like to help with.

I also inherited a project that I would like you to help with:
NAME THE SQUID!

I got this project by purchasing a large number of lenses from the former Citizen Squid, Angela Harms. This lens was started in January as an effort to name our mascot, but it didn't get far.

The entire lens benefits Chimp Haven and so I have enlisted the help of chimps to encourage visitors to vote.

Help us name the Squid that is our mascot and trademark! Go to the lens and vote on the names and even suggest some yourself.

If you would like extra links to your page, this is the arrangement. Anyone who lensrolls the Name the Squid page can put any links they want to on the page plexo. One lensroll, one link.

For any Mall on Squidoo member, I will also provide a link here to your website or squidoo page.

UnSpun by Amazon: Best Squidoo Lenses

Tag Lensrolls

Looking at our current top Mall on Squidoo lens, the Dooney & Bourke handbag lens, by thestyleguru, I see that the lensroll was probably chosen by Squidoo based on designer handbag tags alone.

In that lensroll are 5 directly competing Squidoo lenses, two with ugly placeholders.

The first one is Coach Handbags by KC.

Next Wholesale Designer Handbags by pspdownloads. This lens has no avatar or intro module picture and so it looks very ugly on this page.

The third lens in that lensroll is the Brahmin Handbags by athomesource. This one has a beautiful picture of a crocodile handbag in their intro module.

Next is a very clever take on a designer handbag lens by jaguarjulie, called Bag Lady on Squidoo.

The last one in that lensroll is "I found this great website to buy handbags at up to 75% off," by tonyt. This lens has no pictures, so our lensmaster has ANOTHER ugly placeholder, but it also has no product, only a link to an unknown website that promises amazing savings for new handbags.

Now, if you add to that the 4 paid Google ads for Dooney & Bourke handbags, including a discount ad, you can see that it is a formidable amount of competition for this lensmaster to overcome.

Thestyleguru also says in their bio: "I'll save you loads of time by helping you find information on all of MY interests. Free or at the most affordable prices for You. Whether it be fashion, books, the hottest trends, or just helpful tips on info we all look for and want to know. Let me be of service to you... Enjoy!! -thestyleguru".

From this we get the impression that everything, including the lensrolled pages, are all condoned or recommended by this lensmaster!

The power of Squidoo has been, at least up to now, THE POWER OF PERSONAL RECOMMENDATION. In this case, and in the case of all other lenses with serious competition, that personal recommendation has been DISEMPOWERED.

You can say, 'this is a performing lens, otherwise it wouldn't be so high in Squidoo Lensrank.'

I say, yes, it peformed BEFORE the layout change, and BEFORE the lensroll became so prominent. The old layout ignored it if you had no lensroll. The Google ads were much less prominent, and your intro module was larger and more striking to the attention. Now, it puts a lensroll in place FOR YOU if you haven't done so already, maximizes the Google ads and diminishes the introduction module in every way.

Tomorrow I will discuss options for this particular lensmaster to help save their lens from obscurity.

I hope that you will look at this lens, compare it with the others, and offer your own suggestions. We will all benefit from improving our lenses, and this lensmaster isn't the only one having this difficulty.

Spare Cycles & Squidoo

On the long tail blog, Chris Anderson discusses 'spare cycles'. He has described spare cycles as an 'awesome power.' This is his primary explanation of why there is such an explosion in blogging.

Spare cycles are also being used to begin building small businesses, and an opportunity to create an additional 'royalty' income for people who may otherwise be wasting their time with television or non-essential matters.

For example, no one would accuse Janet21 of having much time to waste, as a mother of three children. Yet she, too, seems to have enough spare cycles to build lenses like her Novelty Pillows lens, and a website, and to begin growing an extra income for her family.

Janet doesn't have a LOT of spare cycles, but she certainly makes good use of them! This lens is #8 in the Mall on Squidoo group, and she is already producing income from this lens, even though it is a new one. Your spare cycles, like Janet21's, can really turn out some performers!

No matter who you are, your 'spare cycles' are probably always unpaid time. One of the wonderful things about Squidoo is how fruitfully you can use your spare cycle time to build something that will enrich your future.

New Layout, New Lensroll!

It is a very important layout change of our maxed pages at Squidoo!

The lensroll is now much more visible to your visitors, and is much more important. While we don't know all the details about the new lensroll feature, the longest lensroll I have, on Michelangelo's David, shows 7 items in its lensroll.

The lensroll is meant to be a 'tour-guide' around Squidoo, of your personally recommended lenses. Up until now there hasn't been a limit on how many other lenses you could put in your lensroll. Now, it will require some thought when selecting other lenses.

