Rakeback on smaller sites

[smackinyaup]

Hey everyone I've seen a couple threads lately on rakeback but didn't want to hijack them.

After searching through the forums I've gotten the impression that it actually is possible for us little guys to offer rakeback on our sites. For the longest time I thought rakeback was only feasible for big sites that can afford the time and expense of tracking all the rake and making payments...and for negotiating deals with the poker rooms in the first place.

But I've seen threads mentioning automated rakeback payments straight from the poker rooms and I've also seen posts that mention something about signing up through superaffiliates to offer rakeback to your players.

If you've seen my site, it focuses on advanced strategy for serious no limit players and I really think it could land some big time players. The only problem is the people that my content targets probably already know about rakeback.

The other problem is after reading that huge CPA/Rev Share vs Rakeback debate I'm not even sure if I should consider rakeback in the first place.

Cliff notes:

If I want to offer rakeback on my site, where can I go to learn more? I tried searching already but if there's another thread somewhere let me know.

Should I even waste my time with that now? I'm getting like 30 hits a day. I don't mind taking a short term pay cut if it means better things in the future but still...should I really spend time on that yet?

PS - One more question: What's wrong with rakeback sites telling people to clear cookies / uninstall software? I would never want to poach another affiliate's players but wouldn't it be really bad if you promised people rakeback and then they didn't get it because of a 4 month old cookie?

[stiankr]

PM me and we can have a chat. Think i can guide you on this one. About the clearing cookies thing: My personal opinion is that every affiliate should do that. If a player signs up through you, you should get credit for him, even if he clicked a full tilt ad 8 months ago.

[mjmurphy53711]

If I had your site I would absolutely be offering rakeback, see pokertrikz dot com for an example of how mixing training and rakeback could work.

Yes, automated rakeback is easy but you don't have to stop there: Sub under a superaffiliate and you have automated rakeback at all the major rooms as well.

PM me if you need any advice, I just recently went through this process myself and if you were to look at my site you would notice that I have a mixture of both rooms under a superaffiliate and some automated rakeback rooms as well.

[mjmurphy53711]

Originally Posted by smackinyaup

PS - One more question: What's wrong with rakeback sites telling people to clear cookies / uninstall software? I would never want to poach another affiliate's players but wouldn't it be really bad if you promised people rakeback and then they didn't get it because of a 4 month old cookie?

The flood gates will open in this thread now, your thread will likely derail in a few minutes.

[PPP]

Originally Posted by smackinyaup

What's wrong with rakeback sites telling people to clear cookies / uninstall software? I would never want to poach another affiliate's players but wouldn't it be really bad if you promised people rakeback and then they didn't get it because of a 4 month old cookie?

This isn't a rakeback question. Any affiliate site that messes with the tracking of cardrooms is likely to not be looked on favorably by the cardroom. Suggesting uninstalling will sometimes directly violate terms, but it is always an encouragement to rip off cardrooms. Ripping off other affiliates is secondary to the cardrooms. Obviously the cardroom doesn't want to pay a new signup bonus to a player every time one affiliate snatches a player from another affiliate, and again that has nothing to do with rakeback. It's just as bad for a CPA affiliate to suggest it.

Cookies are different, but you make no friends with cardrooms suggesting that, since you are more likely clearing a cardroom's own cookie than anybody elses.

[stiankr]

Originally Posted by PPP

This isn't a rakeback question. Any affiliate site that messes with the tracking of cardrooms is likely to not be looked on favorably by the cardroom. Suggesting uninstalling will sometimes directly violate terms, but it is always an encouragement to rip off cardrooms. Ripping off other affiliates is secondary to the cardrooms. Obviously the cardroom doesn't want to pay a new signup bonus to a player every time one affiliate snatches a player from another affiliate, and again that has nothing to do with rakeback. It's just as bad for a CPA affiliate to suggest it.

Cookies are different, but you make no friends with cardrooms suggesting that, since you are more likely clearing a cardroom's own cookie than anybody elses.

Well, i personaly dont see any problems with asking the player to clear cookies before downloading. If you are the site that actually made the player sign up, then you deserve the credits for him, even if he has clicked an ad in the past.

About asking people to uninstall the software, thats a hole different area in my opinion.

[mjmurphy53711]

I absolutely agree with you stiankr, and the "uninstall" argument makes sense because someone had to probably play a freeroll or something at that point, and that would be stealing.

However, PPP and many many others consider it stealing if their cookie doesn't = conversion, even if you did all the work or gave the player the actual desire to signup and deposit.

In my eyes, account creation or depositing = conversion not clicking someone's banner be it on purpose or an accident.

[Beanie]

Originally Posted by PPP

This isn't a rakeback question. Any affiliate site that messes with the tracking of cardrooms is likely to not be looked on favorably by the cardroom. Suggesting uninstalling will sometimes directly violate terms, but it is always an encouragement to rip off cardrooms. Ripping off other affiliates is secondary to the cardrooms. Obviously the cardroom doesn't want to pay a new signup bonus to a player every time one affiliate snatches a player from another affiliate, and again that has nothing to do with rakeback. It's just as bad for a CPA affiliate to suggest it.

Cookies are different, but you make no friends with cardrooms suggesting that, since you are more likely clearing a cardroom's own cookie than anybody elses.

This is one of the things I have a huge problem with because so many rakeback sites have it right on their sites which I think is ridiculous. What do the sites do to combat this? Nothing, in fact, most of those people are being rewarded with monstrous freerolls.

Which is another point. The same people that are doing all of these huge rake races these days were the same people whining about caps being needed for rakeback. I remember Dominique pointing out the irony of them complaining considering they changed the price equation and ultimately gained a lot of customers because of it.

None of this really affects me since this isn't the way I compete but it strikes me as odd that cards rooms set a cap and then essentially direct all of the business to a few places by allowing people to give more than the cap by doing huge monthly rake races.

Rant over.

[Beanie]

Originally Posted by mjmurphy53711

I absolutely agree with you stiankr, and the "uninstall" argument makes sense because someone had to probably play a freeroll or something at that point, and that would be stealing.

However, PPP and many many others consider it stealing if their cookie doesn't = conversion, even if you did all the work or gave the player the actual desire to signup and deposit.

In my eyes, account creation or depositing = conversion not clicking someone's banner be it on purpose or an accident.

Actually that isn't what PPP is saying, he is saying most of the card rooms have a rule against it. Though they don't seem to enforce it since so many sites have it directly on their site how to do this.

[PPP]

Originally Posted by mjmurphy53711

I absolutely agree with you stiankr, and the "uninstall" argument makes sense because someone had to probably play a freeroll or something at that point, and that would be stealing.

However, PPP and many many others consider it stealing if their cookie doesn't = conversion, even if you did all the work or gave the player the actual desire to signup and deposit.

In my eyes, account creation or depositing = conversion not clicking someone's banner be it on purpose or an accident.

Stop being a argumentative long enough to read other people's posts instead of making up stuff. It is the CARDROOM that decides how credit is given. I don't care how they decide. I follow their rules, which leads to good relationships with cardrooms. Running around circumventing their tracking leads to poor relationships at best, and closed accounts at worst.

"In my eyes" is navel gazing. It doesn't make any difference what you think. It's what the cardroom thinks. You agree to follow their terms and conditions. You can think they are dumb terms, or just not like them, but if you agree to follow them and then don't, you have to face the consequences.

It's all just silly to get worked up over anyway. Most places have bonus codes that overide cookies. If an affiliate can't get a player to fill in the bonus code area, they certainly have no special claim that they should get credit for the player.

Cookies work both ways. Pokerlistings converts many players every day for other affiliates, and vice versa. that mostly works itself out in the wash, except smaller affiliates get the best of it if they literally tell a person to enter a bonus code to override cookies.