Impromptu Sample Lens Review
Today I was making breakfast, unsure about what I would blog about today. I wished to my idea fairies that there would be a comment on the blog that would spur an idea for a blog post when I got ready to write.
Thank you.
I opened my inbox and there is a comment. For some reason it hadn’t published yet (probably so I could easily put it here!) I hope this person doesn’t mind me sharing the comment and I’m going to give a little bit of advice on what could be done differently to help her improve her ranking in the search engines, get traffic and get more sales. Since this is her actual comment I don’t think she’ll mind me sharing with the class ~ since she was gonna anyway.
10 Things She Could Do Differently
1 Let’s start with the comment itself. If you’re going to share your niche/product you might as well get a quality link out of it! She could have used the name/url fields in the comment area to create a clickable link to her lens. She could have also used html within the comment to create a clickable link using her keywords as the anchor text.
2 Speaking of keywords. I’m assuming the keyword you are targeting is the one you’ve used in the url. The keyword “delonghi esam3300 esclusivo magnifica super-automatic espresso coffee machine” has NO search volume. This is the exact point I was trying to get across in the how to find product name keywords post. You don’t want to use the whole product name as given on Amazon if it doesn’t have search volume. There are plenty of related keywords for this product that would have served your search engine optimization better.
3You’ve got the related pages still showing (the box in the sidebar that talks about other delonghi lenses) you want to take that out. You want people to click YOUR links, not onto someone elses lenses. (This is true for product lenses ~ there are times the related pages is useful and I would leave it on, but not for this purpose.)
4You have no title in your intro module. It’s one of the most important places Google will look to figure out what your lens is about. This is called on page SEO. It’s what Google looks at to see if it wants to pick YOUR lens to be a source of information on the first page of the search results when someone puts that keyword in as a query. You’ve GOT to tell Google exactly what the page is about, and that’s easiest done by using your keyword in your module titles.
5Don’t ask for marriage on your first date. The first piece of content you have is the best place to buy your product. It’s best to provide some information/content before you go in for the sale. At least a little bit. This is where it’s good to talk about features this product offers. It’s a $750 coffee pot. What makes it worth me spending that much instead of $25 on a Mr. Coffee machine?
6 You’ve got the price showing on your buy now area. If I’ve heard some cool stuff about this coffee maker, say on TV or in a magazine. You can BET they didn’t tell me how much this sucker costs. I see that at the very top of your lens, before I know why this thing is so very good I’m like “oh hell no” click. Bye. I’m gone. Talk about how much they are saving instead of how much they’ll be spending. They will at least click through to amazon to get the price. They still may say “oh hell no” to this $750 coffee pot, but Amazon may have a “you might also like this” pointing to a $200 coffee pot which is more in their price range, they buy ~ you still get credit for the sale. GET THEM TO AMAZON.
7 You’ve got most of the elements of the lens here ~ but no content. Your video is there, but it’s just there ~ you don’t say anything about what they’re going to see, or learn or why they would even want to click the watch button. You’ve got to take them by the hand, and talk to them ~ like you would talk to a good friend. Would you send this video to a friend for them to watch without any reason why they should watch it?
8 You’re not using your keywords in your lens titles. It’s very important to use the keyword you are targeting in your lens module titles. This is one of the big ways Google learns what your lens is about and decides it’s a great resource for someone who wants to learn more about this coffee maker.
Check this post on the 6 things you should be doing to get google love.
9 The content you do have sounds like it was copied directly from Amazon.com. It’s really important to write these the way you would talk to a friend.
I happen to have a lens on a similar delonghi coffee maker ~ let’s see the differences between our features module content ~ just to compare. We can of course talk about this element of content writing in the comment section:
Here’s yours:
Here’s mine:
Two key points to get from this is
1. Speak conversationally, people want to feel like they are getting a real recommendation from a real person.
2. Don’t give them everything ~ you want them to click through to get more information.
10 Your lens is really pretty ~ you’ve added some additional elements that make it look nice. Here’s the thing. You don’t want people to stay on your lens. You want them to click through. I wonder how much time you spent on the testimonial graphic, and finding the other pretty graphic pieces you’ve added? I wonder if that is time best spent?
While the testimonial thing is nice to look at ~ it’s kind of difficult to read and there is no place where you’ve encouraged them to read any more of the 56 testimonials for this machine. I can’t stress enough how much reading testimonials will push a “maybe” into a “yes”. Use them ~ and use them to get people to the sales page.
11 Lacking a strong call to action ~ whether it’s a visual call to action with the orange box or the big arrow module at the end. You want to have a strong call to action ~ click her to get this. Click here to save over $500. Click here to get free shipping. It’s nice to have one toward the top of the lens, and again at the end. I see the spotlight modules not really as a call to action, but as a great place to features something really cool about the product.