First, to keep the look of your page as attractive as possible, try to choose lenses that have pictures uploaded into the introduction module. Without that, the lensroll shows an ugly orange placeholder with a question mark. (If you are wondering why your lens doesn't featured in the Mall group, this is most likely the reason).

If you don't have a lensroll, Squidoo chooses the lenses for you. They could be according to topic or tags. These may not be the best selection for your lensroll.

With the many duplicate product offerings, for example, coach handbags, you could end up with all of your competitors in your lensroll.

It is time for all the lensmasters in the Mall on Squidoo group to begin considering how to best use their lensroll. The clutter of the new layout means that anything that will help you keep the visitor's focus on what you want them to see, and what will most benefit them and you, will be much more important as the time goes on.

Next I will discuss various strategies about lensrolling and how you can best use it.

Megan Made a Great Offer! Calling All Squids!

Megan Casey made a very generous offer that can help YOU to learn more about Squidoo, how it works, and about the lensmasters coming into Squidoo!

Every month they'll be choosing 4 lensmasters to act as Citizen Squids for the "Citizen Squids Brigade," for things like helping newbies, working on the newsletter, and doing various small projects.

There are a LOT of fabulous Squidooers out there, and I think you are one of them!

Don't miss your chance to be part of what is up and coming at Squidoo and on the internet!

The Stumble is GONE!!!

Woo Hoo!

THE STUMBLE IS GONE!

816 Shops in the Mall as of Today!

As I mentioned before, the Mall on Squidoo is growing very fast! Today there are 816 shops, all of which want to be featured, highlighted, and get visitors to them! There will be more by the end of the day.

There are some really wonderful shops that are begging for traffic and repeat visitors, not to mention sales!

I look forward to the announcement from Megan about the decision that she will make about the stumble, because it will have an enormous effect on how I organize and manage the Mall group.

In any case, I plan to aggressively promote the Mall on Squidoo, and we may just have to accomodate the stumble as best we can.

I have plans that excite me, but I am actively seeking, and welcoming any suggestions you may have that would benefit all of us at the Mall group.

Pressing Right Along...

The anger that the information provided by magicality provoked, at least with the forum moderator, is quite a surprise to me. The positive reactions to that information from all but one lensmaster seems to me that nearly everyone is interested in the statistics.

Fortunately Gil has promised stats 2.0 which will probably clear up everything.

So, I think I'll bow out of the discussions around lensrank for the long term, just press right along with my pages and groups, my website and my business, and let headquarters do whatever it is going to do without comment from me. I can't seem to get on the right side of those discussions no matter what.

I have no interest in 'doing battle' with people I like and admire so much, or with the concept of Squidoo altogether, with which there can be no reasonable dispute.

The new phase of the mall is coming up, and the form of it will depend on the headquarter's final decision on the stumble and how it will work.

What we will do next, here at the Mall blog, is take a look at some performing lenses and see what is so good about them.

This will be FUN!

An Extremely Helpful Page

Much Thanks to Magicality for this incredible accomplishment!

Sometimes what we THINK is going on turns out to be different than what is ACTUALLY going on.

Here you have a way to gauge your lens performance against the top 100 lenses, though things like sales aren't counted for much on the global LR scale.

Looks to be Staying...

Well fellow commerce merchants, based on Megan's posting on the squidblog last week, it looks to me like the stumble arrow will be staying. The announcement hasn't yet been made, and so it isn't official.

Further, jeffryv, lounge moderator, made the point that Stumbleupon has a commerce section where merchants pay $.05 per showing to a stumbler. The benefit of it is that there is nothing else showing but your website when the individual stumbles, no adsense for anyone else's benefit, no other advertising, just your own page.

So, clearly Squidoo headquarters sees some potential for income and for interest among people for a stumble through Squidoo.

I expect Megan to announce with a couple of days Squidoo's final decision, how it will be implemented, what we can expect, and how they think it is best for us as lensmasters and merchants to use it.

Big Bad News that Just Can't Wait...

I wasn't going to post again until the stumble function on our lenses was finalized and decided on.

However, this just came to my attention and it is EXTREMELY WORRISOME for me, as the Mall groupmaster, as it SHOULD BE FOR EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU!

The duplicate lenses are now being singled out by Google and assigned SUPPLEMENTAL STATUS in that search engine, which means that any lens that is buried in that way isn't even worth the paper it is written on.

We have SO MANY COOKIE CUTTER DUPLICATES on Squidoo now that we are running the risk of having some serious problems with more and more lenses being diverted to supplemental, and Squidoo becoming less and less favored in the Google search rankings.

If that happens, the whole benefit of Squidoo is OVER.

So, aside from the issue of the stumble arrow and its effects on the groups and the lenses, this issue will be FRONT AND CENTER for the Mall group.

