Action learn your Squidoo marketing

One of the ways to manage your Squidoo marketing is to
use action learning.

As you may have seen on my Squidoo autobiography, this is
an area that I have been involved in since the early 1980's.

I have worked with managers in many organisations to help
them master the principles of action learning. The Top 500
companies in America use this method very effectively
to develop their managers and their businesses.

The fundamental principle is very simple but the application
is often difficult because of our ingrained, habituated
behaviors.

Action learning involves a cycle of plan-act-review. The cycle
is then repeated (similar to the quality improvement cycle).

Too often both managers and Internet marketers get into the
following vicious cycle: plan-act-plan-act-plan-act, with no
review.

So what are you working on now and how do you plan to
review its effectiveness? What aspect are you going to
improve?

Progress is achieved through these incremental
improvements day by day (unless of course you stumble
on the next big breakthrough in the process - and, in fact,
that's how these breakthroughs are discovered, i.e. by doing
the hard yards first).

Most of us fall into either the activity trap (where we repeat
the vicious cycle above) or analysis paralysis (where we
don't do anything at all).

I tend to fall into the activity trap because I love creating
new things - e.g. I made a commitment yesterday to help
a local charity gain support from Squidoo via the
not-for-profit program.

The value of the plan-act-review cycle was brought home
to me recently when I was reviewing the performance of a
PPC ad that I had developed for an Affiliate product.

Normally, I would just keep creating ads like most other
people and not review what was happening. However,
through the PPC Classroom I learnt the importance
of consolidating your PPC ad before moving on to
multiple ads for multiple products.

I was getting a good click-through rate (CTR) but the
landing page was not converting very well (...and I knew
the sales page itself converted very well).

So I reviewed the tutorial on creating landing pages on
PPC Classroom and re-worked my landing page - and
not surprisingly conversions improved.

So this little review action, using a resource I already
had, enabled me to save money and increase my affiliate
income.

So what resources - videos, podcasts, articles, e-Books,
e-mails - have you got to enable you to review what you
are doing online at the moment? It is useful to use
someone else's insights as a basis for your review.

In fact, action learning is ideally done with
someone else - a mentor, coach, a friend, a sponsor
or colleague. The value of this is that they are likely to
ask fresh questions and help you challenge your assumptions
about your product/program, marketing strategy,
target market or buying behavior.

Here's a further article I have written on this topic:
How to action learn your affiliate business

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Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the e-book:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

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Creating posts for your blog and Squidoo lenses

I don't know about you but I often have trouble thinking
up ideas for blog posts in the middle of my everday
business and home life.

The one exception is when I get a creative urge at 4 am
in the morning (I'm a morning person!). Most other times
I need the stimulus of something else to get my brain
churning.

On one of my morning walks it suddenly hit me that I
had hundreds of resources on my computer that could
act as a catalyst for blog posts or posts for Squidoo modules.
I realised I could use the ideas in Squidoo text modules, link
modules or in comments on other Squidoo lenses.

Now I use the following as a stimulus for my ideas for
posts (and add them to my business journal):

• e-Books
• videos
• podcasts (I listen to these on my iPod during morning walks)
• emails from other marketers
• email enquiries from subscribers
• articles in article directories
• webinars
• sales pages of major product launches
• membership sites (free and paid)
• PLR content
• blog posts by other bloggers
• ...and the list goes on.

The reality is that you receive heaps of stimulus for
ideas every day and have an endless store of information
on your own computer to use for blog posts or posts to
Squidoo modules.

Don't just copy what others have written or spoken
- add your own value. Some hints on how to add value to
the ideas that you encounter:

• relate the idea to the focus of your blog/Squidoo lens
• add personal experiences
• illustrate with examples
• concentrate on one key idea and tease it out
• link to other ideas that you are aware of
• expand on, or clarify, a key point/resource
  
• link your post to other things you have written or created

You can link to articles you have written or videos you have
created (as I did above with the hotlink to "morning walk").
You can also add in links to relevant affiliate products - a
much more natural way to promote.

