You may have heard about Squidoo.com before – you may not – either way this website is for you if you:

• Have an opinion you would like to share with the world – by building small miniwebsites, called lenses, using an insanely easy, online website builder (if you can use Word or Facebook you’re over qualified)
• Like building pages on social network sites – like Facebook, Bebo, Myspace etc. – Squidoo offers more flexility than you’ve ever experienced before.
• Would like to recommend your favorite stuff online – unlike the before mentioned sites, Squidoo will actually let you advertise your favorite stuff to your visitors.
• Dream of making some spare cash for yourself and/or your favorite charity – because Squidoo will share the profits you help them generate from advertising sales on your pages with you! And if someone buys some of your recommended products, you can make even more commissions for yourself and your charity.
• Get all of that for FREE – yup, for zilch, nada, nil, zero, njet……..

Needless to say really – but I like Squidoo…. a lot – which is one of the reasons i set up this site. I would like others to catch the bug, and join Squidoo with me.

Why I’m a Squidoo Freak…

The reasons listed above should be enough in themselves, but there’s actually more! Anyone who has tried building websites before knows about competition between webmasters, and know that getting a good position in the search engines can be incredibly hard. Not with Squidoo! So if you’re a webmaster, and you want to get the word out about your website, Squidoo can help you in many ways.

And – there’s more! I do a bit of internet marketing in my spare time, to make a bit of extra cash to sweeten up life for myself and my family. Again, Squidoo allows me to do this on my lenses (this is what the Squidoo minisites are called), which is something unique for social networks.

Squidoo is incredibly easy to manage and understand, and it gives everyone a chance to break into the online world, and make everything from a bit of pocket change to a full time wage and beyond.

Don’t get me wrong – there’s a learning curve to be climbed – and you’re not going to get anywhere without putting in some effort, but if you’re willing to learn and apply what you learn, you’re well on your way…..

Why SquidooFreak.com?

My experience with Squidoo started about 18 months ago – and to date I have built around 50 lenses across a number subjects – but I wanted to take my use of Squidoo to a new level.

While doing this, I decided to let people look over my shoulders, and see what I’m doing. This gives you a chance to learn, though I might not let you in on everything I do

What I will do, however, is tell you where you can go to learn more tricks of the trade. I’m by no means the “finished article” in terms of being an online guru (as a matter of fact I don’t like online guru’s a lot – but that’s a different story).

The 3 Best Places To Learn More…

If you don’t want to just follow along, and learn from me as I go on to build my SquidooFreak lenses (you have to bear in mind I have a lot of other things going on – but I will devote more of my time to this project in the startup phase), I’m going to show you 3 excellent learning ressources, all of which I’ve used to get to know all I know about Squidoo and Internet marketing.

Ressource #1: Social Networking on Squidoo

Social Networking on Squidoo by Tiffany Dow is, without a doubt, one of the most comprehensive guides available online when is comes to Squidoo. This guide will teach you all the basics of marketing online, and also how to craft Squidoo lenses from scratch. Doesn’t matter if you’re a complete beginner in any of the two subjects – this e-book will take you by the hand.

Tiffany Dow is a Squidoo Titan and professional writer, who has built hundreds of lenses over the past few years, either for her own purposes or for her customers on BuildMyLens.com, where she builds and sells professionally designed and marketed Squidoo lenses with her business partner Lewis Smile.

The e-book comes in at US$47.00 – with a few very valuable bonus guides – one of them being Flip That Lens, which will teach you how to sell the lenses you build for a neat little profit and sells on its own for US$19.00.

I highly recommend Social Networking on Squidoo.

Ressource #2: The Wealthy Affiliate University

The Wealthy Affiliate University was set up in 2005 by 2 budding online entrepreneurs, Kyle and Carson, as a membership website for people wanting to build solid online businesses.

Today it is, without comparison, the biggest internet marketing community online – and the place to go if you want to build your own online business. Here you’ll learn absolutely everything you’ll ever need to know about the subject, and you’ll be taught by a number of accomplished “Netrepreneur” millionaires.

The Wealthy Affiliate University holds an abundance of teaching materials, and even if you become stuck when using them, there’s always help to get in the very active members only forum they have.

Even though this site is not exclusively about Squidoo – they will teach you about lens-building in one of the guides – and there’s enough Squidoo “experts” on the site who are always on hand to help out.

The Wealthy Affiliate University charges a “tuition fee” of US$39.00/month, which considering the tools and ressources available is an absolute bargain, but you can cut this down to US$29.99/month by paying up front for 12 months at US$359.88.

If you’re serious about making money online – there’s only one place to be… The Wealthy Affiliate University

Ressource #3: Squidoo Queen

If you’re working on some sort of a “shoestring budget” and can’t afford the US$40+ that the above 2 ressources charge, your best bet is to get hold of the Squidoo Queen manual by Kelly Stone.

This manual will teach you the very basics of making money online, and show you how to use Squidoo to do so, using the techniques taught in the Bum Marketing Method developed by Travis Sago from the Wealthy Affiliate University.

Kelly takes you through all the steps you need, to set up your Squidoo lens and get it noticed, in a down to earth fashion. The manual doesn’t offer quite the same value as the two other ressources, but at just US$27.00 that is to be expected.

In saying this though, this is still a very good manual to get you off the ground, and Kelly is usually on hand with tips and tricks, and occationally email support, to anyone who buys the guide.

Get your copy of Squidoo Queen today…..