Poker Affiliates

This is the ultimate and complete guide for the poker webmaster who wants to make money promoting online poker rooms.

Online Poker Affiliate marketing is one of the best way to earn quick money without much effort on regular basis. Poker Affiliate marketing are the most profitable among all categories of affiliate marketing. It is rewarding, it is profitable and it doesn’t requir much investment.

In this guide I’ll explain step by step instructions to start a poker affiliate website, promote it and start earning money afterwards.

First thing first you need a Plan

Promoting online poker rooms is not so easy either, it requires a meticulous plan, strategy and execution. No to mention that it also requires a lot of patience and some investment. Remember the simple rule you can’t make money out of nothing. You got to invest some money in order to start earning more.

Once you are clear about your plans and ready to plunge into the most lucrative way to earn money on the Internet then read on further.

URL

Once I start explaining about the SEO it would become very clear why it is so important to choose right URL. Just any URL wouldn’t do. First you need to decide what kind of poker website you are going to launch. Whether it is Poker Review, poker bonuses, Poker News, or simply a Poker portal providing all sort of details on poker such as poker games, tournaments, WSOP info, Poker Player Profiles etc.

Your URL shall be reflective of the type of poker website you are planning to launch. If it is going to be Poker Review Website then you need to keep Poker and Review words in it. Similarly if it is going to be Poker Bonuses website then you need to keep the Poker and bonus words in your URL.

URLs with poker keyword in it are scarcity and you will not get a simple URL in which case you need to be more creative in selecting correct URL.

In case you are not sure what URL should you select consult an Expert SEO Company who might help you in finding out a suitable URL.

Web hosting

Next important factor is to find a good web host. Choosing the best host depends on various circumstances such as country, type of services you might need, scripting language/web development language used and so on. The best way to find out a good web hosting company is to go through Web Hosting Reviews.

Web Design

Most of the poker webmaster ignore the importance of good web site design for their affiliate website which results in poor conversion due to the lack of credibility. A good web site not only attracts visitors but also it helps a lot on conversion.

The latest trend in web design is Web 2.0 style design. Get the best web design company to design elegant and attractive web site for your poker website.

Web 2.0 designs are not only attractive for visitors but also they are good for SEO.

Web Development/Content Management System (CMS)

If you are going to start a poker review website or any comparison website then you certainly need a CMS in place. There are plenty of free open source CMS available in the market which you can utilize to build the poker review website. Visit CMS reviews website to find out the various free open source CMS script.

The biggest drawback of free open source CMS is that they could become nightmare and costly to work with if you are trying to modify them to be used as poker review website. Also theme design for them would be additional cost.

So you would need a Poker CMS which is specially designed for the purpose and which enables you to launch your poker review website in no time and less cost.

Million dollar question, which Online Poker Room to Promote?

Once you have your plan re, you have made decision on web hosting company, your web site design is done and you have narrowed down on poker CMS then the next biggest question is which online poker room to promote?

There are scores of online poker rooms and poker affiliates which try desperately to lure you in their net easily.

Narrowing down your choice on poker affiliates is a challenge and that is why we have setup this website to provide comprehensive information on various online poker affiliates.

Read Poker Affiliate Reviews to find out which poker affiliate would be most suitable for you.

USA Accepting Poker Rooms

Finding a good online poker room to promote require little bit of research. If you want to promote poker rooms which accepts USA players then your choices would be limited and you will have to settle down with a very low conversion rates most of the USA players accepting online poker rooms are already present on all of the websites and most of the USA players are already registered there and have been playing with them.

If you widen your choices and ready to promote EU/Canada based online poker rooms then you will have a large number of online poker rooms to choose from.

New Poker Rooms Vs. established poker room

Next criteria which require little bit of research is to promote established poker room or new poker room.

Both has its advantages and disadvantages

Established online poker rooms offer trust, stability, reputation and attract loyal poker players, where as new poker rooms are examined under microscope by any poker player and hence promoting new poker room might be daunting task. However new poker rooms sometimes offer high CPA/Revshare which might be attractive for webmasters but at the same time it also requires a lot of work in order to get it established and earn reputation among poker players.

CPA Vs. RevShare

This is the most crucial aspect of Online Poker Promotion after all this is the criteria which determines your earning.

CPA

CPA refers to Cost Per Acquisition this is the amount paid to you when any new player joins a poker room, deposits money and satisfies some basic criteria. Most of the online poker rooms have some sort of criteria to be fulfilled before you can pocket your hard earned money. Most of the time it is the first deposit amount. In some cases it is the hands new poker player has to play. Read the Poker affiliate’s terms and conditions to know the rules.

