The TetleyBlog

Full Tilt v Interpoker

2011-07-05T17:30:00.002+01:00

Is Interpoker the Serpico of Poker Rooms?

Okay, so the first question will be: Why Interpoker as a comparison?

Interpoker have been around since 2004 – same as Full Tilt – and as I see it we get an interesting view of what Full Tilt have done wrong and why Interpoker have been a steady household name without having to take the sort of risks FT have made and are paying for now, the same reason the Full Tilt Poker Download Now button is strictly Free Play only.

Both Interpoker and Full Tilt established themselves early as leaders in online poker –both companies seemed to grasp that poker would soon become a phenomenon and invested considerable time in promoting their brands (Interpoker’s Extreme Poker Series was one of the most memorable campaigns in online poker history) and making sure they were competitive. But the first big difference starts here.

Full Tilt spent hundreds of millions on sponsorship deals, gave away 100% Rakeback to their pro players, make sure their logos populated as many final tables as possible and pretty much paid above the going rate to ensure they got the airtime. Non-Us players who tried to access the Full Tilt software to find that the Full Tilt problems were not restricted to the US know how irrelevant big name players are when it comes to actually playing poker online.

Interpoker didn’t go down this route, and in retrospect it was a wise decision. Interpoker understood that while having pro players endorse the site and getting big names on board was a good short-term strategy, the real value was in giving online players what they wanted and not depending on associations to acquire players. It is safe to say that while Full Tilt will be opening their doors again soon enough – and have the arduous task of removing all the Full Tilt Server Down and Full Tilt Issues messages too - they will have lost the trust of a majority of their players – and most of them will just withdraw their funds when they get access to their accounts. So do players feel duped by FT? Yes. And they should.

Having the biggest poker names on the site was meant to show that they were trusted enough to play safe-house to hundreds of millions of other people’s cash, but then what happened? Interpoker may not have invested their cash in getting their names on final tables, but where they have been spending their cash is far more worthwhile: E-cash – secure transactions that are genuinely safe and where players have peace of mind knowing their money is in reliable hands. Of course many people will also say the comparison is not legit because Interpoker doesn’t take US players. Well, yes, but what got FT in trouble in the first place?

Players going to their Full Tilt Login to discover the message that Full Tilt is down know what it’s like to find that the biggest site online is not necessarily the safest site. Interpoker, as one of the largest and oldest poker rooms, could have done what many sites did and navigate through various loopholes in the hope they would evade the law forever. But of course this isn’t the case, and Interpoker knew that the way to go was concentrate on legitimate markets. This means that they are not gambling with player funds, whereas Full Tilt were aware that at any time they could have to cease their operations and all player funds could be confiscated.

The Full Tilt payments team has not been very vocal in the past few weeks and there has not been any reliable Full Tilt Update aside from hearsay. Interpoker is still going from strength to strength. It is one of few sites that will not bend to illegal deals in order to hoard traffic, and while this might seem illogical in light of today’s poker economy and ecology it will see them striving forward where other sites lag behind in the future the more they depend on smaller and more illegal margins via Rakeback and under-the-table agreements.

If you are looking for one of the few truly standup sites on the poker landscape look at Interpoker – the Serpico of poker rooms.

Massive BBJ on Boss

2011-06-24T13:50:00.004+01:00

The Boss Media/IPN Network currently have the biggest Bad Beat Jackpot in history and it's getting bigger by the hour.

At the time of posting this, the Jackpot stands at an incredible €902,000. Depending on which exchange rate you apply, that is something in the region of $1.3 Million!!

I understand the arguments against the Bad Beat Jackpot tables and the increased rake that they take to add to the Jackpot fund but when the numbers get this big it's pretty hard to ignore.

Obviously, if you choose a Tetleyboy Affiliates deal on Boss then the huge returns will soften the blow, somewhat, when it comes to you getting your rakeback and bonuses.

When BBJ's hit these sorts of heights you are in the realms of having to consider that you probably have more chance of hitting that Jackpot than you do of winning a similar amount in the Lottery.

Remember, there are only a few thousand players on Boss usually and most of those are not even on the BBJ tables so your chances are greatly increased again.

Of course, unlike the lottery, if you 'buy a ticket' by way of signing up and playing on the site, you have the possibility of still ending up with more than you started even if you don't win a prize.

All things considered, if you ever had even the slightest inclination to play on the Boss Network then make it right now!

Still going strong......

2011-06-13T16:09:00.001+01:00

Another month passes and the online poker world seems to be settling down after a pretty amazing few weeks.

This tends to be a period of slowdown for sites such as ourselves as players take a break from the grind to go on holiday or just enjoy the weather. (Assuming, of course, you are not based in the UK!)

