Empire Avenue – the fun social networking stock market game

September 11, 2011 by John Dilbeck · 4 Comments
Filed under: Blogging, Business Networking, Facebook, John Dilbeck, Musings, Social Networking

Now, for something a little different.

I’m a hard working guy and I spend most of my waking time working on my marketing business, writing blog posts, creating new pages on my websites, and interacting on some of the social networking sites, most notably: Facebook.

A couple of weeks ago, two of my friends were talking about a website where we can earn credit for what we’re already doing. Now, let me make it clear that we can’t earn money, but we earn value in our stock in this game, and we can earn eaves, which is what the site calls their virtual currency.

It’s like a social networking stock market and we earn by being active with our blogs and on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and others.

When you join Empire Avenue, you get some money to purchase “stock” in others who are playing the game, and there are a lot of people doing it. I bought stock in folks like Guy Kawasaki and Mari Smith and other well-known social networking “stars.”

(Note: we are not buying ownership in each other. It’s just a game.)

Folks bought shares of my stock, too, and that gave me more money to invest.

I’ve been buying more shares in the people who invested in me, as I earn more “money” with which to purchase their stock. It’s been a lot of fun.

I’m also buying stock in people I’ve never met before, based on recommendations from others who are playing the game.

I used to enjoy investing in the real stock market, and the Empire Avenue game offers a lot of the same fun with no financial risk.

It also provides another way to expose people to our various social networks and blog feeds.

You can add multiple RSS feeds to your Connections tab, but each feed needs to be endorsed by at least five people before you start getting credit for your blogging activities. And, the credit you receive for blogging is limited, because it’s just too easy for people to cheat by adding the RSS feed of a robotic “splog.”

I’m not playing the game to try to win it; I’m playing for fun and to expose my sites to more people.

I generally buy some shares of the people who invest in my stock, but don’t promise a quid pro quo.

I’ve also bought shares in the stock of some of my online friends who are not playing the game, yet. I can say I’m the first to buy their stock, and I get it at the absolute lowest price, should they decide to start playing the game.

If you’re already playing the Empire Avenue game, I’m still a good investment, but I’ll be crossing the $50 per share price shortly. Invest in me now, before the price goes up! (grin)

Seriously, I go there a couple of times per day and spend maybe five or ten minutes investing in more stock. It’s a nice, short break from work, and still does a little to promote my work. Since I enjoy combining work and fun, this is a good match.

It’s a bit confusing at first, but I’m starting to find my way around. That makes it even more enjoyable. I don’t think I’ll ever spend more than 15 or 20 minutes there on any given day, probably less, but it’s a nice break, now and then.

While it’s not for everyone, it makes it a little more fun to think about myself as representing my marketing business and it’s fun when someone at Empire Avenue buys stock in me.

If you’re looking for a site to purchase advertising and want to expose your sites and blogs to others who are active in social networking, there are ways to spend real money buying advertising and credits. I haven’t done any of that, and don’t have any plans to do so, at this time. I don’t know what I’ll do as I learn more about the site and all that’s available there.

Empire Avenue also has communities where you can interact with others who share the same interests. I don’t have time for that, so I haven’t tried it.

Join Empire Avenue and try it for yourself. It’s free, and you can sign in through your Facebook account, or create a separate Empire Avenue account. It’s your choice.

What about you?

Are you playing Empire Avenue? What do you think about it?

Act on your dream!

Tags: Empire Avenue, games, Social Networking, stock market

New 21st Century Affiliate Marketing page on Facebook

August 15, 2011 by John Dilbeck · 4 Comments
Filed under: Blogging, Facebook, RSS Syndication, Social Media Marketing, Social Networking

Good morning,

Last week, I finally got around to creating a new 21st Century Affiliate Marketing page on Facebook and I hope you’ll visit it. At the moment, about all that is there is a copy of the articles I post on this blog, but I intend to add additional information on the Facebook page in the coming months.

If you’re like me and spend a lot of time on Facebook, you can follow new posts in your newsfeed on Facebook, if you go to the page and like it.

I’ll be continuing to tie my various websites in to their own Facebook pages in the coming weeks.

Thanks for visiting and reading! I really appreciate it.

