How to Publish Your First Article On Squidoo

Ever wonder how to get started writing articles online? 

Well, today I'll walk you through how to publish your first article on Squidoo. 
   

Gather together the article you've already written,  the title of the article, your profile, your profile photo and your list of potential Lensmaster names and open a window on computer for each.   

We’re ready to proceed.

General Information

Go to www.squidoo.com and open an account.  Choose a user name and password, and enter all pertinent information.  Squidoo will want your email account and your profile information.   

You’ll be asked about the article you want to write, you can enter that right away or come back and do that later.  It’s all up to you. 

They’ll also award you points.

What are points?

Points are Squidoo’s way of keeping your active on this Squidoo website.  You’ll get points for joining, points for publishing articles, points for playing games, and points for visiting other people’s work.   Points only value is in keeping score, although sometimes you’ll win free advertising or certain gadgets to help improve your own pages.  Some people love to play with points, and others totally disregard them.  It’s all up to you whether they interest you or not.  (More on points another day!)

How Do You Want to Be Paid?

You’ll also be asked at one point a little further down the line how you want to be paid.  I’m addressing this early so that it doesn’t surprise you, and you’ll have awhile to think about this.   

This question has to do with whether you’ll be taking your earnings yourself, donating your earning to a specific charity, or donating to a Squidoo cause.  The question comes down to your motivation for online writing.  Are you here to supplement your income or as a hobby? 

Once you’ve named your lens, given it a title, and tagged it with keywords, you’ll be asked to tell Squidoo how you want to be paid.  No surprises then, and you'll be ready to answer this question. 

Squidoo Screens

Squidoo is a busy and dynamic website and the folks at Squidoo Headquarters are also addressing new ideas and fixing arising problems.  This means that things change all the time at Squidoo.   

If you go online to see YouTube videos or other helpful sites, you’ll notice that their screens look different than the screen you’re seeing on your computer.  Don’t worry about that.  Like I said, things change here and pages get updated all the time.  Because of this, I plan to walk you through the sign-up without the visual screen shots to confuse you.

Terms of Service

Make sure you read Squidoo’s TOS (terms of service).  You need to know the rules.

The most important rule is to post unique work that hasn’t been plagiarized or copied from other sites, even your own.  They want fresh, valuable content. 

There are products, services and subjects that you are not allowed to be included online at Squidoo. Basically, they don’t want you to be “scammy”.  No MLM or products touting dubious benefits allowed. 

Read the rules.  You’ll need to understand them.

GETTING STARTED

Create a Lens

This is where we start to publish an article online.  Click Create a Lens.  (The first time it may say Create My First Lens.)

Remember, “lens” is the term used on Squidoo to describe your article and its page on the site.  The term lens refers to everything that appears on the page of this one article—that is the story, the photos, the links, any polls or quizzes, any products, comment section, etc.  A lens is one Squidoo page covering one article.  

I Want to Make a Page About – Title!

This will be basically the Title of your Article.  It will also be part of the website address to your Article.

Don’t rush this part.  Take your time and type it in correctly.  CHECK the SPELLING.  You can change almost everything on this page but you can’t change the URL or web address.  If you’ve made a spelling mistake, and we’ve all done this, it will stay there. 

Let’s call today’s lens “Cocker Spaniels are My Favorite Dogs”.    

Your URL may end up looking like this: "www.Squidoo.com/Cocker-Spaniels-are-my-favorite-dogs".  

Once you like what you have, go on.

Topic

In the Topic section, Squidoo is asking you to categorize your article.  Use the drop down box to pick the best match.  Depending on the category, you may be asked to additional sub-topics.  Take a minute to decide which category is the best choice for your article.

Rating

Most articles are rated “G” for general.  If you’re doing something different, check the TOS one more time to assure yourself your article will be allowed.  You don’t want to put in the work only to have them block your lens. 

This Page is About

These are your Keywords and Tags that describe your article.  Squidoo will ask for several different descriptions and may even suggest a few.  Use your best discretion.

For this article you might use “Cocker Spaniels”, “Favorite Dogs”, “Favorite Spaniels” and “Cocker Spaniels Make Great Pets”. 

Now On to Lens Workshop and Build My Lens

From here on in, we’ll be working with “Modules”.  Modules are blocks of texts, photos, products, links, etc that can be rearranged within your work.  There are many types of modules, and we will work through them in due time.

Today, however, we’ll be working with only a few to get you started.

The first module on every single lens on the site is the Introduction.    So that’s where we’ll begin.

Introduction – Give this Lens a Title

This “module” should contain the catchy intro to your article.  Ideally, it’s a summary of what you’ll be writing in your article. 