The quiet periods give us chance to review all our deals to make sure that we are still as competitive as we like to be and we have been pleasantly surprised.

We like to keep up with what the opposition are advertising and we enjoyed the fact that we could not find a single deal that we felt was better than one we already had.

Naturally, we are going to say that, but is a simple fact that our deals really are as good as you can get.

When I was playing online full time a number of years ago, I would always choose my affiliate very carefully and found that I was certainly drawn to the ones with the proven good track record and the familiar names.

The last few years has seen a large increase in affiliates offering their services to players and we are delighted to get the feedback that tells us the ‘Tetleyboy ‘ name and reputation are what convince players to not only use us, but also refer fellow players to us.

We are even noticing a subtle change in how affiliate managers at poker sites treat us.

The deals they offer now are just that little bit better than a few years ago and we like to think this is because they know that we can convert the offers to real life new players for them so they are willing to give us the best deal which they know will produce results.

The fact that the sites now contact US to be promoted, rather than the other way around suggests we must be doing something right.

Over the quiet periods of the year we try to contact as many ‘inactive’ players as possible.

When you have over 800 names on your books, a lot are inactive and it’s a challenge trying to keep up with this.

It’s probably one of the most important aspects of the job to make sure it’s a success.

We want to find out if players are inactive because they disliked our service or maybe the deals we offer were not as they expected.

It’s these personal touches that we like to think have helped towards our success and we hope that we will be providing the best service for many years to come.

Black Friday fallout.......

2011-05-12T13:43:00.000+01:00

The poker world has had a chance to just take stock of the impact of the now infamous ‘Black Friday’ when the US Department of Justice took legal action against PokerStars, Full Tilt and Cereus.

Initial panic has been replaced with a degree of uncertainty.

It seems that the US Government have granted the sites permission to allow US players to retrieve their balances from the sites.

We are now in a situation of having tens of thousands of US players still wanting to play poker online but unable to use their usual preferred site.

There are still a number of sites allowing players from the US that haven’t been affected up to now by these proceedings. Namely, Merge, Bodog, and Everleaf.

Merge is now cemented as the number one site for US players in terms of player numbers and can only get bigger.

We would expect that the Merge Network, as a result of this, to break into the top 10 sites in terms of player numbers in the next few months.

We have tested Merge software ourselves and found it to be surprisingly smooth and there is technically no limit to the number of tables you can play at one time.

The site we deal with primarily, namely BlackChip Poker, also offer extremely good customer service.

They also do not hold the player balances themselves, which will re-assure more nervous players.

The funds are held by the Merge Network.

At the time of posting this the maximum allowed rake back on Merge sites is 35%, although this is due to stop for any new sign ups after June 1st 2011.

Our particular deal on Black Chip Poker offers a private rake chase that can take player returns up to a total 65%

We would urge anyone that is even remotely interested in playing at Merge to sign up before 1st June and our Black Chip deal is the best one out there.

Now the dust is starting to settle on the poker community, there is no doubt that the US poker players are in a completely un-enviable position.

However, it has also led to sites improving their offers to not only attract the US players (assuming the Network allows it) but also to attract the thousands of players that took their funds off of PokerStars, Full Tilt and Cereus while they waited for this to play itself out.

Bottom line is that there has never been a better time to look for a new deal……

Play against Italians!

2011-04-15T15:34:00.001+01:00

We have seen a sharp increase lately in deals on sites that have Italian players among their numbers.

Although we don’t have any direct evidence, we are led to believe by some very experienced online players that the Italian players may not be as tough to play against as a lot of other nationalities.

We are seeing that players are willing to sacrifice a few percent of rakeback in favour of a significantly increased winrate.

For this reason we are delighted to be able to offer a selection of deals which allow players to take advantage of this situation.

One is on the ENET Network, which is primarily for Italian players but software also allows players from other countries to register.

Although ENET do not allow rakeback to be offered, we still have some great deals including deposit bonuses.

Another option is a site called Piranha Poker which is actually on the Everleaf Network.

The great thing is that not only does it include all the normal Everleaf players, it is also the ONLY site on Everleaf to have a license that allows them to sign up Italian players.

These Italian players cannot play against players in the normal Everleaf player pool so the only way to share a table with them is to sign up through Piranha and you will then have access to all the tables where the Italian players are.

The fact is that Piranha has maybe double the normal number of tables running compared to the other sites on the Network and even some exclusive ‘4 seater’ tables.

You also get 35% rake back on this site, paid direct into your account each week.

Sites including Italian players really are extremely popular at the moment and we believe we have the very best options around.

Giant return deals..........seriously

2011-03-18T13:26:00.001Z

Another month goes by for the fast moving world of the poker affiliate.

We’ve spent the last few weeks making further subtle changes to the website.