All the best,

Tags: Facebook

Sitesell reaches 10,000 fans milestone on Facebook

March 27, 2011 by John Dilbeck · 10 Comments
Filed under: Affiliate Marketing, Facebook, Sitesell and Site Build It, Social Networking

On Friday, March 25, 2011, at close to 9:00 pm (Eastern), Sitesell reached a big milestone on their Facebook page.

I was among the crowd of Sitesell fans who were watching as the fan counter approached and exceeded the 10,000 mark.

It was an interesting achievement.

The folks at Sitesell didn’t think there was a need for a Facebook page for the company, but they decided to give it a try.

At first, only a couple of fans were posting regularly, but — in less than nine months — Sitesell went from no fans on Facebook, to over 10,000. I believe that’s a real achievement.

It’s interesting in another way, too.

Now, with the privatizing of the Sitesell Forums, I think the Sitesell Facebook page will be the best way for people who don’t subscribe to SBI (and therefore can’t gain entrance to the private forum) to get a glimmer of the camaraderie shared by many who build our sites with SBI (we refer to ourselves as SBIers).

Wow! Did I really write that sentence! I gotta sit down and try it again. Let’s see…

With the forum closed to non-subscribers, I think the Facebook page is the best way for people who aren’t Sitesell customers to get acquainted with what’s going on there and to meet some of the people who are involved with Sitesell and SBI.

Subscribers (SBIers) post regularly, and quite a few of the people who work for Sitesell do, too. And that includes Ken Evoy, the Founder and Chairman of Sitesell, who visits now and then.

It’s also a place for people who don’t use SBI to ask questions and get real answers from people who know what they’re talking about.

Plus, it’s a lot of fun. Some of the Sitesell fans have a great sense of humor.

The growth in the number of “fans” is similar to what we see in the number of visitors to a well-researched and well-constructed website. It starts slowly and builds. At some point, the “snowball starts rolling” and we see real growth in the number of people who visit our sites.

Now, the snowball is rolling at Sitesell’s Facebook page.

I can’t wait to see the celebration when the count passes 20,000 fans.

Let’s celebrate!

As part of the celebration, Sitesell is having their first ever buy-one-get-one-free sale that isn’t occurring at Christmas. The sale will last a limited time — 72 hours — and then it’s gone. It will be over at 9:00 pm (EDT) on Monday, March 28, 2011. I doubt there will be any extensions to this sale’s timing.

You can’t take advantage of that sale price at the normal order page. You have to find the “secret” link on the Facebook page to get the discount. (It shouldn’t be hard for you to find.)

Go to Sitesell’s Facebook page and click the “Like” button at the top of the page, and then look for the link. Hint: Go to the welcome page, if you’re not already there.

Congratulations!

Congratulations to everyone involved with the achievement of this milestone. It was fun to be there watching the fan counter reach and exceed 10,000 fans.

I’m looking forward to being there when the 20,000th fan joins in.

Act on your dream!

Tags:

First ever live Q and A session with Ken Evoy and the whole Sitesell team

November 20, 2010 by John Dilbeck · 1 Comment
Filed under: Affiliate Marketing, Facebook, Sitesell and Site Build It, Social Networking

The entire Sitesell Team is making their Facebook page a great place to ask questions, learn new things, and meet the people behind the scenes at Sitesell, the folks who make SBI what it is.

There are a lot of urban myths about SBI that have already been addressed on a new page on the Sitesell website, and this is our chance to ask questions and get the answers from the team that makes SBI so great.

On Wednesday, 24th of November, 2010, at 12 noon ET, Ken Evoy and his entire team will be live on Facebook answering your questions about SBI (Site Build It), Sitesell, and how to build a successful online business.

This note on the Sitesell Facebook page explains it in more depth.

I’ve set my alarm so I’ll be sure to be there.

Next Wednesday at noon, USA Eastern Time.

Act on your dream!

Tags: Facebook, Ken Evoy, SBI, Sitesell

How do you manage your email marketing lists?

November 3, 2010 by John Dilbeck · 9 Comments
Filed under: Advertising and Marketing, Aweber Autoresponders, MailChimp, Social Networking, email marketing

I’ve had an account at Aweber for a long time, but I’m almost embarrassed to say how little I use it.

Recently, I learned of MailChimp and I’ve been reading their PDF books and watching their videos.