Reading, listening and viewing create new connections in
your brain and enable you to link to other ideas/experiences
in your brain store. As you write your posts you are building
your knowledge base, creating a directory of information
for yourself and others and moving yourself along the path
to creating your own profitable product(s).

You can make the most of your time by listening to material
on your walks or creating advertising credits as you
read articles (as you can with the Affsphere Article Directory).

I can assure you that you will build Squidoo lensrank when
you add unique content to your lens and you will also build
the Google positioning/ranking of your blog if you continue
to add new material.

[Personal note: This blog held No 1 position in Google for its
targeted keyword for a number of years (created in 2005).
It is now at No.2 - displaced by my Squidoo lens:
Affiliate Marketing Coach (created on 23 March 2007).
Around 2007, the blog had a PR5 ranking but gradually
lost this when I started to post irregularly (once a month).
I am starting to rebuild PR again.]

********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the e-book:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

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Develop your Squidoo marketing using a business journal

How often do you lose a good idea because you have
not written it down?

Why not start up a business journal to record your
ideas, goals, plans, keywords, future products...?

I have started a new journal in the form of a Spirax
A4 Note Book - I got sick of chasing my loose notes
all over the place.

Now I'm using it for lots of things to help me to
develop my Squidoo lenses and build my
Squidoo marketing.

Here's some of the uses I've found for it:

1. recording significant keywords for my major lenses
after using the Google Adwords Keyword Tool (this
means that I can quickly update tags of multiple lenses
every day!)

2. jotting down potential article topics

3. keeping notes from webinars, videos, podcasts and
online conferences

4. recording the key ideas from an e-Book and the
actions that I want to follow up with

5. identifying potential topics for blog posts

6. mapping out the chapters of a new e-Book

7. sketching out the outline for a new article

8. developing a to do list

9. recording key ideas for future implementation

10. establishing goals and focused achievement deadlines

11. recording ideas for future Squidoo lenses including
potential modules

12. reminding myself about key things to do (in big
print) - such as add my videos to Flickr (paid version)

13. keeping tabs on resources I buy and what's in each

14. record key affiliate opportunities in line with my
desired direction and goals.

********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the e-book:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

********************************************

Squidoo: how to find great tags for your Squidoo lens

One easy way to regularly update your Squidoo lenses
is to change your tags (keywords).

You are able to use 40 tags on each lens.

But where are you going to get worthwhile tags that
represent high search volumes and reflect profitable
keywords?

Well Google provides a range of tools to assist you
with this task. In a previous post, we covered
Google Insight for Search. In this post we will cover
the Google Adwords Keyword Tool.

This FREE marketing tool provides you with heaps
of useful and timely information that can help you identify
really valuable tags for your Squidoo lenses.

You can search on any term such as "dog training" and
include synonyms or exclude specific words.

Google Adwords Keyword Tool now gives you monthly
search volumes and competition levels (very high, high,
average, low). This is very relevant to your Squidoo
marketing.

You can even click on "match type" and specify broad,
phrase, exact, or negative types of keywords.

Your analysis can go even deeper than this. Google
also provides a "choose columns to display" in a drop
down menu that enables you to display for each keyword (tag)
the estimated ad position, average CPC (cost per click),
search volume trends (displayed pictorially by month)
and the month that the highest volume occurred in (giving
you important seasonal information).

Thus the Google Adwords Keyword Tool provides you
with superb market research information that you can
use to choose the tags that are relevant to the focus of
your Squidoo lens and your Squidoo affiliate marketing.

You should never be short of relevant tags for your
Squidoo lens.

********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the e-book:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

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Squidoo: targeting your Squidoo lens

With Google Insights for Search, you can compare search
volume patterns across specific regions, categories,
time frames and properties.

In this way you can identify niches and specific
keywords that have the desired search volume and
potential profitability.

Google Insights for Search can be used to isolate trends
in specific categories such as health, business and sports,
identify trends by regions and cities and gain insight into
the impact of seasonality.

You can use this information to focus your affiliate marketing
plan, time your affiliate promotion or enter new geographical
markets.