We’ve streamlined the way we give the information on each particular Network and increased the amount of information we give for each individual site by devoting an entire page to each deal.

It is while doing this that we got a true picture of just how insanely good some of our deals are.

Obviously we knew they were good but some are really quite exceptional.

Take, for example, the deal we have on an Entraction site called Club4Aces.

Players get 30% rakeback PLUS a deposit bonus that adds another 20% PLUS reloads every second month PLUS rake races that can add between 5-30% PLUS a completely private rake race that can add another 10-20%.

Many players on this site, maybe raking between €1k and €1.5k per month are enjoying returns anywhere between 50-80%

If you just happen to hit the sweet spot with your rake that happens to pay a prize that equates to a high percentage return then you could literally be looking at close to 100% back.

And this is a STANDARD deal. Nothing that breaks any rules.

We have this deal because we are fortunate enough to have built up a reputation that means that sites that have these exceptional deals contact US so we can promote them.

We don’t necessarily have to go in search of these deals. Often they find us.

Looks like our hard work has paid off……….

Free iPads for all.....

2011-02-17T17:10:00.001Z

Microgaming Network which includes, Purple Lounge, Ladbrokes and Unibet have been going to great lengths to make sure that players are treated fairly.

They wanted to avoid a situation that sees sites within the Network ‘poaching’ each other’s players.

This does nothing of benefit for the Network in general and only leads to sites having to work on smaller and smaller margins.

For the last 3 or 4 months Microgaming have actively been ensuring that all of their sites comply with the rules regarding player rewards and returns.

‘Rakeback’ in the sense of a fixed percentage payment is not allowed on this network. They have their own VIP points based system that gives players ‘Loyalty Bonuses’.

This return can be a maximum of 30% of the generated rake.

This means that the only difference between the various sites are the additional promotions that they run.

For this reason we had lengthy discussions with Affiliate Managers at Purple Lounge to try to come up with a suitable incentive to attract new players.

We have just launched the free iPad Promotion.

All players need to do is generate 9000 VIP points within 3 months of registering.

We realise that this is a fairly large requirement but it has to be remembered that this does not affect the 30% Loyalty bonus and anything players win in the site’s own races and promotions.

It is also worth comparing this to some of the other so called ‘Big Affiliates’ where the only way to get an iPad with some of their deals is to meet a rake requirement AND somehow win through in a freeroll tournament.

We considered a similar system but decided that we wanted it to be fairer. You play enough, you rake enough, you win.

Guaranteed!

We are considering offering this incentive to some of our other deals and would also appreciate any feedback from Blog followers about other similar type promotions they would like to see.

Freeroll Freeloaders

2011-01-26T16:03:00.002Z

Tuesday 25th January saw the monthly $500 Tetleyboy Freeroll take place on Betfred.

It’s an event that has been taking place for maybe 18 months now and proves very popular with the players.

Even though just over 100 players are actually eligible to play, there is generally a field of around 40 that actually take the time to register and play.

There is no minimum requirement for rake to allow players to become eligible for the event, only that they needed to have opened their Betfred account under our link.

However, this month we noticed a field of around 80 with about 2 hours to go before the start.

We asked Betfred to look into this and, sure enough, they found a number of entrants with ‘suspicious characteristics’ associated with their account.

Identical IP addresses or a sudden extra number of players from a certain country.

27 players were removed and, to our knowledge, only 1 of those maybe should not have been.

At least, only one bothered to contact us to query why he had been removed from the list.

It just goes to show that we need to be vigilant with these sorts of events.

There are sites dedicated to finding these freerolls and publishing them to members to participate.

We knew this sort of thing happened but had no idea that the lowly ’Tetleyboy Freeroll’ would attract so much attention.

In fact, just last month, when the event was posted on the Tournament schedule on Betfred and open for registration, we looked 3 days before the tournament and there were over 350 names on the list!!

iPoker had set no restrictions on the entry and it was basically open to anyone on Betfred to enter.

These names were removed in good time but it did show us that there are an awful lot of players out there looking for the absolute maximum value wherever they can get it.

Next month the Freeroll will be password protected and hopefully that will stop what happened here.

We like to make sure that the most value is gained by genuine Tetleyboy customers.

A look back at last year.....

2011-01-14T14:59:00.003Z

Welcome to our first ‘blog’ of the year.

It’s a good time to reflect on how we feel last year went and look forward to the future.

The first thing we have to say is a massive ‘thank you’ to all of our loyal customers.

2010 saw Tetleyboy Affiliates pass the 600 player mark in terms of accounts we handle at various sites.

This is no mean feat for an independent affiliate that started out with no customers.

We like to think that this is a direct result of our hard work in making sure that all of our players get the deals and the service they deserve.

Fingers crossed we hit the magic 1000 this year.