One thing I really like about MailChimp is that they really understand and use social networking and provide a lot of tools that are not available with Aweber.

I’m going to make a concerted effort in 2011 to greatly improve my email marketing and help my consulting clients do better with their efforts, or teach them how to get started.

MailChimp has increased the numbers of subscribers and total emails you can send every month on their free account and I think that is a good thing. Let people learn how to use the system for free, and when they start reaching the limits of the free account, then — if the email marketing is producing profits — it’s an easy choice to upgrade to one of the paid plans.

Small businesses can easily run several campaigns and lists in the free account before they start hitting the limits.

Have you used either Aweber or MailChimp?

Which do you prefer? Why?

Or do you use a service that you like better? Why?

Act on your dream!

Tags:

Why do some forums thrive and others just seem to wilt?

August 24, 2009 by John Dilbeck · 21 Comments
Filed under: Act On Your Dream!, Communities, Forums, Social Networking

I have several forums that I manage and I don’t know the answer to what appears to be a simple question.

Why do some of them thrive and grow while others just wilt?

Two that are thriving are actually social networking communities hosted on Ning.com, but they feel very much like a forum to me.

My Squidoo Marketing community continues to grow very well and the membership is approaching 200 members. I join in the conversations when I have something to say, watch out for spam, and check in two or three times per day, but the majority of the activity comes from the members interacting with each other.

Murphy Connections is growing, too, but a bit more slowly. That’s understandable since it’s geographically targeted to a small town in the mountains of western North Carolina. Yet, even though it draws from a smaller target group, it is growing and the participation is pretty good.

On the other hand, my A Year From Now Forum, which is tied in with my Act On Your Dream! website just isn’t doing anything. Part of the fault is mine, because I really neglected it over much of the last couple of years when I wasn’t able to give it the attention it deserved. Still, it’s getting an average of 50 visitors per day, yet practically none of them are joining and participating. It’s obvious that the posts are getting read, but replies and new threads are practically non-existent.

Is it the subject matter? Am I reaching the wrong audience? Is the forum just not worth joining and participating?

I don’t have much ego involved in this, so please feel free to be honest with your comments. Just remember that honest doesn’t mean the same thing as brutal.

I’m hoping your fresh eyes on the subject will help me learn what I can do differently to improve.

I’m hoping you can offer some advice to help me.

Act on your dream!

Tags: activity, Forums, members, participation

I just learned how to enjoy Facebook more

August 24, 2009 by John Dilbeck · 12 Comments
Filed under: Facebook, Friends and Family, Social Networking

I don’t spend a lot of time on Facebook, but I do go there two or three times per week to see what my friends are doing.

I’m not one of those people who goes “friend crazy” on Facebook. I have just under 300 friends there.

Lately, I’ve been getting tired of going to the Facebook home page, because I just wasn’t interested in what I was seeing most of the time.

But, this evening, based on a chance comment I read somewhere yesterday, Facebook got a lot more enjoyable for me.

I’ve been reading a lot of blogs over the weekend and someone — I don’t remember who — said something about Facebook friend lists in passing. He or she didn’t go into any depth to explain it, but it stuck in my mind, somehow.

This evening, when I went to Facebook, I went to their help center and found out what friend lists are.

Over the last few weeks (months?) I’ve seen the “Add to list” link when someone requests to become my friend, but I never thought about it.

Tonight, I learned that I can create multiple lists to segment all of my friends into smaller, more useful groups.

I went to the Friends tab on Facebook and waited for the drop-down menu to appear and then I chose the All Friends link.

Then I went through all my friends there and added many of them to one or more lists. I created a list for close friends, another for family, another for bloggers, one for Squidoo friends, one for marketing, and so forth. I may go back and add other lists, but I’m pretty happy with what I accomplished this evening in a surprisingly short time.

I was also a bit surprised when I realized I had not a single clue who some of the people were who I had accepted as friends. I don’t remember ever seeing some of their names. Over the next few weeks, I’ll visit the profiles of the ones I don’t remember. Unless there is a good reason to keep them, I’ll be removing them from my friends.

After all, how much of a friend can they be if I don’t even remember who they are?

So, after doing all of this, I still didn’t see how it would be useful to me.

I went to the Facebook home page and still saw the same old mish-mash of updates that weren’t very interesting to me.