10 Things I like about this:
1 You’ve taken action. All the little stuff can be tweaked and fixed and this lens can do fine.
2 You’ve chosen a great product ~ good price point, lots of good reviews.
3 You’ve started your blog ~ I love the theme by the way.
4 You’ve used the table of contents ~ there are some new advantages to this. (better if you have kw in the module titles)
5 You’ve used your tags well.
6 You’ve used video to really let them get a taste of what this machine can do.
7 You’ve used the subtitles quite well to further explain what you’re going to talk about.
8 You used your product keyword/link right at the beginning of the intro module.
9 The content in your intro module is good.
10 You’ve taken action ~ oh did I say that one already? It’s the most important one and deserves to be said twice. It’s the key to this. The first few can be rough, figuring out all the intricacies of SEO can be tough, but the more you do it the better you get and the easier the process gets. But you have to take action for that to happen!
10 Things you can do now!
Is this lens a total loss? OH HELL NO!! This lens is far from a loss. Here are some basic steps you can take to tweak this lens and have it in tip top shape in no time.
1 Identify a better keyword. One that has plenty of search volume and minimal competition.
2 Use the new keyword in your module titles, and within the content of your lens and the other on page seo stuff that’s necessary.
3 Tweak the features content ~ make it a little more conversational. Think girlfriend over coffee kind of chat.
4 Add at least one call to action. It’s best to include 2. One toward the beginning and one at the end. You can use the visual call to action and then the “big arrow” module for the bottom works well.
5 Make sure you link back to amazon encouraging them to look at more features and more reviews.
6 Try to make your links to the product WITHIN the content you’ve got, not right at the top of the module. That’s both for Google and for your reader.
7 Add a little more content around your non text modules ~ reason why to watch the video or what they’re going to see etc.
8 Add a guest book!!! It’s like a wrap up area, where you can say thanks and ask for input about the product.
9 Turn off the related lenses. (it’s in the intro module, there’s a tab you click and then click the off button)
10 Start linking to the lens using the new keyword as your anchor text in the link.
I’d love to see the newly modified lens ~ please feel free to share it if you want.
The top half of this lens is very similar to what I do when I do lens reviews. Of course a personal lens review is more in depth, and I give suggestions to help solve issues as well, and it’s specific to your lens, topic and keywords. If you think this might benefit you, you can order a lens review by clicking here. The 2 for the price of 1 deal is still on. 
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Other Posts That Might Help:
Hi Jackie! Great post as always! I’m wondering how to remove the related pages from my lenses. I can’t seem to figure it out.
Thanks,
Tina
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You have made some great suggestions for this squidoo page, I am heading over to your post: 6 things you should be doing to get google love.
Thanks
@Tina ~ check out #9 under what could be done now. (the last set).
@Robert ~ cool. That’s the basics of on page seo it’s a good habit to get into.
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Jackie, I admire the way you explain and show and share!
I have a question a little off topic, but only just:
I am being taught to produce squidoo lenses, hub pages, articles all pointing to my (presently being re-worked) blog to basically sell One product.
You create 1 squidoo lens to sell One product.
Am I missing something? Am I a little too dense to see around all the corners?
Should I forget what I do and just concentrate on doing Squidoo lenses?
I’d love to hear what you have to say.
Lis
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I really appreciated you showing the difference between the two product features. That’s infinitely more helpful for those of us who go, “What do you mean?”
And I just got some lenses up myself. Yay me.
Now to worry about tweaking them.
– Jeffery
@Lis ~ It sounds to me like what you’re doing is micro niche sites. That’s definitely a good strategy as well. The purpose (and you know I love to talk about the purpose) in your strategy of building hubs and lenses is to provide LINKS back to your site. I imagine you are using keyword anchor text links to point back to your site from these web 2.0 sites. We’re going to be learning more about that after Christmas.
I wonder how big your blog is. Is it an ongoing thing? Or is it a couple pages focused on one product? IF you’re doing an ongoing blog for one product I’m not sure that’s the most effective way to go about it, but …
@Jeffery Glad you found that helpful. I was a little worried about putting that in there. I certainly don’t want to hurt the other lens writer’s feelings, but thought it would be a clear distinction in how to cover features conversationally.
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WOW – WOW – WOW!!! Jackie, first of all – I am so honored that you picked my lens as the lens you would provide a lens review to! I can’t tell you how shocked I was to see my post – this never happens to me
A HUGE and hearty THANK YOU to you for this honor!