Last year also saw a complete over-haul of our website.

We felt that when we started, our layout was just right for the deals we were offering. However we decided that now our selection has grown to such an extent that we needed to make the website more user friendly for anyone visiting.

We feel we have improved it greatly but we are constantly ‘tweaking’ it to make sure we stay at the top of the list of affiliate sites. Any comments or suggestions from our customers is always appreciated.

We also added a number of extra benefits for our players that we are especially proud of.

Firstly, the ‘Grinder’s Bonus’.

This allows us to pass more real cash rewards to our players and also enhance our deals even further to attract more new players.

Secondly, the free Deuces Cracked membership.

In case you are not aware, just about every deal we have qualifies players for a free membership to the excellent poker training site. All you need to do is rake a set minimum amount, usually $500, and the membership is yours.

A number of players have taken the time to contact us to thank us for this service and also explain to us just how valuable the membership has been to them in terms of improving their winrate and also giving them more confidence to move up to the next level.

We are sure that 2011 will bring many changes to the online poker industry but we will do everything we can to stay one step ahead and make sure that the very best possible service is offered to our players.

Goods luck to you all in the coming months and I hope that you hit a permanent upswing!

Calling all 'Web Wizards'

2010-12-16T14:15:00.000Z

We are in the fortunate position to now have a large player base and good reputation within the affiliate community.

This means we get a healthy influx of new players in the form of referrals.

However, to compliment our drive to recruit more sub-affiliates, we want to examine the opportunity to get new customers who have searched for rakeback deals using Google or other search engines.

This is a specialised area that we can’t claim to be expert in.

However, regular visitors to our website will have noticed several changes to the wording and appearance over the last month or so.

We would be very interested to hear from any of our players who have some advice on SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and how to improve our Google ranking.

We could, of course, just recruit some random company that claims to be able to guarantee a top 10 position for any website, however we would prefer to discuss this sort of thing with people that also have an interest in our site and in online poker in general.

If it turns out that any of you have contributed to a marked improvement in our website performance then we would certainly be looking to reward you.

I hope to hear from many of you in the near future.

VC moves to Entraction. Bad for players?

2010-11-26T16:36:00.003Z

It has been announced that VC Poker are moving, in mid December, from iPoker to Entraction.

Regardless of the whole ‘did they jump or were they pushed?’ discussion, we are interested to consider the various ways that this affects the poker player with a VC account.

Obviously, the first thing that becomes apparent is that the player has to move Networks without having a say in it. (please ignore the fact, for the time being, that the player can switch back to iPoker at any time if he wishes)

Let’s assume that VC Poker have made the decision purely from their own business point of view. This has the following implications for their customers……

1. The player now has to use software that is completely different to that he has been used to.

2. The player numbers on the new Network may be such that he cannot play at his preferred time and preferred game due to lack of tables running.

3. All the data that players have built up over months and years in software like PokerTracker or HoldemManager is now redundant and useless.

As far as point 1 goes, you have to assume that in most cases, this is going to be a negative for the player. Except in certain circumstances, it is fair to say that if a player liked the software at a different Network, he would play there. One exception may be that he plays at high limits and there is no action at other Networks so he has to put up with software to play the game he needs.

However, a huge portion of the online community, including VC customers, are playing at levels with a Big Blind of $1 or less. Entraction is currently ranked only 13th busiest by PokerScout but there is still plenty of action at most times for these limits.

It surely follows, then, that if players preferred Entraction software to iPoker, they would already be playing there.

Point 2 is related to point 1 in as much as the player numbers will dictate to some players where they choose to play. If Software is not an issue then the real hardcore grinders playing 16 tables 6 hours a day is not going to want to move to a Network that has a significantly smaller player base.

There may just be enough tables to get going but the option of good table selection may be taken away due to the fewer player numbers.

The subject of the ‘grinder’ brings us nicely to point 3.

Many players on VC will have a database of players built up over hundreds of thousands of hands.

They rely on this data in their PokerTracker or HEM to maximise their winrate.

That will disappear OVERNIGHT.

Bear in mind this example from an iPoker player that I know personally.

He has been grinding out rake in the region of $10-$15k a month for maybe 3 years now.

His deal on iPoker is good but he is maybe missing out on an extra 10% return each month by not switching to a more beneficial VIP deal that is STILL ON THE iPOKER NETWORK.

The one and only reason he will not switch is because he wants the other players to know who he is. He is aware that all the stats that players have on him for NL200 and up will mean that he can more readily adapt his game in different situations.

In other words, he knows what they are thinking.

If he were to switch to another deal on iPoker, he would be anything from $1k to $1500 better off each month in terms of his VIP return BUT even though he still has all the player stats in his own database, his winrate will likely be affected by the fact that the opposition will be less predictable than before.