Then, I looked into the left column and saw some links. At the bottom of the short list was the link labeled “more.” I clicked it and there were my brand new friend lists.

I clicked on the Family link and a few seconds later all the updates were from my family members on Facebook. Now, that was interesting and useful!

After reading that, I clicked on the Close Friends list and read what they were up to.

Next I clicked on the Marketing list and enjoyed reading their updates – for the most part. It turns out that some of the updates really weren’t all that interesting. I may be removing some of the people in that list from my friends.

In the next few minutes, I clicked on each new list, in turn, and really enjoyed reading updates that were more or less grouped by people in categories in which I was interested.

I can already tell that I’ll spend more time on my Family and Close Friends lists as I continue to use Facebook.

Several people are on multiple lists.

It was interesting that I chose to add some people I know in real life as Close Friends and a few people I’ve never met in person, but who feel like close friends, anyway.

Maybe you already know all about this and you’ve been doing it forever and wonder how I could be so dense. That’s okay. Sometimes it just takes me awhile to learn to use the features each tool offers.

I know for certain that I’ll be using friend lists on Facebook from here on out.

What about you?

Act on your dream!

Tags: Facebook, friend lists

Did you get your preferred username at Facebook?

June 13, 2009 by John Dilbeck · 22 Comments
Filed under: Social Networking

I know this is not breaking news for many of the readers of this blog, because you already got the username you wanted on Facebook today.

Still, for others who aren’t up on the latest developments, I thought it would be worth a short post about the subject.

This morning, Facebook made it possible for us to set our preferred username (if it is available) to make it easy to link to our profile there.

I was lucky and now you can reach my profile at facebook.com/johndilbeck.

Have you claimed your username at Facebook, yet?

You can do it here: facebook.com/username.

Act on your dream!

Tags: Facebook, profile, username

Lynn Terry blogs about the FTC and Social Media Marketing

May 20, 2009 by John Dilbeck · 24 Comments
Filed under: Advertising and Marketing, Affiliate Marketing, Blogging, Social Networking

For the first time in several weeks, I fired up my newsreader and started catching up on what my friends have been blogging about recently.

One of the first things that caught my eye was Lynn Terry’s post, FTC to Regulate Social Media Marketing.

She did a good job linking to information about this, so I won’t repeat what she said. Click the link, above, to read her post; it will open in a new window.

I think it’s about time that the FTC started to crack down on deceptive advertising and claims, and the new emphasis on “atypical results” is a good thing, too.

Although I can’t show you specific statistics to back up what I’m about to say, it’s common knowledge that over 90% of affiliate marketers never earn anything, or at least earn very little.

Yet, there are people and websites out there that claim that it’s the easiest thing in the world to join a few affiliate programs, set up a blog, and start earning thousands of dollars.

This claim is simply not true.

Yes, there are a few people who earn thousands of dollars every month through affiliate marketing, but they are the exceptions – they are the people who enjoy “atypical results.”

Perhaps it was a matter of timing. Maybe they got in at the right time.

Maybe they had more experience in marketing and advertising than most of us.

Who knows why they were successful.

Online marketing is still not as easy as some would paint it.

So, I’m hoping that the FTC does crack down on all the hype and scams that are floating around.

On the other hand, it worries me a bit that they may go too far.

Some of us try very hard to have a good knowledge of what we recommend. I am a satisfied customer of the products and services I recommend the most, but I can’t be 100% sure that I haven’t said something, somewhere, sometime, that may come back to bite me.

What about you?

Have you ever taken someone else’s word about a product and recommended it with little or no personal experience?

I don’t think you want to open yourself up to all the problems that will arise when the FTC cracks down on blogs and social networking sites.

I am far from getting rich, and my affiliate marketing income has dropped dramatically since last September, but I’m in this for the long haul and look forward to the months ahead when my revenue will rise, again.

I feel that I’ve been ethical and honest about the things I promote, but I look back and see that some things I liked a few years ago no longer look as good as they did then.

Does this mean that I have to find all my websites and everything I’ve ever published and see if they need to be modified and/or deleted?

I really don’t know.

Lynn’s post has given me something to seriously think about now that I’m getting back to work.

What do you think?

Act on your dream!

Tags: atypical results, deceptive advertising, FTC, honesty, integrity