Dealer Dan, pictured here with WWE Superstar Mick Foley, has been in internet marketing since 1996. He likes hugs, long walks on the beach, and making money while wearing his jammy jams. For more information, you can read all 
Welcome to Thank Lockouts It’s Monday. Seriously – I absolutely love lockouts. The NBA lockout last year and the NHL Lockout this season.
It’s great for a couple of reasons:
(1) It makes me appreciate the sports season that much more when it does come back. I forget how much I missed watching it.
(2) As an affiliate who relies on income from sports betting it is fantastic. You go from sweating bullets to making money overnight and it’s a great feeling.
I mean it’s sports overload at the moment. NHL, NBA, NFL(although as a Patriots fan who gives a crap now), Soccer, MMA – the list goes on. Just a fantastic time, and how can we not be thankful for that!
My Latest Pet Project:
I enjoy running websites. I’ve been building and running websites since 1996. In the early days I didn’t make a dime from the websites – and I didn’t care! I just love doing it. The purpose of those websites was never to make money – I just loved creating a site, improving it and honestly getting a good feeling knowing I was providing information people were looking for.
Usually once per year, I start up a website like that. While my ultimate goal is to make money from the site – I start a site where it’s my own pet project. I handle practically everything myself – from the coding to the graphics to the content. Sure the graphics end up sucking but I don’t care – it’s just fun as hell doing it.
Last year I ran the BetEuro2012.org website for Euro 2012, and this year I’ve went with the sports betting niche again, however decided to go country specific. I’m working with my business partner Scott on this one, and the website is BetNHL.ca.
It’s so fun doing it. The lockout ended on Sunday January 6th, and I had a business meeting with Scott on the Monday to talk about future projects. We headed to a wing place, sat down and started going through the list of domains I owned. The list was in alphabetical order and we got to BetNHL.ca before we stopped – we knew this was the website we’d be launching.
I mean really – sitting down for beers and wings, and debating over who is going to win the Western Conference, or who is going to take home the Rocket Richard trophy(Stamkos is a lock!) – and it’s a BUSINESS meeting?
That’s what life is all about.
The site actually got off to a great head-start too, ranking high for betting tips on Day 1 and actually got our first depositor. I think that’s a new record for me. Even better – Scott is new to affiliate marketing, so I’ve been explaining a lot to him about sports betting tips websites. It’s inspired me to write a few articles on here about sports betting tips so I’ll hopefully get off my arse this week and do just that.
Irony At It’s Finest:
We made the decision to promote Bodog Canada as our #1 sportsbook. The reasoning for this was simple: the site is focused on Canadians, and Bodog actually have sponsorship on TSN Sportscentre. Really a no-brainer there as our target market is already familiar and trustworthy of the brand name.
Now a lot of people are simply petrified to bet sports online, so I decided to do a video. The video was simple – to show people how easy it was to deposit at Bodog. It would be a quick step-by-step guide showing me depositing. Not only would it explain how easy it was to deposit, but it would show that I trusted Bodog myself, if I was willing to deposit money there.
So I started doing the video, made my deposit to Bodog…..
…and my money disappeared.
poof* Gone, just like that. Left my Moneybookers account, yet didn’t make it Bodog.
Seriously – what the hell?
This frustrated the hell out of me. I personally don’t care – I know I’ll get my money back no problem, but I can just imagine someone betting sports online for the first time having this occur to them. That’s not good at all, and would put them off depositing online forever.
Customer service were no good either. First telling me it would take 48 hours, then coming back with various different excuses – my favourite one being “Your bank blocked the transaction”. Yeah that’s great – except the money came from my Moneybookers balance. My bank had absolutely nothing to do with the transaction.
Apparently it was a “freak time out incident”. I really do hope so. I trust Bodog completely – I’m not bashing them at all here as I just think this was a funny story more than anything else – but it definitely is concerning.
Hopefully I’ll get my money sorted soon, then I’ll be getting some friends to test with deposits to make sure this doesn’t happen to them.
And It Gets Better:
This all occured on Friday night. So I went to bed, woke up and ran StatsRemote as I usually do. And what happened? Overnight my Bodog Affiliate Account went into the red, with a casino player winning thousands of dollars!
Now this was nothing but a horrible coincidence, but it really was amusing. It brought back good memories of being a beginning poker player and expierencing the “cashout curse”. Remember that? You’d withdraw and then the RNG would PUNISH you for withdrawing – or at least that’s what it felt like.
I talk to a lot of new poker players regularly, and they like to tell me the “cashout curse” still exists. And for those ex-poker players you’ll be glad to know that “Riverstars” is still a common title for Pokerstars.
Good times. I need to play more often – I miss that paranoia.
Off to Mexico:
Unfortunately I won’t be attending the London Affiliate Conference this year, because I’m heading off to Cancun. I mean don’t get me wrong – traveling 10 hours to pissing rain and snow while being stalked and harassed by Israeli affiliate managers IS sort of appealing – but I think going to sunny weather in an all-inclusive resort and playing bar golf is just a tad better.
So I won’t be around next week. I’m hoping to write a few AB articles to schedule while I’m away but no promises.
Prior to a vacation is my favourite time though – I do up a “pre-vacation to do list” and just hammer away at it. Honestly I get almost as much enjoyment from doing that as I do while on vacation itself. It’s just a great feeling destroying a to do list, and allows me to enjoy teh vacation that much year.
Have a great 2 weeks – I know I will!
This article was written on January 21, 2013 however all articles are looked at on a monthly basis and updated to keep them relevant.
If you need to contact Graeme, please see his Contact Page. If you are an affiliate manager wanting promoted please see this page.
