Latest Trends in Social Poker - Twittering and Facebooking Poker
Social media like Twitter, Facebook, and Friendfeed is finding its way into the world of poker. Social media sites and poker sites are starting to blur the lines.
Poker Going Social
Poker has always been a social game, but these days being social means something entirely different from what it did in the past. These days, if you can't update your status, then you're not social. Some online poker sites have started to look for ways to make their sites more social media oriented. These sites began by allowing players to create their own nicknames and avatars, but that's only the very tip of the iceberg. Sites like PKR.com have created their own complete social media site. Players signed up to PKR can upload photos, update their status, and send messages to friends. Moreover, the site offers articles that people can read, and like in Facebook, whatever you can read, you can comment on. Turning a poker site into a full social media experience might be the next way to market poker, but other sites have different strategies.
Poker Over Facebook
Facebook has several different poker applications, and it's only a matter of time until those applications start to see millions of players. Moreover, unlike most online poker, Facebook's online poker doesn't make money from cash games with a rake. Instead, they make money by advertising in the margins of their application. In fact, players can play for free with no deposit ever and win cash prizes on Facebook.
Poker Over Twitter
It's hard to imagine how a poker client could use Twitter to make a poker game run, but someone's already working on it. It's only a matter of time before you can tweet your bets, raises, folds, and calls. How to make money on Twittering a poker game is a whole different issue, but yo ucan be certain that someone will find a way to capitalize on it!
How Poker Sites are Using Social Media
It's easy to see how social media is a real boon to poker sites. With companies like Google and Yahoo refusing to run poker advertisements, any way of reaching out to potential players is fantastic. Sites can announce tournaments over Twitter, and players interested in the tournament will re-tweet the announcement. Creating Facebook fan pages is also a great way for an online poker room to attract new players. All a poker site needs to do is make a fun fanpage and invite all of their players to become fans. All of the players' families and friends will see the notice and be drawn to the site's fanpage. If a site puts interesting or fun news on the fanpage or runs a contest that non-players can win without ever signing up, poker site operators can be certain that they will generate a lot of interest. In fact, since Google stopped allowing gaming sites to advertise, social media is the best thing ever to happen to online poker advertising.