Does Squidoo Still Rank Well In Google?

For many years, Squidoo has served online marketers including myself with the ability to rank well on Google and make good money online and honestly. 

But has that changed? Absolutely. In fact, a lot of things changed…

Update: Read below for a update on Squidoo (it’s gone).

Yet this review isn’t going to praise them, because in the past 2-3 years, even though their lenses still rank well, the ability to earn honest money through this place has GREATLY diminished due to their outrageous and dare I say fanatical policies.

Is it still a great place to earn honest money? Yes, but you’re probably going to be spending more time trying to avoid breaking their TOS than getting anything done. Let me back up and start from the beginning:

Originally Squidoo was a GREAT place to make money through the internet, and here were 2 reasons why:

1. You could elect to NOT promote any product, create a lens and if it received a lot of visitors, you could earn money from the ads which were on your lens. If people clicked on the ad, you’d make money.  It just so happens that to this day, this is the MOST viable way to make money through Squidoo.

How much does Squidoo pay it’s lens makers? Honestly? Pennies for every click. So what’s the point of using it? Well if technically speaking you’d make a few dozen lenses, all of which received great traffic, those pennies could quickly add up to dollars and more. This is how some of the most successful Squidoo members do it (at least today).

The most popular lenses on this site get over 1,000 visitors a day which means if even 25% click on an ad which pays $0.05 per click, that lens maker would be making $12.50 a day. Not bad if you have dozens of lenses doing the same thing for you daily.

2. It had massive prestige with Google (and still does), thus lenses (which is another name for blogs) could easily be made promoting affiliate type products with the expectation of having that lens rank high. Having been there myself, I have made over $50,000 through Squidoo.

All I did (as did many other marketers) was create a lens, promote an affiliate product and send traffic there via paid ads and articles. At the time (2007-2009) Squidoo was a gold mine for marketers who couldn’t afford to make their own sites and the amount you could make with this site was unlimited.

But that was then…

Then Google began to see that Squidoo was having WAY too many people promote scam like products as well as do nothing but spam through Squidoo and thus the site got the ax from Google. Lenses were suddenly de-listed, Google slapped and even blacklisted.

This Led To The Squidoo Crackdown…

Squidoo fearing for it’s future and to remain a good boy in Google’s eyes, quickly changed it’s TOS and began going after people who had lenses that looked like spam and over promotional. Thus the chaos began…

• 1000’s of lenses were removed from Squidoo.

• The owners of those lenses BANNED from the site.

• Entire businesses affiliate marketers depended on were gone in an instant.

• Squidoo even took it to the next step and deleted every other lens associated with banned members, even if those lenses were NOT violating their TOS.

I was unfortunately one of the people who experienced this. I can’t speak for all my lenses there, but most never violated Squidoo’s TOS. However, when the domino effect that was Squidoo’s banning began, it was only a matter of time before my account was the next piece to fall.

What about trying to talk to them? Oh boy there’s something that MANY have tried and failed, including myself. Squidoo has NO real customer support NOR do they have ANY sympathy for those they ban. Everytime I tried talking to them through their email support, I would receive an automated message which basically said “Our decision is final.”

So What Happens Now?

If you’re considering Squidoo as a way to make money online, here are some pros & cons which you should consider:

Pros:

You can still make some money with it through making lenses and collecting the advertising.  

Squidoo lenses still rank well in Google. You can create a free lens with no need to invest in a website/hosting.

You can risk making a lens which promotes an affiliate product to make money off, but eventually you will get caught. You can create another email and make the lens again, but it’ll happen again and again. Squidoo has a duplicate content sensor so if you’re going to remake a blog, make sure to NOT use the same wording.

Cons:

The money you make off advertising is abysmal. I can guarantee you not every lens you make will get a lot of traffic, let alone reach the most popular lens ranks and get the benefit of that traffic. I really think you’d be wasting your time and energy if you chose this route.

It’s too risky to work with Squidoo. What’s the point of making lenses with affiliate products only to have them banned constantly? Even if you are NOT doing anything wrong by their TOS, you can still get banned for no reason!

Squidoo shows NO mercy to their members. If you get banned, forget about talking to them. You have better chances of digging yourself out of a hole by digging deeper.

It is a content farm. Content farms can be VERY risky places to put all your online marketing efforts into.

You can make a TON more money by making your own website/s. It may take longer, but in the long run, YOU control your site and you get to call the shots. If you have a site which receives good traffic, you can easily monetize off it without worrying about violating any TOS. And in the end YOU are the owner, not someone else like Squidoo. Build your first free site in 1 minute!

Final Rating Squidoo:

3 Stars Out of 10: Still an option to earn honest money, but not worth the effort. See #1 recommendation.

 

Final Thoughts: Should You Try To Use Squidoo?

I really think it’s a waste of time. I hear so many stories from former members who absolutely hate them, including myself. They all say the same thing too: I never violated anything but they just banned me and EVERY other lens I had. In Squidoo’s mind you are guilty by association with no way to prove your innocence. I’ve never heard of anyone who was banned from Squidoo get back into it using the same account.

But you can always try that (make new accounts) and keep jumping around trying to make something, but like I said before, this is really a waste of time. Stick to making your own website for the maximum benefits. Here’s my bottom line:

Stay away from Squidoo if you’re serious about making money online. 

Make your own website and have FULL control of your internet success. Here is a program which lets you build a website in 1 minute and for free.

And if you’re new to online marketing, I HIGHLY recommend getting proper guidance on how to succeed in this business.

Here is my #1 recommendation which will teach you EVERYTHING you need to know and you can start for free.

Forget Squidoo! And please do not buy ANY products which teach you to make money through it! It won’t work, I promise you (update, it’s offline so there’s another reason).

Have you been screwed over by Squidoo or does it serve you well? Whatever your story, please share it below. I’d love to hear your experiences with this place.

 Update: Squidoo is long gone. What now?

It’s a part of Hubpages now and regardless, that doesn’t change my original advice. Stick to this program for making websites and ranking them.