Negotiating with poker sites

SecretSauce · #1 08-10-2007, 07:22 AM

I'm interested in specifically hearing about PartyPoker, but any poker site would be fine for this discussion.

Does anybody have any tips for negotiating better deals with them? MGR or CPA or MGR+CPA, whatever. I've never been great at squeezing the sites for more money.

How do the pro's do it?

haynesey · #2 08-10-2007, 07:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SecretSauce

I'm interested in specifically hearing about PartyPoker, but any poker site would be fine for this discussion.

Does anybody have any tips for negotiating better deals with them? MGR or CPA or MGR+CPA, whatever. I've never been great at squeezing the sites for more money.

How do the pro's do it?

Would also love some tips, i feel a bit "cheeky" trying to negotiate deals.

SEO · #3 08-10-2007, 07:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SecretSauce

I'm interested in specifically hearing about PartyPoker, but any poker site would be fine for this discussion.

Does anybody have any tips for negotiating better deals with them? MGR or CPA or MGR+CPA, whatever. I've never been great at squeezing the sites for more money.

How do the pro's do it?

Many times decent affiliate managers contact you if your site is good.

Don't be afraid to tell them what you think. If you bring enough quality traffic to get $250 CPA then that's what you tell them. It's all about numbers. Usually with quality sites you'll get what you deserve.

Pokerlistings tried to "blackmail" some sites but they failed. So getting more than you deserve is hard, but getting what you really deserve is easier than many think.

haynesey · #4 08-10-2007, 07:54 AM

What would you say is enough players to start negotiating? 40+ a month?

Darko · #5 08-10-2007, 02:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SEO

Pokerlistings tried to "blackmail" some sites but they failed. So getting more than you deserve is hard, but getting what you really deserve is easier than many think.

lol, you know this for a fact do you ?
Also how can anyone blackmail a pokerroom ? (and if you mean they dropped sites because they didnt get the cpa they wanted, then im a blackmailer too ! and so is most other affiliates and companies in ANY industry where you sell advertising)

But to the OP, if you dont ask - you dont get - simple.

You should always ask if you get a fair amount of players, even if its around 25 real money players a month - always worth a try.

But when they approach you, you should just ask whatever you feel is good for you.

PPP · #6 08-10-2007, 04:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darko

lol, you know this for a fact do you ?
Also how can anyone blackmail a pokerroom ?

Everyone knows its a fact. You would have to have had your head in the sand to have not seen their blackmail pages, which lo and behold they removed once they came to terms again.

Negotiating is one thing. Making false claims is another. But of course they make false claims all the time, like their rankings are "objective" rather than just based on the highest bidder.

This path may work okay for one of the top five sites/groups, but smaller affiliates will just be told to screw off if they put up blackmail pages.

Darko · #7 08-10-2007, 04:51 PM

i didnt have my head in the sand..... but i dont see how removing pokerrooms from your site for whatever reason is blackmail. Im mean who hasnt removed a poker room because of payment problems or the cpa/mgr wasnt high enough etc

example PL's AP page.... "PokerListings.com has temporarily suspended the listing of the Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet poker rooms as a result of serious problems with both historical and current payments due PokerListings for services rendered. We are aware that our decision not to list these two brands may be an inconvenience, but as a trusted guide and resource, we do not believe it is appropriate to continue listing them."

So they are saying they do not endorse AP or UB because of payment problems for services rendered...... whats misleading or false info about that ?

Or did they have some other not so nice pages up that i missed ?

And about their rankings, yes its BS, but common, so's prob 95%+ of poker portals ranking lists (including mine), if PAW tomorrow anounced a CPA of $325 for say Ultimet Bet, i would bet most paw affiliates would be promoting them as their no.1 site almost overnight. (most are in this game to make money and didnt just decide to set up a poker site and spend 60+ hours a week to provide what they thought was a real and truthfull ranking list for anyone who visits your site).

Basically i just think what they did wasnt wrong and most do it all the time (im sure a fair few here dropped AP / UB after all the threads of their stats errors)

(Show me a poker affiliate site in your top 25 sites (from your poker seo blog, which i enjoy reading BTW) that has a ranking list where its not BS ?)

edmc · #8 08-10-2007, 05:01 PM

Quote:

PokerListings.com has temporarily suspended the listing of the Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet poker rooms as a result of serious problems with both historical and current payments due PokerListings for services rendered. We are aware that our decision not to list these two brands may be an inconvenience, but as a trusted guide and resource, we do not believe it is appropriate to continue listing them.
Sincerely,
The PokerListings.com Team

PPP · #9 08-10-2007, 06:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darko

example PL's AP page.... "PokerListings.com has temporarily suspended the listing of the Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet poker rooms as a result of serious problems with both historical and current payments due PokerListings for services rendered. We are aware that our decision not to list these two brands may be an inconvenience, but as a trusted guide and resource, we do not believe it is appropriate to continue listing them."

So they are saying they do not endorse AP or UB because of payment problems for services rendered...... whats misleading or false info about that ?

You mean aside from the fact that it is a blatant lie. Seriously what are you suggesting here? That you put up a page about AB, lie that you "do not believe it is appropriate to continue listing them" and lie about the reason... and then when you make a deal for more $ with them, just remove the bullshit?

C'mon, let's be serious here. the US rooms cut their rate. PL reacted with blackmail pages. Sure they can do that, but pretending they didn't do it is silly.

As for the "objective" rankings, yes, only dishonest sites say their rankings are based on objective quality when they are in fact based strictly on payments. Affiliates who do that are rogues who should be shunned and shamed as the bottom-feeding liars they are. The rest of of us are in the business of not lying to our visitors. We try to get visitors/players to trust us... which is in the interest of all legit affiliates everywhere. The liars have a different business model, and they hurt honest affiliates.

Darko · #10 08-11-2007, 07:26 AM

look, i dont want to argue here (theres no point and i have real life family stresses to think about, as i bet you do too), but where is the lie about them removing AP ?

It clearly states, they removed them because of problems with services rendered - seems pretty upfront to me.

Yes i agree PL rankings are a lie and so are 99.9% of everyone else's. Pick any top site and look at the rankings and you will see odd things........

As said before, if PAW came out with a cpa of $350 for any cardroom, almost every paw affiliate would lie and put them as one of their top poker rooms.

Show me a site where you think the rankings are true....... maybe poker news, lets have a look.......

PokerStars - 4.6 / 5 (seems fine)
PartyPoker - 4.1 / 5 (seems a bit low to me)
WorldPokerTour - 5 / 5 (LOL - best card room in the world)
Mansion - 4.8 / 5 (lol - better then PokerStars, FullTilt, PartyPoker )

so according to PokerNews, WorldPokerTour is the best card room in the world..... isnt this a new room / launch ? which make there 5 / 5 ranking even more BS, So PokerNews are liers, Rouges and should be shunned by the community in your eyes (like every other site).

I beleive PL saying that there reviews are objective is wrong, when in fact they are not (i dont make a statement like that on my site) - so i agree its a lie and wrong, but ranking rooms according to $$$ is what everyone does no matter if its launchpoker(they even state you can buy the featured top room for a monthly fee in their media kit), pokerlistings or poker news