For the life of me I don't understand why players don't take advantage of all the opportunities available to them in online poker.  I'm talking about all the free money out there waiting to be claimed.

I'm not talking about 100.00 - 250.00 free rolls with massive fields where you can play for hours and not win a single dime.

I am talking about smaller free rolls with reduced fields, sign up bonuses, refer a friend bonuses, rakeback, special promotions, points tournaments, gold chips and gold cards (at Cake poker sites), Doyle's room first time deposit FREE 27.50 entry, etc etc.  Then you have the OFC tournaments that have individual free rolls plus added forum prizes. The buyin events are usually 5.50 and have added value because of added money and/or tournament tickets.

I would rather play 10 smaller free rolls with under 100 players than one massive one. You get more experience in the smaller ones because your chances of making the final table are greater and that is where the money is and the more experience you have around the bubble and final table the better off you will be when you play money tournaments and reach these levels.

I'm going to walk you through what I would do if I was a new player OR I was a player trying to build a bankroll.

The first thing I would do is never sign up at a new poker site unless I had rakeback and then I would try to get someone to refer me as a friend for those bonuses.

I would save up as much money as I could to take full advantage of the initial sign up bonus.  You can always play freerolls for the practice until you get sufficient funds together.  

The first site I would sign up for is Full tilt.  100 percent first time bonus, refer a friend bonus, Fulltilt Academy, Ironman promotion and other special promotions they run all the time.

Then I would play 60 percent cash games, 30 percent sit and goes and 10 percent MTTS.  I would try to make 50 points per day for 20 days of the month so that I could qualify for the Ironman tournament each month. At the very least I would earn 1 point a day for the month and gain entry to the 2K freeroll OR I would take the 15 medals and not play it. I win at least 25.00 80 percent of the time I play in the ironman each month. The other day I won 450.00 and earlier this month 400.00 which I consider 'bonus' free money.

EVERY time I play a cash game or tournament I put up one of the Poker Academy challenges.  Eventually you will earn enough points to get a free satellite ticket to a very decent MTT and a chance at a big score.

EVERY month I do ONE quiz and qualify for the monthly 5k free roll where it is not difficult to earn at least the minimum amount of 7.50.  By taking advantage of all your opportunities at FT it's like double or triple dipping. You earn regular points (double during happy hours), you earn medals for ironman which can be converted to points or tournament tickets and you have the Fulltilt Academy where you can learn valuable skills as well as earn extra points and money for free.

Look for guaranteed MTT's that have overlays (they are around) which is more bang for your buck.

If you don't want to join FT then join Doyle's room. With a first time deposit of 50.00 you will get a free entry into the 27.50 weekly tournament where you have a chance to win 1,000.00 knocking off one of the 3 pros. Earning points gets you gold chips and gold cards that can be used for satellite events for some very nice guaranteed tournaments. They have a 110 percent first time deposit bonus and if you have the money it's best to deposit as much as you initially can to get the most value as this bonus is good only ONE time at each site!

EDIT: With Doyle's room moving to a new network I cannot recommend them any longer.   If you want another room then go with Pokerstars which has a very good reward system.

There are many other similar opportunities out there at various sites so do some research and find what is best for you.  For any new room I would do a google search first and run like hell if there has ever been any problem with withdrawals.  That is usually a sign of trouble.

Educate yourself. Read the good poker books, watch final table videos of major tournaments at Poker stars, view and participate in the discussions on playing certain hands in this forum and others, go to a table, cash or tournament and watch the play and make NOTES!  You never know when you will run into a player again and having some information on them is unbelievably useful.  Save up your money and buy Pokertracker or Holdem Manager.  Keep records of your play either in a spreadsheet or manually for each day.  Put in as much information as you like and eventually you will see where you are making money and/or losing it.  Then play the games where you show the most profit. Play hands you show the most profit and avoid or limit your play on the hands you are losing with.  Begin by playing ONE cash game or ONE tournament focusing 100 percent on the table.  Don't play unless you are physically and mentally in shape.  There are so many times I have registered for a tournament and have pulled out because I'm tired, didn't really feel like playing or something else came up.  Eventually you can play more than 1 table at a time cutting down on variance and maximizing your profit potential.  