You can also identify common months of the year when
sales of particular products trend upward across the
globe, e.g. digital cameras in December.

The numbers shown on the comparative graphs do
not represent absolute volumes of searches. They do reflect
how many searches have been done for a particular term,
relative to the total number of searches done on Google
over time. So you will see results ranging from 100
(top result) downwards to 0.

The results identified can then be vetted with other FREE
keyword search tools such as the
Google Adwords Keyword Tool:
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal


********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the ebook:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

********************************************

7 Key Reasons To Blog

There are numerous reasons why you should blog.

Here are 7 Key Reasons for Blogging:

1. A focused blog builds your Internet Profile, credibility
and reputation.

2. Google loves fresh content and looks to blogs to provide
regularly, updated content.

3. You can add the blog's RSS feed to your Squidoo lens
and build lensrank.

4. Regular posts with appropriately targeted keywords
can help you dominate a niche and the first page of
Google results.

5. Blogs are a great place to store your own learning and
readily access it via intelligent tagging - they can serve as
reflective journals.

6. Blogs boost traffic and sales if you set them up right and
market them effectively.

7. Blogs help you build relationships with your subscribers
and develop two-way communication.

********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn how to make money with your blog, check out:
http://www.squidoo.com/ReviewofBloggersPaycheck

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the ebook:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

********************************************

Squidoo : the importance of blogging

I can't stress enough the importance of blogging
to support your Squidoo lenses.

Blogging will boost your Squidoo lensrank and Google
PR rank as well as bring you targeted visitors and
increased income.

Adding your blog's RSS feed to your lens will provide
fresh content whenever you update your blog.

[Note: even though the feed from your latest post
shows on your lens, you still need to edit and publish
the revised lens to get acknowledgement of the
update in your Squidoo dashboard - I've checked this
over multiple lenses.]

The value of a blogging is beyond dispute. Both Squidoo
and Google love fresh, unique content.

I had real proof of the impact of a blog feed on Squidoo
Lensrank over the past few weeks. Two of my new lenses,
with different blog feeds, achieved a lens rank of around
1,200 within two weeks of creation.

I attribute this to two key actions:
1. daily updating (however small the change)
2. incorporation of a blog feed

So create a blog today and get the RSS feed linked
to your lens - you will be presently surprised.

If you want a comparative review of blogging
products to help you blog, check this site out:
http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com/howtoblog

Here's some further blogging resources I have created
on Squidoo lenses:

Review of Blogger's Paycheck
Write great blog content
Create a Blog Today
Latest changes to Blogging
State of the Art Blogging Training
Blog Success Case Study (with principles of sound blogging)


COMMENT

Giant Squid, thefluffanutta, left this comment on my post:

"Unfortunately, because of how the RSS module has
been implemented, Google and other search engines
cannot see your feeds. All they see is an empty
module, with no links, and which doesn't get
updated. You can observe this yourself by looking
at the source code, or looking at the 'text only'
cache of the lens on Google.

The RSS Module is still good for real visitors
though, as it showcases your most recent blog
posts. This brings traffic to your blog, and the
clickouts from your lens will help its Lensrank."

RESPONSE from Ron

The RSS feed, as thefluffanutta mentions, does
not impact Google.  However, the original post
itself does and the more frequently you post on
your blog the better (provided it is on the topic
of your blog's focus). By way of example, I
noticed recently that one of my earlier posts
ended up in the 5th position on the first page of
Google results for a targeted keyword that had
4.3 Million results. In summary then, regular
blogging helps your Google ranking/positioning
and the RSS feed to your lens, helps to boost
lensrank.

********************************************
Ron Passfield is a Top 100 Squidoo Lensmaster and
Giant Squid. He provides free resources
for Squidoo affiliate marketing on his Squidoo lens:

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoomarketingstrategies

To learn more about Squidoo Affiliate Marketing

check out:

http://www.squidooaffiliatemarketing.com

Subscribe to Ron's free Squidoo Marketing e-course:

http://www.smsecourse.squidoomarketingstrategies.com/

Ron is the author of the ebook:

Squidoo Marketing Strategies

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