First Time Player Poker Website Guide
10 Tips to Starting Out
The first time you play online poker, it can be a bit overwhelming. With time and a little bit of first hand know how it will become second nature. Before you know it playing two, three, four or even more tables at once will seem like nothing. But, at first no matter who you are there are a few things you’ll want to know before taking the leap and playing at a poker website. We have extended articles for new players and new online poker players at our poker questions for new players webpage.
1. First time poker players are usually drawn in by what seem to be lucrative promotions. The expression, “Nothing in life is free” especially applies to poker websites. For every little bonus, free tournament, or cash giveaway you’ll have to do something to get the promotion. Usually it comes in the form of playing what the poker site refers to as “raked hands”. This is how the poker website makes money and pays for your “free” money. Some websites give away their bonuses at faster rates, some will make you sick how long it takes to get a small portion of your sign-up bonus.
2. