Arkansas Gambler

I invited Mark from Sit and Go Planet to do a guest blog post on here. Mark is truly one of the funnest guys I know and a great example of an poker affiliate. I am honored to have Mark come on here and write, and after reading his post if you have not laughed then you are dead inside! Thanks again Mark!

Saw Randy’s invitation for topics here on this excellent blog and thought it would be a great opportunity to show readers who are not fully immersed in the Poker Affiliate Business what a typical day for an affiliate is like. This particular affiliate somehow contrived to end up more than 1000 miles from his English home in Budapest, Hungary… and then equally accidentally became a poker affiliate… so without further ado, here is a typical Monday from start to end.

8:00 AM: Alarm beeps and off we go, shambling like a zombie first to the kitchen, where I make a nice strong cup of tea, and then to my home study to switch on my laptop.

8:30 AM: By now I have usually completed the first task of the day, which is deleting all the e-mails received overnight from Lucky Ace Partners. Next I’ll usually check the sign-ups at the larger sites for the previous day – a task which also includes being completely baffled by the ‘special magical random number reporting system’ (also known as PAW).

9:15 AM: A kiss goodbye for my beautiful other half, who sleeps in each morning to properly recover from the previous day’s shopping… and we are off.

9:30 AM: After a short tram journey I’ll arrive in the office and put the kettle on for a nice cup of tea. We have a fantastic location just 50 meters from the bank of the river Danube… shame we are on the inside really… still – the view of those 3 steps and wheely-bin kind of grows on you. At this point I’ll sketch out the days major tasks and people to contact in my trusty ‘things to do’ notepad.

10:00 AM: Anna and Corina arrive, my job is to start up the coffee machine for a good strong caffine boost. We are all in the same room so it is usually a matter of turning the chairs round and going through the to-do list. One of the complicating factors is that the biggest site is in several languages, meaning it is possible several of us could have been working on different bits. The game of ‘which updates are where’ is always fun with the risk of losing stuff always present.

Anna is Polish and also speaks native level Russian (and fantastic English too), while Corina is Romanian and now learning Hungarian and also speaks English. Having British genes the part of my brain dedicated to foreign languages is sadly absent, replaced by an enlarged drinking-cortex.

We now get on with the day to day of building up our portfolio of sites, writing new content, link building and all that good stuff. The ladies are both brilliant and do not require micro-managing, though they apparently live in fear of the dreaded (and common) exclamation from me…. “I’ve got an idea!”

11:30 AM: I’ll usually grab a nice big cup of tea and take 10 minutes to browse the poker affiliate forums. Starting with PAL where a large community of successful affiliates pretend to like each other while avoiding the ever present danger called the ‘Badgers-Boot’ which quickly stamps out any semblance of wooly thinking…. And then PAP, where the moderators debate the age-old question of exactly which bit is their ass and which bit their elbow (with lots of smileys ;o) ).

12:30 PM; After finishing up a delicious cup of tea I’ll head out to the local Chinese Buffet for a take-away lunch… usually the Schechuan Chirke (Chicken) with Riz (Rice)… for less than $3 and damn tasty too… prefer taking it back to the office to torture the ladies with the smell, and of course brewing a big milky cup of tea to wash it down with.

1:00 PM: The squeal of the gate tells us that Erika has arrived, and the cry of ‘Fucking Muppets’ (followed by a tale of a dumb shop assistant / bank clerk / utility call centre etc) reveals it to be true… Erika is in fact the same lady I said farewell to during the morning, and with at least 1 decent row each day being 100% living proof that I was completely wrong and you were right dear…. Except we are engaged, own the limited company together and, well, Erika is the one who knows how stuff works… talking important stuff here…. Dreamweaver, ftp clients and domains and SEO and, well, everything really. Erika is Hungarian and speaks fluent English and a little of several other languages (yeah, I know, and we thought our crappy Western education systems were actually good…. trust me, we were wrong!).

1:20 PM: By now I have explained the priorities to Erika, who has totally ignored me and got on with something else. Time for a strong cup of tea.

2:30 PM: Another break in the content / creation / optimization routine for more coffee and a browse of the poker forums. I’m probably unique among affiliates in not thinking of poker as something cool, in fact I’ll happily acknowledge that my interest peaked after 6 months of playing back in early 2006 and has been waning ever since. While I read the forums, news sites and magazines I’m holding 99% of players in contempt (the other 1% are already beneath it). No harm in playing for fun, and my 1st degree in Psychology always has me trying to get into the minds of these pathetic kids, Man, when I was young we used to…(Cut!)… best make a nice cup of tea.

4:00 PM: Anna and Corina are leaving us now after working hard, Anna is especially good with the network of translators we have working for us (the ladies in the office are too busy to do anything but the smallest pieces, so we have people in several countries to contact for this work, most of them excellent). When one guy sent back some sloppy work his pay was immediately docked – and he sent the next pieces double quick and double-great to make up for it… great, I’d have done it the British way myself, mildly grumbled and asked for better quality next time, if you would be so kind…

5:00 PM: More tea, more content, more websites more, erm, tea. Possibly still time for one more row with Erika too (hey, we get on great between rows!)

6:00 PM: Time for my run, well 3 or 4 times each week anyway. Our office is next to a bridge which leads to a huge island in the middle of the Danube called the ‘Margrit Island’, around this is a 5.3 KM soft running track which is hugely popular… love a quick lap to think of ideas, plan strategy, get my heart and lungs working and occasionally do a quick survey which confirms my suspicions that there are very few ladies running on the island with asses as nice as Erika’s… ah, no, did I say very few? Slip of the typing fingers, I meant none…none at all, zero, zip…. Doh!

7:15 PM: Sometimes I’ll stay in the office after this and sometimes not, depends on the day and agenda and how many more Lucky Ace e-mails there are to delete… as long as there is tea I can keep going… poker affiliation is a great industry and full of great people, if you are thinking of taking the plunge then I urge you to come on in… plenty of room still.

Hope you enjoyed the insight into my day – you are all welcome to stop by and check out the number #1 online resource dedicated to SNGs, Satellites and Poker Tournaments anytime!!

By: Mark – SNG Planet