Now let me tell you how overwhelmed I am
I’m still pretty new to Squidoo (just joined in late August) so I’m still getting my sea-legs 
About the Keyword and the URL I chose. When I locate a better keyword, can I change the URL for the lens or should I re-create the lens with a new URL that is more SEO friendly? I am at a loss as to what to do if this step is wrong.
Thanks again! I’ll keep you posted on my changes
Julie
Oh – by the way – I am in no way offended that you used my lens as an example. I am completely HONORED and thank you again!
Phew ~ I was hoping you would weigh in.
No you don’t need to redo your lens. Once you find a better keyword you can’t change the url, but you can just use the new keyword in all the other places. Most likely your new keyword will be in your url (maybe not in the right order or all together ~ but they’ll be there) you can overcome a not so great url with good backlinking with the new keyword as the anchor text.
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Hey Jackie,
I know I do because I always have to go back and change it after I publish my lens!
Excellent post as usual. Great review on how to get the most out of your lens. One thing to also mention is to change up the resource box in the upper right corner to include a little diddy and anchor text link for the product. Every little bit helps and it takes not time to do, it seems that most people forget about this
OK I have gone into the intro module and turned off the discovery content tab but I still see the related topics popping up on my lens
I am with you, I don’t want people clicking onto other peoples lenses but how do I get rid of it! Is it still on because my lens is maxed?
Thanks
Chad
P.S I have now had 3 product sales off my Christmas lenses!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hey Chad
I think that’s definitely mentioned in other posts though. 
First off ~ congrats on the sales. That ROCKS.
Second ~ absolutely on the bio area. You most definitely want a keyword anchor text link there. I was going to say that, but I didn’t want to nit pick and overwhelm her.
third: Are they the green underlined links? If yes, then yes those are because you are opted in to advertising. If ALL of your profits come from your own links then you can opt out of them. If you opt out you will not have the opportunity to be part of the income that comes from Squidoo ~ since you’re not showing the ads
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Jackie,
Thanks! You have definitely mention the bio area in other posts I just thought I would throw it in there
Not the green links, I know how to opt out of those. Do you keep them on or off on your lenses?
What I am talking about is the Related Topics section on the right hand side of the lens about 1/2 way down, if you look at my lens on the PreSonus FireBox 6X10 Firewire Recording Interface you will hopefully see what I mean. If there is a way to turn that off I would love to know how.
Thanks
Chad
If you aren’t an Amazon Affiliate, how can you go about making a visual CTA on Squidoo? What would you link it to?
I haven’t really checked out the Amazon modules since I do have my affilate account, so I don’t know – is there a way to set them up that doesn’t show the price as you were mentioning?
Kelly
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@Chad Those are your tags ~ they’re a good thing.
@Kelly ~ check out the how to make a visual call to action post ~ there was some comments at the bottom that I talk about that. The modules you don’t have to be an affiliate they pay you through squidoo.
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Thanks Jackie, as to the green links do you keep them on or off?
Chad
I leave them ~ just because I have quite a few lenses in the top tier and make some money from squidoo each month.
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Thanks, I was wondering how they affected things!
By the way the HTML cheat sheet was peer genius!
Chad
Alrighty! I’ve gone through the lens and incorporated not only Jackie’s suggestions but those on the comment section as well (thank you so much!).
Here is my updated lens:
DeLonghi Magnifica – Espresso/Coffee Machine
Please let me know what you think and thanks again for everything!
Julie
Bah! I’ll get the hang of this HTML stuff someday! Linked you to the product instead
Oh…feel free to stay around and browse Amazon for…oh..just kidding 
Try this one instead:
DeLonghi Magnifica – Espresso/Coffee Machine
Jackie, thanks for yet another excellent post! This whole series of posts has helped me enormously and assisted me in putting together, what I believe is, quite a respectable lens. Also, your Ironman example has been a great inspiration. Now I’m busy with the real work – building backlinks!
Comment: I’m sure you don’t need it any longer but I find the “Health” check facility on the Dashboard quite helpful.
Question: How do I stop Amazon from advertising the exact same product in the banner ad across the top – or do I earn the same commission should someone click through this one?
@Julie! WOO HOO!! That’s so much better. NICE JOB!!
@Henry Congrats on taking action ~ that’s half the battle. Now the other half is building those links.
Just be aware that the health check thing is not always accurate so if it says something you feel isn’t true don’t get totally wrapped up in Squidoo is always right, because sometimes it’s not.
Are you talking about the ad on the top of your lens? I don’t think you can opt out of those ~ that’s how squidoo makes its money. That’s one of the pitfalls of free sites ~ but don’t worry ~ come the new year we’re gonna start building our OWN sites so we don’t have to worry about that!!!
