Superhero Contest Runner Up

I know this is a bit late, but my family’s been having a tough week (a family member passed away) so I’ve been hanging out with and supporting them for most of this week. On July 14 I received an email from Anne Reidy, who is the Nonprofit Organizer for Squidoo. She informed me that one of my recently-made Superhero lenses, about Ben Carson, was chosen as one of five runners up for the Squidoo Superhero Charity Project.

Originally, they picked five great Superhero lenses and donated $500 to charity for each one, but I guess that they decided it’d be fun to pick some runners up. The email I got from Anne said:

We’re big softies. We couldn’t pick just five:
http://blogs.squidoo.com/lensoftheday/
Happy to say that Ben Carson makes the list!

Please let me know where you would like the $100 donation to go. And please send me your snail mail address as we have a special surprise for you!

Thanks and congrats!

Anne

Wow! I was floored when I read this. I never thought I’d win, and I didn’t really build the Superhero lenses hoping that I’d win. I just did it for fun and to kind of give back a little of what I’ve been given. I was even more surprised when I saw that I’d be getting a super special awesome surprise in the mail. I’ll keep on the lookout and let you know what I get when I get it. In case anyone wants to know, I had the $100 donation sent to Save the Children.

Also, while looking at that Lens of the Day blog post, I noticed that three of the Superhero runners-up are regular chatters in the Captain Squid Chat Room. I thought that was pretty neat! If you haven’t done so yet, you’d better swing by sometime and say hello. We’ve got a great community there with some amazing people and lots of innovation and thinking going on!

Increase Squidoo Income with Affiliate Programs

Did you know that there are other ways to earn money with Squidoo besides the Adsense revenue share and the modules such as Amazon and eBay? You betcha! In fact, almost all of my Squidoo income comes from other sources than Squidoo’s “sell stuff” modules. What I use are affiliate programs, which are programs offered by companies that work with big retailers such as Wal-Mart, Microsoft, and even Hanes and act as a sort of “bridge” between us and the retailer. We can then sell the products offered by these retailers, and receive a commission for doing so.

Why do retailers do this? Well, they spend millions and millions of dollars each year on advertising. When we partner up with them through affiliate programs and promote their products for them, we do it at our own risk. Since it’s cheaper and safer (for them) in the long run to just pay affiliates (us) a cut of the profit for selling something, these big companies prefer to do this and be able to spend less on advertising costs. We spend our time promoting their products, get a share of the profit for each product purchased through us, and the company spends less on advertising. It’s usually a win-win situation.

To join an affiliate program and start promoting products is very easy. There are literally dozens of big affiliate programs that are partnered with hundreds (thousands?) of companies. Some of the bigger and most prestigious ones include Linkshare, Commission Junction, and Pepperjam Network. Simply sign up with one of these programs (free, never pay to join an affiliate program) and look for some products that are relevant to your lenses. Usually, all you have to do is copy and paste some HTML code into your lens and it will generate a link or picture people can click through to buy the product. You’ll then receive a commission for each item sold.

I’ve seen a LOT of lenses that have had great potential for earning money, but their owners don’t seem to know about affiliate programs and a lot of opportunity is lost. All they would have to do is join one of the programs listed above and earn some money for their hard work of creating a great lens. Most of these lenses have some of the Squidoo money making modules such as Amazon, and I have no idea how well they’re doing on that, but there can be other more rewarding alternatives. Don’t get me wrong, Amazon is great–there just are often alternatives that are more targeted. For instance, if you build a lens reviewing art supplies, wouldn’t you rather buy them from a trusted art supply store instead of an all-in-one superstore like Amazon that sells tens of thousands of products ranging anywhere from computers to lingerie to even groceries? I know I would, and I think that a lot of people would agree.

Also, like I mentioned earlier, never pay to join an affiliate program. You should never have to pay to promote other people’s products for them, and any affiliate program that tries to charge you for the “privilege” of making them money is almost always a scam. Stick with the guys that have built up a good reputation, and be sure to check out each affiliate program before you join it to be sure it’s legit. A simple Google search of the program’s name should bring up enough reviews and information to verify it. If you see a bunch of people complaining about it, then find a different program to work with. There are plenty out there. I’m working on a list of trustful affiliate programs that I recommend, so stay tuned for that.

And, if you join Linkshare, Commission Junction, or Pepperjam Network and are having trouble getting started, just shoot me an email and I’ll see what I can do to help you out.

Superhero Lens Number 2 Done

It’s a race against the clock!

I just finished on my second lens for the Squidoo Superhero Project for Charity. As of this writing, I have 4 days, 13 hours, and 41 minutes left to create three more lenses for the Superhero Project. Think I can make it? I hope so!

My second lens for the project is about Dr. Ben Carson, who is a gifted neurosurgeon who has saved the lives of thousands of people, and become a great role model for millions (including me). In 1987 he performed a medical procedure to separate siamese twins who were joined at the back of the head–the first time such a procedure was successful. Really neat stuff. Since I’m a nursing student, his life story is especially fascinating to me.

That’s Superhero Lens #2 down now, and just three more to go.

Getting Around Squidoo Social Bookmarking Site Bans

While browsing the SquidU forums today, I came across a post about Propeller, which is a social bookmarking site created by AOL. Not too long ago, Propeller banned Squidoo for spam reasons, which was due to people promoting their lenses the wrong way and also for getting a flood of Squidoo submissions. A lot of people probably were being honest and professional about it, it’s just that with Squidoo having over 500,000 lenses made, even a fraction of those submitted to sites like Propeller would be overwhelming.

Anyways, The Captain had a brilliant idea. Why not join SquidTop, create your a blog (free) and write up a useful and informative post about your lens and then submit that to social bookmarking sites? That way, you’ll be able to get traffic to your lens and not have to worry about the “anti-Squidoo” people who have been burned by SquidSpammers downvoting or removing your submission. And, since SquidTop blogs are in subdomain format (ie, blog.squidtop.com), the same way Blogger blogs are instead of just the Squidoo.com/lens format, it will appear a bit less overwhelming because people won’t just see the same “squidoo.com” URL over and over.

The key, though, is to be conservative about your submissions–ie, don’t overwhelm the social bookmarking sites. Also, write decent descriptions, not just one-liners, and tag and categorize your submissions properly. I’m not sure if anything is hated more by social bookmarking site users than a submission that’s in the wrong category or is tagged wrong. If you take the extra few seconds to find a proper category, write up a quick (but decent) description, and tag well, your submissions to social bookmarking sites will be enjoyed by all and will stand through the ages like a beacon of hope for your Squidoo lenses.