The “Title” they’re looking for is more of a subtitle to the article.  The actual Title to your lens article is what you labeled it for your URL.

Example -You may want to look at a lens to fully understand this.   

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE INTRODUCTION IN MY EXAMPLE.

“There’s Rural Living in Florida?”  is the name I gave when I started my lens and answered the question “what do you want to write about?”  This is the URL name, and the actual title.

“Rural Living in Florida” is the title to my Introduction module in this example. 

Fill in your intro module with your text.  Make sure its written in your voice, completely your own work, and unique to this page.

When you’re finished,move to the bottom of the module and upload a photo or illustration to illustrate your article.  This is the only spot you really have to have a photo.  Ideally, your photo is square 250 x 250 pixels in size.  But don’t worry if it’s not square.  The photo will still be published.  We’ll discuss photos on a later post.  Just use what you have.

If you’re using a photo that’s not your own, make sure you give a photo credit to the photographer somewhere in your article.

Next Text Module

Most of the best articles are broken up and divided into easily digestible bits for readers.  This is done by putting only similar paragraphs together in a text module.  Feel free to add photos or illustration to each module if you like.

All modules will need to be given a title.  If you miss this step, the article will end up with titles such as “add a text module” and you don’t want that.

Make sure you click the SAVE button before leaving the module.    Each module is saved separately before the entire lens is published.

Other Types of Modules

At times, you may choose to follow each module with another text module for uniformity.    Other times, however, you may want to engage your readers by asking questions, taking polls, or giving a short quiz. 

If you would like to look through modules, this is a good time to browse.  Go up to the top and click on the Plus Sign next to Modules.  There are many types to choose from, and as you write more articles, you’ll probably want to try them out.

Today, we’re going to keep it simple.  

View This Squidoo Lens to View Polls, Comments, Links and RSS Modules in Action! 

Polls

In our “lens” today, we’re talking about our favorite dog, the cocker spaniel.  Let’s add a “Poll Module” and place it in between two text modules. 

Give your poll module a title.  Let’s call it “Are you a Dog or a Cat Person?”

Compose some answers for those polled to answer.  “Dogs are the best!”  “I’m a cat person all the way”. 

Do you want folks to comment on their selection?  Make a choice.

Save your work.

Amazon Module

If you’d like to showcase a product to monetize your article, you’ll want to include an Amazon module.  If something off your site sells, you get a small commission. 

You don’t have to include an Amazon module, but if you don’t want one, you’ll have to delete the module because it comes up automatically for you.

There are many types of Amazon modules.  Today, we’ll just choose the plain “Amazon” module.  

Give your Amazon module a title.  How about “Cocker Spaniels Love Dog Beds” and include dog bed products. 

Choose a product or two that you feel works with your article.  On this Cocker Spaniel lens, it could be books about Cocker Spaniels, it could be dog food, toys or grooming products, whatever you like. 

Save your choices.

Guestbook Comments Module

The guestbook allows people to tell socialize with you.  You can leave the title or give it a new one.   

You’ll also want to choose whether to allow comments as they come or whether you’d like to moderate your comments prior to publication.  This is a decision that only you can make.   

If you choose to moderate your comments, you will need to check the Squidoo site often to okay the comments that are left and approve them before they go on your page.   

By not moderating, you run the risk of someone placing a comment a comment on your page that you don’t want to have, but I’ve yet to run into this problem myself.

RSS or Link Module

Let’s say that you write a blog about dogs and would like to link it to this Squidoo lens.  Two of the ways you can do this are with the RSS Module or the Link Module.

The RSS lets you enter your website’s URL and the module will showcase several of your recent posts. 

The Link Module allows you to enter links to sites that have appropriate corresponding content that readers might enjoy linking to for additional information.   You can enter several different websites in this module.   

For our cocker spaniel story, you might include dog associations, cocker spaniel enthusiasts groups, your dog blog, etc.  Try not to use Wikipedia as a link here.  Most people already know how to find that resource.

Remember to change the title on these modules and also to save your work.

Do You Want to Rearrange the Order of Your Modules?

You can rearrange the order of every module but your Introduction.  This is done on the right sidebar on your screen by moving the modules listed either up or down, and then pressing “apply” to save the order. 

Final Steps

You’re just about ready to publish your article.  Reread your work in draft mode. 

Preview it to assure yourself you’re happy with what you’ve done.  

Go over to TAGS in the right sidebar and enter as many tags as you can come up with that will match your article. 

Save your work.

Hit “Publish”.   (Squidoo will help you link to Facebook and Twitter, if you care to share your work right now.)

Congratulations!   

You’re just published your first article!