How to Optimize My Squidoo Lens

On the website Squidoo, users can share information and earn advertising revenue for themselves or a designated charity by creating a "lens," a free Squidoo page containing text, videos, links, images and other elements on a single theme or subject. To make the most of your Squidoo lens, you'll need traffic. Use the principles of search-engine optimization, or SEO, to climb search-engine rankings, attract readers from within Squidoo and beyond, and increase your chance of earning money.

Instructions

1. Add keyword phrases to each section of your Squidoo lens. Keywords are important words and phrases that users type into a search engine in order to find your site. For a lens called "Top 10 Horror Movies," for example, words and phrases to incorporate include "best horror movies," "horror film recommendations" and "horror review." In a 400-word lens, use these about three times each.

2. Set a lens URL that contains some of your keywords, separated by dashes or underscores, "best_horror_films." Most search engines take into account the URL when ranking your content. You must do this at the creation stage, as you cannot edit a Squidoo URL later.

3. Edit your lens title and subheadings to contain your main keywords. "Viva Espana!" may sound like a catchy title for a lens about Spanish history, but it will mean much less to search engines than a title that contains words such as "Spain," "history" and "facts."

4. Add keywords to your Squidoo tags. Search for the tags on Squidoo first to avoid using "orphan tags," tags no one else uses. Using the same tag in more than one article helps boost your lens rankings in Squidoo's internal search engine.

5. Set a relevant category. If you write the most informative article ever about which dog food to buy, but file it under "Business," instead of "Animals and Nature," your poor category choice could cost you readers.

6. Link to your Squidoo lens from your other websites and blogs, including other Squidoo lenses. For the most effective SEO results, use link text relevant to your keywords, rather than generic phrases such as "click here" or "my article."

References

• Colorado State University: Department of Web Communications: SEO - Getting Your Page Found!