Empire Avenue is a Drug! |

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This is the verification code the good people at Empire Avenue have asked me to place at the start of a blog post in order to verify that this really is a blog, and it’s mine. Smacks of paranoia to me, but I suppose there can be a lot riding on making sure ethics and morality are being observed in the heady game of betting on people.

I won’t go into the game’s concept, you can read about that on (where else?) Wikipedia. But I will say that once I started reading some of the guidance offered by a few of the pioneers (the one-year anniversary of being public is coming up in July), I realized I had fallen into the classic trap of buying up stock in people I knew. It didn’t take long before my stock price flattened and my earnings were preceded by two and then three zeros. Wake up!

I took some time to read the extensive post by Chris Pirillo much of which has yet to sink in, two and three readings hence, but one thing rang like a bell: ratios. Look for dividends of 1.0 or better. Cripes! I was invested in a whole bunch of 0.25′ers. The search for finding those mystical 1.5, 1.86, even (dare I say it?) 2.0 dividend generators sucked up a good half a day, but I found them when yet another reading of Chris’ wisdom taught me to look at the Leaders board and sort for Weekly Dividends.

I could go on, but this is not about business use of social media. Or is it? I noticed that the Leader board had two columns, people and companies. While some appear to be virtual companies, many are names you know: Intel, Xbox, Google, Laughing Squid and Mashable, to name a few. So what is in it for these businesses you ask?

What is social media but more tools to carry on better conversations with customers, prospects, potential employees and influencers, right? Stock price performance on Empire Avenue is heavily influenced by activity on social platforms, as well as interactions with shareholders and investors on Empire Avenue. Companies that want to drive up their price in “eaves” (the EA virtual currency if you didn’t read the Wikipedia explanation yet) have to do what they should be doing anyway, and they attract new supporters (aka EA shareholders) as they do it. Win–Win or what?

More on this as my knowledge develops. For now, I suggest you get in, set up a profile, and start investing heavily in SRDILL, a sure winner!