This change in winrate, he estimates, would likely cancel out his increased VIP return.

Admittedly this is an extreme example but there are many players in exactly the same situation.

Let us not also forget that VC were the worst kept secret at iPoker when it came to attracting high raking grinders on high return deals, ‘illegal’ or otherwise.

So, in conclusion, I feel that this can only be a negative move for VC’s players.

It is not often that a site has moved, apparently voluntarily, to a different Network and all it’s players stayed as they preferred the new home.

Some sites have even moved to bigger Networks with massively increased player numbers and the players just didn’t like it.

The whole focus of Poker sites nowadays is to promote player loyalty.

What a shame for all those loyal VC players who are now rewarded with unfamiliar software, smaller player numbers and redundant player stats.

On the other hand, I would invite comments here from VC players that are happy with the move.

November already!

2010-11-04T14:59:00.000Z

Wow, I can’t believe I missed a whole month without posting here.

In fairness, we were away in holiday for half of the month.

Obviously it’s great to go on holiday but there is always the dilemma about how to keep in touch with our players while we are away.

When we had a lot fewer players we would leave the automated vacation response on the email and then hope that nothing major would go wrong while we were away.

However, now we have a much bigger player pool we need to make the effort to keep in touch as much as possible without spoiling our well needed break from poker.

Unfortunately, staying online is not easy when you are on a ship in the Atlantic Ocean!

When there was internet access the charges were extortionate and the connection speed was not what you would call ‘fast’.

It was not unusual for us to take 10 mins just to open an email, read the contents and write a simple 2 line reply and send it.

Fortunately nothing much happened during the holiday and we are fortunate to have some very patient and understanding players too.

At least by answering some of the emails and filtering out the junk and spam, there were not 350 mails waiting when we finally returned.

We’ve been back 6 days now and probably just about caught up.

I think I need a holiday…………….

The new look site is here!

2010-09-22T15:15:00.001+01:00

After much deliberation and discussion, we have finally completed our new look website.

Regular visitors will still see the same familiar colour scheme but there are a couple of major changes and what we hope are improvements.

We felt that the home page was getting just a little too full up with information so we have decided to create different sections of the website that are dedicated to each of the different Networks and then group the deals into the different Networks.

Just choose the tab down the side for the Network that most interests you and you will find the selection of deals that we have for that particular Network.

To assist those that are new to Online poker or maybe just a little in the dark about certain things, we have added a table on the home page that links to PokerScout so you can see, in real time, the top 10 busiest Networks and the player numbers at that specific moment.

We have also created a brand new page that explains the different types of rake calculation methods that sites use and how they affect different styles of play.

We hope that we are providing a service that benefits both novice players and experienced grinders alike.

Any feedback on the new site and possible new content that you would like to see would be greatly appreciated.

Nik
(Tetleyboy )

Summer's over...

2010-09-10T12:18:00.001+01:00

It seems that the summer months are finally over, at leat for us in the Northern Hemisphere, which is good news for the poker affiliate.

Player volume shows a marked decrease at this time of year due to the obvious things like holidays and the fact that better weather means players spend less time in front of the computer.

The challenge facing the affiliate is how to encourage the more recreational players back into the habit of playing regularly.

It is not so much of a problem for the serious online pro because he needs to take a break some time and summer is the obvious time to do it.

However, if your are a recreational player that tends only to play evenings and weekends then the act of playing less for a couple of weeks or months inevitably leads to you getting used to playing less.

For this reason we try to make sure that if we have new deals in the pipeline then this is the time that we make them public.

Much like shops will hold their best ’sales’ during January. Shoppers have gone crazy in the lead up to Christmas and a combination of bad weather, exhaustion from shopping and the holiday season and straight-forward lack of money means that shops will be extremely quiet in January. Therefore they offer the best bargains to tempt shoppers back into the habit of spending money.

This same thing applies to the good poker affiliate.

If we offer something special at this time of year then it will get a lot of people back in the habit of playing.

And if the deal is good enough then there is the added bonus of getting a lot of ‘dormant’ players active again.

It is extremely rewarding to spend a lot of time negotiating and finalising a deal that you think will be popular and then finding out that you were right and the time was well spent.

All of our players will be hearing from us in the next week with some incredible new deals that we have arranged and we are confident that they can look forward to a lucrative few months ahead.

Nik
(Tetleyboy)

Any Ideas?

2010-08-16T16:12:00.000+01:00

We are considering an overhaul of our website in the very near future.

We think it’s time to maybe start grouping the deals by Network.

Have specific sections of the website devoted to the different Networks that we have offers on.

We also want to really promote our sub affiliate opportunities.

As we have said before here, sub-affiliates really are the way forward for an affiliate of our size to take the next step.