Play within your bankroll! I cannot stress how important this is and finally avoid TILT!  It's ok to walk away when you are losing.  Tomorrow is another day and you may double what you lost today from the horrible beats you suffered. It's ok to walk away a winner as well.  I set goals for myself each day. If I get my 250 points (my goal is at least 15 days at 250 a day at FT) and am up I'm done my cash game/s. If I'm down and haven't taken a beating I continue to play setting a most loss barometer until I win it back.  If I hit my most loss barometer I'm done.  Do I feel crappy?  Yup, but I know tomorrow is another day.  If I'm doing a Poker academy cash game that requires 100 hands and a profit I will quit once I hit my goal and if I'm still short points I'll join another table and continue with another challenge or the same one from the Academy. It's all about maximizing your opportunities. Sometimes I will not quit when I hit my goal because the table is so juicy and I'm winning but as soon as the dynamics change I'm out of there.


I see so many players without a plan bouncing from one free roll to another, making a few dollars (blowing it within a day or two). Why does this happen? Probably because they haven't prepared themselves in the areas I mentioned.

In the last 5 years I have made over 20,000.00 (not including a main event 10k WSOP seat) with the majority of this coming from 'free' money taking advantage of bonuses, points, medals, gold chips and cards etc etc.  And this from a very limited play schedule. I take a LOT of time off from poker.  This is my hobby and it's so much more fun when I can play whenever I feel like it and earn extra cash for taking vacations and buying things I wouldn't have been able to afford without poker.

This post got longer and longer and for those who got this far and have comments or questions fire away. I hope that some will find this information useful.  

All the best and good luck at the tables!



Kash

great article you wrote kash.  let's say you are having  a day where the cards are just not in your favor, or you aren't in the correct mindset.  do you keep playing to get your 50 points per day?

Great post and awesome advice.
I'd like to add one other way as well.
On Pokerhost you can play a step 1 fun money buy in game- top 3  wins a step 2 ticket. top 3 win step 3 ticket and the winner of that game wins 1.00.
this is a really easy way to make a small bankroll and get you started with no restrictions.

yep nice advice---I don't think many FT players take advantage of the academy.  As just a casual user, I've earned over 10000 points which I converted over to regular FT points.  Especially in the beginning, most of the sng and mtt challenges are pretty easy to get done.

I posted something about the Academy at Rakereport and/or Pokernations over a year ago and it seems that it didn't change anything lol.  Or maybe you were the one true converter?

As a matter of fact, I have almost 8000 points and have cashed 5000 for regular points or if I remember correctly I used the Academy points for a buy-in ticket because it cost less than the regular points.  When converting you need to look at the cost of a ticket with normal points vs Academy points. 


Kash

LOL, yer funny.  But thanks for the formality of politeness.  Obviously you can dispense with that from here on out.


Well, actually, maybe I shouldn't let you link my standings in fantasy football... but other than that...

Hi Kashuskay

I have a small beef with the issue of Sign Up Bonuses which you mentioned and recommended here.  Plenty of innocent newbies don't understand how they operarte nor the appallingly slow rate at which the sites release those bonuses.

Can you therefore using your example of FT sign up bonus (which is current $600) lay out the reality of how many hands a newbie would have to play before all of the bonus was released.  You'll have to assume some realistic average amount of rake per hand.   It would help also if you can state the figures if a player can only break even, or can only make a small profit.  Also would be good to state the numbers if the newbie is a losing player.

Thanks

absolutely, ....important aspect of taking advantage of various promotions at various sites, is to "comparison shop" within that promotion to get the best deal
equally important is reading all the fine print associated with any given program or promotion to find what's the best option for you as participation/use of some things may affect your true returns (like rakeback affected by point usage at FT) ....

as far a FTP Academy goes.... there's 100% no rhyme or reason for anyone NOT to have a (pertinent to what you're playing at the time) challenge active for every hand played....
 it's free extra points for what you're doing anyway, and often, waaaay more points than you earn through rake for the time played to complete the challenge

 I got a couple tourny tickets from academy and they were at cheaper rate than in the reg FT store .... extra free points for play I was engaged in anyhow, AND got the pts at about 10:1 rate compared to rake earned, AND when spent they got items at discounted rate....

i unfortunately cant get rakeback at FT, and I'm not sure how Academy pts redemption affects it....but I think even if you have rakeback and redeeming the pts neg. affects it, still a good idea to do the challenges and rack up a ton of pts, never know what may happen to rakeback structure/rules in the future..... or you could buy a car with em or something




on a sidenote.... JBaker just sent me an email

   if you get one from him immediately delete it

     trust me, you DONT want to open it

         you just can't unsee some things   

Welcome, sir. Good to have you here.

for US players..... since negatively affecting your rakeback is no longer a concern, prob a good time to use up those FTPs, medals, academy points ect (if it's even allowed to do that now ?)