PokerStars

[Notspot]

Yesterday I sent this all over to Becky at CalvinAyre.com and they got a story out today, thanks to them for that.

PokerStars Embarks on Gambling Affiliate Cull | Online Poker News : CalvinAyre.com

Thanks MJ & Becky.

Pokerstars closing affiliate account? - Poker News - News, Views and Gossip

[adioking]

I'm not frequently in here, but this is quite a hot topic, or should be.

Our affiliate account was terminated as well. According to the affiliate manager Ryan Harper, for predatory reasons under section 8.4 of the terms and conditions (which I never recall agreeing to):

8.4. We may terminate this Agreement at any time on 7 days' written notice.

Source - https://www.pokerstarspartners.com/p...onditions.html

This is absolutely ludacris and we have a large pool of players working under revenue share only, a pool that took 3 years to generate. We didn't want to come out publicly about it just yet because we weren't sure if the incident was isolated or not, and it seems that it isn't. I have no problem working on CPA if that is what needed to happen, and we are more than capable of sending nice numbers. I think this situation alone is going to spur some adaptation in our business and turn up the heat on getting even more traffic.

Here is the letter we received:
http://www.bestoddscorp.com/wp-conte...etter-2014.pdf

Best wishes to everyone regarding this matter.

[adioking]

P.S. If any of you are in Las Vegas for G2E, I'm having people over for an insane must-attend party over at my place. Details here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/1507112096195201/

[shishan]

Is this really all that surprising considering that they didn't pay FT affiliates when they bought FT? Still not sure how they got away with that.

[war10ck]

what we need to do is band together as affiliates and come up with our own form letter and alert the new owner that we are removing PokerStars from our websites. thats all we can do. we need to get the word out and get as many affiliates on board with this as possible.

if you are a big affiliate earning from them right now thinking this doesnt affect me, think again. after what they just pulled it can happen to anyone and probably will.

this is the danger any time a company gets bought out. things like this can and usually do happen. some bean counter and/or attorney said hey look at how much money we could be saving. they think they are invincible and dont need affiliates. lets see if theyre right.

clay

[TheMan99]

The big problem to unite all affiliates against PokerStars is that people still earn decent money on PokerStars. However, you can either fight back now, or you can wait till you dont send more than 5 customers a month and wait for PokerStars to close your account.

I can see why its so hard for affiliates to unite, and thats why big sites like PokerStars keep doing shit like this. However, PokerStars will get a wake up call they will never forget when they start asking marketers to promote Betting and Casino. Sure its great to have monopoly on Poker, but Good luck competing with bet365 ect. on Betting and Casino with the bad reputation they have now.

I dont get why anyone would ever promote PokerStars or FTP, when you only get revenue on one of the sites when they cross sell the database. Thats the real scam, and why you should never even consider promoting Stars or FTP.

In general, PokerStars want risk free rev share deals, but when they dont get enough new customers, they forget why they did rev share deals to start with, and start complaints that we earn to much. Hallo PokerStars, thats the deal. If you cant live with that, then only do CPA. But hey, PokerStars dont trust in the traffic we send, and thats why PokerStars do rev share deals. You know, the deal where we cover ALL the cost at the beginning when the players have bonusses ect ect. When we dont expect to earn anything, but belive that SOME of the players in the long term can generate a profit of the money we have invested to promote your site. So when Poker.org sent 1000 of new players, Poker.org was one of the main reason PokerStars had the liquidity to take the site to where it is today.

It seems that new customers is the big focus, but let me tell you how you DONT get affiliates to send you more new players. Yes, closing affiliates is not the way. How about redefine how to work with affiliates and encourage affiliates to work harder and smarter to send you more sign ups? Mabye you should consider why affiliates dont send PokerStars as many new players anymore. Mabye lots of the affiliates dont like to send players to PokerStars and then see them moved to FTP with 0% in earnings.

And yes, most of the big affiliates PokerStars have been working with over the years are now doing Casino and Betting. Well, I would love to see the replys when PokerStars start to contact the old affiliates that have been closed.

[corpfan1]

What affiliates should do is band together for an all out media blitz about the situation...

Governments, companies and other affiliates need to know about this.


I don't promote Stars - but hope that affiliates that do have solid backup plans.

[rbc21]

I had my account closed as well. I referred them a ton of players and I was an affiliate of them since around 2004.

[adioking]

This has very little to do with anything but predatory terms and conditions. Look, ever since I began affiliating in like 2004, we all stuck together and thwarted off any predatory companies. Sites like CasinoMeister made their entire business plan based on negative reviews of crap companies that take advantage of people.

The fact of the matter here is that we referred Pokerstars and Full Tilt ("Amaya") players, and we made an agreement with them to be paid for these players. At minimum, a commission buyout is in order for such traffic. I'm open to working with them still, but that option will quickly diminish based on how they react. They've done wonderful things in the wake of bearish situations in the iGaming industry, and have moved mountains to get Full Tilt Poker back in action as a brand. The way that Rational Gaming handled the situation after Black Friday was nothing short of angelic, and the poker community was blessed to get their hard earned money back into their pocket.

Sure, affiliates got the shaft, but that's also business. When I bought my gas station I used the same moves, I'm buying the assets and not the entire company. It was a "real estate deal" where the land I bought happened to have a building, canopy, and gas tanks on it. The previous owner tried to charge me for the fuel left in the tanks and I told him its hazardous waste so write me a check and get it pumped out lol.

This last move however, was a bad one. Amaya is playing poker with us guys, and they're making a strong play here. The play is advanced - they cut off the affiliates that are sending less than the amount of players it would take to justify the revenue share that they're paying, simple as that. They are not accounting for the potential growth or future relationships with these affiliates, and they know that large affiliates, no matter the relationship with the exiled affiliates, will not go anywhere because they have a huge player pool and are only guaranteed the same fate if they stop promoting Pokerstars.

As I said, its predatory terms and conditions that controls the entire affiliate market for PokerStars right now.

[Notspot]

I take back everything I said. I'm pretty annoyed now.