We have passed the ‘500 accounts’ milestone and want to hit the next 500 in half the time.

We are also considering sections devoted to our players’ achievements. Maybe a ‘Hall of Fame’ type set up.

We would encourage any of our players that have won tournaments online or live to send us the detail and maybe we can initiate them into the New section of our website.

We already know of one of our players that made 2nd spot on a WSOP event this year for a payday in excess of $500k. When we have permission from this player to report on this we will likely make him one of the first entrants into the website.

We would also like to hear from any of our followers about ideas that they would like to see on our site or preferences they have for how the deals are displayed.

We need to know that our site is as interesting, up to date and user-friendly as possible, so the best way is to ask the people that use it the most…..

We are also keen to hear from French player.

After the recent changes in French laws regarding online poker then we realise that there is a market to be serviced.

If anyone out there is either a French player, or knows of one, then we would be very interested to chat to them.

Rest assured it would be extremely worthwhile for anybody that is able to assist us in this huge marketplace.

I look forward to hearing back from many of you with your ideas and comments.

Nik
(Tetleyboy)

Recruiting sub-affiliates.

2010-08-04T14:36:00.000+01:00

Once we established the whole ‘Tetleyboy Affiliates’ name and built up a good player base (400+ at time of posting) then the next stage is to see how best to start spreading the word without spending fortunes on advertising, which may not prove cost effective in any case.

It seems that the use of sub-affiliates is the answer.

Many of the deals we have allow us room to recruit sub-affiliates to offer the same excellent deal to the players and also have a worthwhile commission for themselves.

If you look at some of the so called ‘big boys’ in the rake back affiliate world, they will offer opportunities for anyone to act as their sub-affiliate.

Generally the sub-affiliate is looking at a commission of maybe 2-3% of the gross rake that their players generate.

This is a tiny incentive for the ‘sub’ but the main sites get away with this because they are able to allow the ‘subs’ to promote extras like rake races that the ‘sub’ would not normally be able to offer.

They use the fact that they have a huge player base generating high amounts of rake to offer special promotions to add extra value for the players and, subsequently, for the sub-affiliate’s players too.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this and is an excellent business strategy and very attractive for a lot of players.

However……

It is likely that by acting as our sub-affiliate that players get a better deal and the ‘sub’ gets a bigger percentage too. Everybody wins!

Admittedly, we don’t have the facility to offer giant rake races but players these days are far more knowledgeable about these sorts of things.

They realise that they are not realistically going to get any extra value from these races and so everything comes down to the quality of the basic standard deal and what they get back from it each month.

We are confident that our own standard deals are always as good and, in many cases, actually better value for the player.

We offer extras that other affiliates don’t as they feel that they are already offering the extra value in their exclusive promotions.

We feel that the better deals, the real value extras that we provide, all coupled with our customer service, means that our sub-affiliates are in a better position to recruit players.

There is also the advantage of the fact that your deals will stand out from the rest.

Because so many people choose to sub-affiliate for the biggest, well known sites, the market is flooded with offers that are all identical.

By using our deals, the prospective new player will actually be reading about offers and extras that he has not read a hundred times before.

When all things are considered, we feel that for a player to be successful as a sub-affiliate, we have deals that will afford the best opportunity for that to happen.

We also like the idea of ‘subs’ trading off the good name of Tetleyboy Affiliates.

It’s all good for us and it’s an excellent way for us to spread the word about who we are and what we do.

If you feel you’d like to explore the possibilities of being a ‘Tetley-sub’ then please get in touch.

The more, the merrier….

Nik
(Tetleyboy)

Malta here we come............

2010-07-24T17:55:00.000+01:00

So I’m working away, doing things that affiliates do, when I am contacted on MSN by the manager at Poker Idol. He tells me to check out a tournament that is taking place later that evening.

It’s the final qualifier for their ‘Malta Madness’ tournament. First prize is a $3k package to Malta including Live tournament entry, flights, hotel, boat party etc…..

It’s $220 to enter and there are currently only FIVE entered.

This was, admittedly, still 6 hours before the tournament starts but the manager insists he thinks the tournament will struggle to gain just the 15 players needed to cover the cost of the package.

I contacted a number of my players to bring this to their attention.

Only one responded, surprisingly, as I know a number of my players are keen tournament players and would appreciate the notification.

I kept the software open all day and with just 1 hour to go there were 10 entrants.

I vow to myself that if there are fewer than 15 players 2 mins before the start then I will have to enter.

Sure enough, I register with 30 seconds to go and am number 15 and the final player to register.

Didn’t really see many hands in the first 2 or 3 levels and hit the first break with about 4800 of the 5000 starting chips and placed 9th of the remaining 13 players.

Then I start to hit a few hands in the second session and find myself 2nd in Chips on about 12500 with 10 left.