No you don’t get a commission for that ~ wouldn’t that be nice though. The money earned from the click goes into the pot where it’s dispursed through the community depending on the ranking of your lenses.
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Thanks again Jackie – your help has been absolutely PRICELESS!
Hey Julie ~
I was a little distracted this morning, and I really just glanced over the content ~ but I went back and looked again and now I’m wondering what keyword are you targeting for this lens now?? Ok I’ve looked again and I think I see what you did. Thought that was going to be way too high competition ~ but I guess not. DANG that’s a lot of search volume. Make sure you do the linking ~ this could be a very good earner!!!
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Hi Jackie,
Fabulous post! They just keep getting better and better. I learned somethings and now need to go in an tweak them.
Thanks Again Jackie!
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Hello Jackie! Great post As you Do Always! Thanks For Describe how to remove the related pages from my lenses. I can’t seem to figure it out.Good Bless You,Bye.
Why not repeat the same lens but with slightly different keywords….and therefore title.
Use the same product but with slightly adapted…some even mis-spelled perhaps… (researched of course!) keywords…this would speed up your process considerably and increase your visitors to the same product, as well as giving you much better returns on the time spent researching the product!
Repeat content, if that’s a problem, could be slightly re-worded….the remainder, basic layout, pics, reviews etc would be the same. Say four times.
I would appreciate your comments on this idea
Incidentally, just a side note: I found the word thyroid (in a three word phrase) had almost the same traffic as thryoid in the same three word phrase…so don’t discount the mis-spelled words…..I know of someone who made (few years ago now) a living buying Dimonds (sic) from ebay and selling them as Diamonds on ebay!
Have Fun….make some money!
Hey Dilbert ~
That is more for a full blown niche campaign and much along the lines of what One Week Marketing teaches. Personally I love the research part so it keeps me motivated to do different things each time. I also find you can rank for the very related keywords by using them in the tags and then using the anchor text in backlinks.
Also a lot of people have a hard time coming up with unique content for such similar content and the more unique your content the better. It’s those little frustrations that push a lot of beginning marketers to quit.
It’s definitely a plan ~ and I like to keep it really simple and non overwhelming for the beginners.
Yep ~ mis-spelled words can be really good ~ you just have to watch that you don’t use the misspelling all the time throughout the lens/page or Google will ding you ~ knowing you are optimizing for the misspelling.
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What a splendid review. I love those numerical graphics by the way. Are you able to share more information regarding the source of those lovely images?
We appreciate your very generous professional reviews and feedback.
Let’s Here It For Jackie!
I got the graphics and the code from my favorite html resource~ http://www.squidoo.com/advancedhtml
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@Julie – Your lense looks great and your content is quite inviting and conversational. I almost bought this item and shucks, I’m not even an espresso drinker.
Thanks Jackie for the graphic resource.
Is there any danger of using your keyword too many times in a lense? I know sometimes google doesn’t look kindly on pages that are overly optimized for a certain keyword. Do you have a standard that you usually use for your lenses?
Dennis
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It hasn’t been a problem for me doing it this way ~ as long as you have some content on your lens as well. As long as you are writing conversationally and not just saying your keywords to say your keywords you will be fine.
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@ North Face Jackets On Sale Hee hee…thanks
I feel so much more confident now after getting this lens review! Seriously…I’m thinking about doing this for some of my other lenses too that aren’t earning how I’d expected them too!
Jackie – you’re the BEST!
Jackie – one more question – I’m getting traffic but no ratings. How do you cure this without “begging” ?
For this purpose ratings aren’t important. I wouldn’t worry about it.
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Hi Jackie,
Thank you again for all you do and share. I just finished my 4th Squidoo Lens and put it in my blog. No visitors yet but we’ll see. I read about your comment about next year, I can’t wait. Thank you,
Les
Oh, I forgot to ask my question, is this site a Squidoo Lens? I’m asking because you said you got the graphics code from Squidoo, so I’m asuming this is a Squidoo Lens site. If it is it sure fooled me. Thank you again,
Les
No this site is a self hosted wordpress blog. I got the code from a squidoo lens about html code.
Html works just about anyplace, whether it’s on a lens, a blog, a website ~ it’s just a computer language that gives your machine directions for what something should do or look like.
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jackie, you are the QUEEN of squidoo and internet marketing.
straight forward, easy to read, easy to understand. and a mom!
thank you.
@Jackie – Thanks!
once again Jackie I came back to this post as I’m more calm and sane. Before Christmas it was just getting them up and make a few sales, which worked. Now I’ll go back and correct the HUGE amount of mistakes I made.
I think my intro module is where I lose the most!
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