Rick Phillips: Resident Anomaly
This week Marti Lawrence interviews Rick Phillips, also known as Anomaly Man.
Marti: Hello Rick! Thank you for granting me an interview!
Rick: I'd be happy to provide you my opinions about Squidoo.com -- again, I can only provide opinions as you know.
Marti: That's OK! We're interested in hearing all opinions. How did you first learn about Squidoo?
Rick: Sometime late last year a good buddy of mine sent me a link to his lens --- additionally, he told me that he `might' make money someday from what he did on his lens (Amazon module). And, from the first moments, I found the idea of a free one page website with ads which could put money in ones pocket to be compelling. That said, it wasn't until March that I set up my first lens -- my Anomalies, ParaNormal and Mind Perceptions lens.
Marti: How many lenses do you have? Do you have plans for more?
Rick: Currently I have 6 lenses (I've deleted `theemptylens') and two of those I just created. Of the 6 lenses, 2 have to do with analyzing Squidoo's Most Profitable Lenses, 2 with Anomalies, and 2 to support my business positionings. As far as creating more, I intend to continue my Squidoo Most Profitable series in 6 months and may make just a couple more on areas of interest of mine.
Marti: How do you promote your lenses? Do you encourage others to build lenses?
Rick: The only lens I `promote' in any sense is my Anomaly lens which I have on about 5-10 `toplists' -- I know that perhaps half or more of my traffic comes from them. I will say however, that I'm considering spending 25 bucks on an ad in FATE. Since my total earnings on Squidoo in 6 months is about 6 dollars -- it may take a while to get it back, but I really would like more people to see my anomaly site. I also like to move my Anomally Lens within Squidoo's `areas' such as news and entertainment. Obviously, I also get some traffic from posting in the SquidU forum (for a day or so) -- but, some of that traffic becomes return traffic as they know my anomaly lens is personally updated nearly daily. I try to keep my `tone' of my anomaly site without `politics' and away from being too skeptical or believer -- which is actually about where I come down on alot of it.
Marti: What's your web background? Blogs, websites, writing, design, programming?
Rick: I almost have to laugh as I was one of the last to even get on the internet (in 2000) -- so, suffice it to say that I have no background in the web. That said, I had a buddy who said to me that he thought the whole idea of the web would be appealing to me and indeed he was 100% right. My crude.com websites are streetlevelviews.com; juggleatlanta.com and theheavystuff.com.
Marti: How do you plan to use Squidoo in the future?
Rick: Is there really a future? Just kidding. As I indicated, I plan on a few more lenses and keeping the Anomaly lens as something that folks want to visit. I also see myself supporting that lens on my theheavystuff.com site much more, with more in-depth writings about my opinions on some of these matters.
Marti: Tell me about yourself.
Rick: I'm a male, age 54, married for 23 years and with same woman for last 29 years, 1 child about to graduate from college in May. Marketing researcher since 1977 and in business for myself since 1984 as a researcher specializing in radio research and restaurant research.
Marti: Thank you for your time and answers!
Learn more about the ParaNormal with Rick: http://www.squidoo.com/lensmasters/RickPhillips/