I’m always happy to make a final table, even if there are only 15 players to start with!!

I’m sitting comfortably now and still in 2nd spot with 8 left when I get dealt KK.

UTG raises and I put in a good size raise. Only the UTG guy calls.

Flop is J high with 2 clubs. I have 2 red Kings.

He checks to me and I bet just over half the pot which is actual about half my opponent’s stack. He calls.

Turn is a Queen of clubs. We both check.

River is another club.

We both check and his pair of 2’s with a club wins the pot. (Nice call preflop and flop I thought..)

I’m still ok though but back in midfield rather than big stacked.

As we get down to 7 left I knock out 2 smaller stacks in 3 hands and I am now chip leader with 5 left.

I’m checking my passport is in date now and I hear the sound of suitcases being dusted off.

I then take a big chunk off the other big stack and I’m comfortably chip leader with just over half of the chips in play.

I then come back to the field when I have to call a couple of all in’s from the 2 short stacks and end up doubling them up.

We get down to heads up when the other big stack knocks out both short stacks and gives himself 55k to my 20k.
I admit to not being the best HU player, mainly due to the fact that it’s pretty unusual for me to get this far in a tournament, but I figure that I only need to hit a few half decent hands and this is all mine….

Of course I hit endless 9-2, 7-3, 10-3, 9-5, etc…

The one time I got dealt JJ and I min raised pre flop. He called, the flop cam J high and he OPEN FOLDED!!

When that happened I stopped applying the sun cream and put away my Maltese phrase book.

This obviously wasn’t going to be my day…..

The final hand saw me all in with 3-3 v AQ. The board ended up double paired which counterfeited my pair.

I then realised that the person who won was my friend from earlier on who’d done me with the pocket deuces!!

Although very disappointed, I can’t remember the last time I got such a buzz playing in a tournament.

It made me realise that there really is some insane value out there if you look so I’ve made it my mission to keep trawling the sites to find these little gems.

Nik
(Tetleyboy)

Good service is not ‘rake dependent’.

2010-07-19T13:53:00.000+01:00

How do you keep players loyal?

Once you have a significant player base, the next dilemma for the affiliate is how to keep players actually playing.

With the industry being so competitive now, any affiliate that is serious about his job cannot afford to just sign up a player and assume he’ll just keep playing and generating commission for him.

You would hope that the player has chosen you at first because he felt that your deal and service were the best option for him at the time.

However, if your attitude, as the affiliate, is that your job is now done, then you are not going to be successful.

Just because you provided the best option 3 months ago does not mean that the player is not constantly looking around, just to make sure he can’t do better.

The duty of the affiliate is to make sure that he continues to offer the best deals and service for every single player.

You have to make sure that there is not another option out there that is clearly better than what you offer and, if there is, do whatever you can to ensure you provide a reasonable alternative for your players, just in case they start considering a change.

This is a full time job in itself.

It is very easy to spend time on a player that rakes $15k a month, bend over backwards for him, answer his emails before others and generally ‘go the extra mile’.

But the mark of the good affiliate is to do this for every single player.

The guy that played a few $1 MTT’s last month who is asking you about the VIP system on iPoker is just as important. He is asking you because he does not know and he sees you as the person to answer his questions.

As the affiliate, you must never lose site of what you are supposed to be doing.

You are offering a service to the players. This is not ‘rake dependent’ or ‘volume related’.

You cannot be successful if you don’t appreciate something as fundamental as ’best service for all customers’.

The guy that made you $0.03 in commission last month may just know somebody who grinds on PokerStars and rakes $10k a month.

If you spent hour after hour on MSN explaining how a VIP system worked or even just chatting to the guy that just moved house and was unable to play lately but was hoping to start again soon, who will they recommend when their $10k raker friend tells then they are thinking of moving from Stars because they can’t play any longer without some sort of rake back?

The nature of the industry is such that large scale advertising is not really cost effective for mid-sized affiliates like ourselves.

More new business is going to come from referrals and ‘word of mouth’ and, for that very reason, every single one of your players is equally important as the rest, regardless of whether they rake $10k a month or $0.

If you are doing your job well then you should notice a pattern….

Players who have not even played under you for maybe a year will still contact you to see if you can hook their friend up with a deal. Players that rake high amounts will contact you BEFORE they consider some other deal that apparently returns higher amounts.

It is like a show of loyalty for the good service. They are thinking of moving to a different deal but wanted to give you the chance to at least match it and keep their business.

If your service was not up to scratch then these players would move without saying a word.

The fact that they take the time to contact you first means that they appreciate the job you do for them and want to reward you.

The bottom line is that in order to keep players happy, you have to make sure you don’t get left behind.

A good example of this would be the recent move of Betfair to the Ongame Network.