Typically poker rooms offer anywhere between $50-$300 CPA.

Revshare

Revshare, short for Revenue Share, refers to the % of the amount you earn while players keep playing and generating revenue. It is calculated based on the net rake.

The typical Revshare deals vary anywhere between 25%-75%. Some of the poker affiliates offer high Revshare in the beginning.

Sometimes CPA might seems to be tempting if the CPA amount is high lets say $250. However in long terms it is the Revshare which is more profitable and it keeps generating profit for you on regular basis.

CPA is like western world’s one night stand and Revshare is like traditional Indian marriage which lasts for 7 lives ;)

Choice is yours if you are in hurry and want to get your ROI quickly then you would go for CPA however if you are planning to stay in the business then Revshare would be the ultimate choice.

Mixed/Hybrid Plan

Some of the poker rooms also offer a mix of CPA and Revshare plan where as you get CPA and after sometime you also start earning Revshare. This might sound to be tempting but in reality it is the pure Revshare which is the ultimate winner.

How to get Traffic?

Why traffic? No traffic no money. So if you wanna earn money you got to get massive traffic and convert that traffic into depositing players.

There are a lot of ways to get traffic and it is the most secretive part of the trade. No one wish to share how to get traffic but I’m sharing it here free of cost. It is not a magic, but a carefully orchestrated opera.

The various ways to get traffic are

• Blogs
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Social Media Optimization (SMO)
• Social Bookmarking
• PPC
• E-mail/Newsletters
• Forums

Blogs

Blogs are the best way to get direct converting traffic and not to mention blogs are easy to setup, manage and promote. The best thing about blogs is that they are automatically indexed by major search engines. With little effort in Blog promotion you should be able to attract more than 10k unique visitors per month on regular basis.

But the biggest challenge with blogs are the regular updates/writing. You need to get help of good Poker Writing service providers who can churn out quality and authentic articles for your blogs.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

For any webmaster SEO is not a new field. In simple terms, for those who are not aware of SEO, Search Engine Optimization is the process of making a website appear in the top of search results on various search engines.

SEO is a slow process, requires careful and meticulous planning and military style execution. It is a long term process and the result of any short cut operation is chances of getting banned.

When it comes to do SEO for poker websites you will certainly need help from a Poker SEO company which specializes in Poker Search Engine Optimization.

Remember Poker is the most competitive keyword and also most hated by Google. Websites keep on disappearing from 1st pages to Google sandbox overnight without any reason at all. So don’t try DIY tricks on your poker website as it is serious business and your hard earned money is on the stake so get help from a good Poker SEO company for all your SEO needs.

Social Media Optimization (SMO)

Promoting poker websites on Social Media is another way to get direct traffic. However not all social networking websites like poker so you need to be careful with promoting on those social media websites which accepts poker websites. There are also several poker/gambling related social websites popping up now and then.

Social bookmarking

Heard of twitter, Digg, del.icio.us, reddit etc? They are called social bookmarking websites which are now becoming very popular now a days for promoting websites and getting quick and huge traffic.

However social bookmarking is a daunting and time consuming task which requires help of a Social Bookmarking expert who can make your job easier.

PPC

PPC is another way to get direct traffic and one of the costliest advertising methods. With Google opening its doors for the Poker advertisements in UK it wouldn’t be so long that rest of search engines would follow the same after all big money is involved in Poker and and they can’t turn their back in such time of recession.

PPC is complex as you need to adhere with a number of rules imposed by Poker Affiliates and Search Engines. Until and unless you are extremely rich to afford PPC I wouldn’t recommend you to go for PPC.

E-mail/Newsletters

E-mail marketing and newsletters are another way of attracting new poker player. It also requires expertise and e-mail database of the potential poker players. you better leave it to a specialized e-mail marketing company who specialized in e-mail marketing.

Forums

Forums are another popular method to spread the word about the poker deals, tournaments and news about the poker rooms which you are promoting and get traffic. However you need to have your own Poker Forum to do so as others don’t allow you to do such promotions.

You can find plenty of free and licensed forum scripts such as phpBB3 (free) and Simple Press Forum plugin for wordpress which is the easiest way to get your own forum started.

Well I hope I’ve covered most of the aspects of the earning money by promoting online poker rooms. I’ll try to cover further topics in details in next posts so keep tuned.