If you have a lens that is duplicated or has been duplicated and you have no original content, then please consider the following for your membership in any of my groups:

1. Do you have good, original content?
2. Is your lens focused on a topic?
3. Have I seen you anywhere around??? Guestbooks, email box, forum?
4. Can anyone contact you?

Those who have all FOUR will be featured lenses and I will promote you as much as I can.

Those who don't will be booted from my groups. If you have more than one lens, I will look them over too, and make my decisions.

While We're Waiting to Hear....

You may have noticed the new arrow at the top right corner of your pages, which directs visitors who have just arrived on your page to immediately leave for a 'stumble' which takes them to the #1 in the topic category your lens belongs to.

Like Digg, it assumes a 5 second attention span on the part of any visitor and gives tham a command to take them elsewhere.

Most good lenses require more than 5 seconds to get a sense of what is really on the page.

Most good lensmasters are working very hard to drive traffic to their own lenses just to have it, what?, driven out???

The stumble arrow will be up for at least another week. I can't make any new decisions about what to do with and for the Mall group until I know how this is decided.

It is much too much unremunerated work to examine and organize over 700 lenses into a pleasant browsing experience for potential customers, just to have them bounced around squidoo like superballs. I am going to use this time to take care of some of my lenses and other projects, and will begin work on the Mall groups again when I know what is going to happen with this new feature.

In the meantime, for your enjoyment, take a look at this.

#1, #2 & #3 Today (MP, MP, LR)

This is a first for me, and I think a first for Squidoo, too! I have both First and Second positions on the Most Profitable list, and the Third position on the Lens Rank list!

The #1 today is an 'out of season' lens, meaning that you might think that at the end of winter, no one would be interested in buying a shearling coat! I've learned, though, that out of season lenses, like Christmas lenses, can surprise us, and it is a good idea to continue to update them anyway.

I'm watching the MP list, since I manage the Mall group, and I'm looking to see which of our merchants make it there! I want to focus on featuring those lensmasters, while also featuring the small business owners who's best sales will probably never show up on Squidoo's list. These are all success stories, and around here, it seems like success breeds success!

Cuban Missile Crisis #1

John Fenzel, being a true hero, rode in on his white horse at the very last minute and won the OFFICIAL Squidoo Lens of the Year!

The Lens of the Year is Cuban Missile Crisis Lens, a lens that has been deserving of such an award since the day he wrote it.

Though not selected as Lens of the Day, John's other lenses are equally as stunning, such as The Peloponnesian War (a personal favorite of mine, The Balkan Wars, Carl von Clausewitz, and Vietnam: We Could Have Won; all of which comprise a corpus of work that is second to none, anywhere.

In other extraordinary contributions to the Squidoo community at large, John masters the History Group, and is a jurist on the grassroots Squidoo Lensmaster's By Invitation Only panel for the People's Choice Awards.

Congratulations to John Fenzel!

DESERVING Winner of the Official Squidoo Lens of the Year Award!!!

Big Day at the Blog- Spam: Its NOT What's for Dinner!

Thanks Gil, for the announcement about the measures to deal with the tsunami of spam.

Read his blog here, folks!

He thinks 10 spammy lenses was bad, good thing he didn't get a REAL dose of it!

Thank you Squidoo for helping with this!

#1 MP Today!

Today, I have SEVEN lenses on Squidoo's top 100 Most Profitable list. I also have the #1 listing!

It wasn't intentional, to be sure! Who would ever think that a lens about Catholic Apparitions and Miracles could draw some business?

Well, the folks who have survived the Rwandan Genocide will be thankful, I'm sure!

When will I see YOU on the top 100 MP???

Remodeling: Starting with the Rock Stars!!!

When I took over the Mall group, it had approximately 50 members. It didn't grow much at first, and my own commerce lenses were a LARGE part of the population.

By next Monday, I expect to have over 700.

I am going to update my Squidoo Mall lens today. This will be useful to you to know the minimum standards and what to check for on your lenses.

For the remodeling, I'M STARTING WITH THE ROCK STARS!!!!

What it Takes to Be #1- John Fenzel

Fabulous John Fenzel on his Stumbleupon Blog today quotes Vince Lombardi:

Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all time thing. You don't win once in a while; you don't do things right once in a while; you do them right all the time. Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing. I have finished second twice in my time at Green Bay, and I don't ever want to finish second again. There is a second place bowl game, but it is a game for losers played by losers. It is and always has been an American zeal to be first in anything we do, and to win, and to win, and to win. Continued.

Another brilliant man who deserves the award Lens of the Year for his Cuban Missile Crisis, or any of his other work, for that matter.

He has an uncanny sense of timing...