This is going to lead to increased interest in Ongame sites and deals so we had to make sure that when players asked about Ongame, we have a deal that is likely to compare well with what is being offered by other affiliates.

The fact is that we did already have a perfect deal for that situation, but if that Betfair move had happened 2 months earlier, then we would not.

We would have had to make sure that we contacted as many Ongame sites as possible to negotiate the best possible deal available, ready for any enquiries we get.

And all of the time still contacting players, keeping them updated about developments that may interest them and generally making sure we have a list of happy customers.

I sincerely hope we achieve this but we also welcome any criticism that players may have.

We cannot hope to improve deals if we are not aware of the things that are wrong.

I am very proud to say that any negative feedback we get is almost exclusively related to problems that are down to the poker site, as opposed to our own service, but we still want to get involved and try to resolve any issues for the player as soon as possible.

It’s just another thing that an affiliate should want to do as part of providing the very best service possible.

I am sure that we would hear if we are doing it wrong………………..

Nik
(Tetleyboy)

What's it like being a poker affiliate?

2010-07-09T16:34:00.001+01:00

Welcome to the inaugural Blog post of Tetleyboy Affiliates. Now to be known as the TetleyBlog.

I thought I’d devote a little time, on my first post, to a subject that comes up so much when I chat to players.

They want to know what it’s like and do I make good money?

My stock answer is that ‘’it’s hard work’’ and ‘’I do alright’’

Both of these statements are accurate but there is obviously much more to it than this.

I have never worked in an environment where the old adage ‘the more you put in, the more you get out’, has been more appropriate.

When I first started out I was a full time multi-tabling grinder who wondered if there was a little extra money to be made from referring players.

I noticed that it was extremely simple to actually register as an affiliate with any poker site I chose, but it was a whole different thing to actually have a deal that is likely to attract other players.

It didn’t take long to realise that getting a good deal is only a part of the battle.

The next obstacle to overcome was finding potential players and then you had to convince them to trust you.

As an avid user of forums such as Pocket Fives and Two Plus Two I was able message players that had stated that they were in the market for a new deal.

It didn’t take long before I realised that there is a massive amount of competition out there and you absolutely must have a website. Even if you have a player on the verge of signing up for a deal that you may offer, it is often the case that they will ask for your website so they can check it out for themselves. If you have to reply that you do not have one then there is a good chance that this player will start to have doubts.

Think about it……

If you had been contacted by two different people, both offering the same deal, would you prefer to use the person with or without the website?

I would never suggest that affiliates without website are not to be trusted and I would certainly not say that all affiliates with websites can be.

However, it’s an indication that if an affiliate had the inclination to spend the time and dedication required in devising and producing a website, surely there is a better chance that he will work well for you and get the best deal for you.

And here is the key to being a successful affiliate.

You have to realise that the customer is effectively employing your services and the better your service, the more customers you are likely to attract.

Unless you have a huge budget at your disposal for advertising, you have to rely mostly on referrals to bring in new business for you.

The hours are as long as you want them to be but the rewards can be there for the affiliates willing to put in the effort.

Being a GOOD affiliate is not just a matter of signing up a player then forgetting about him as he earns you commission.

You should make sure that you are there to answer any questions promptly and efficiently.

This may seem obvious but it is amazing how many players will come to me, complaining that their last affiliate was no good and the only reason was that ‘he never answered my emails’.

We don’t profess to be online 24 hours a day, and our customers do not expect this, but the fact that we are on MSN just about all day every day and including weekends, has given our players a sense of confidence that the affiliate is there for them if they need them.

I will reserve a different post on another day to give accounts of players contacting me telling me about their downswings, implying that I have set them up at a ’rigged site’.

Contact from players is not only, ‘my payment is late, can you chase it for me’.

Our players know that they can contact us on MSN or email about anything even remotely related to poker.

This leads to a very wide range of communication subjects and we would not have it any other way.

The bottom line is that we LOVE poker and LOVE to talk about poker and anything related to poker.

We spend up to 12 hours a day contacting poker sites, negotiating deals, finalising new promotions to advertise, processing player payments, following up on enquiries, updating websites, chatting to potential new players, explaining how VIP deals work, bonus release rates, etc….

But we wouldn’t want it any other way because that is what we LOVE doing and we hope this comes through in our quality of service.

It seems that this initial post to launch our Blog page has turned into self promotion but I’m not going to apologise for that.

We are proud of the job we do here and we feel confident that our players appreciate it.

Future posts will likely involve topics relating to all aspects of the poker industry but don’t be surprised if a little self-advertising slips in……..

I hope you have enjoyed reading this and that you will check back regularly to see what’s going on in the world of your favourite poker affiliate.

Good luck at the tables.

Nik
(Tetleyboy)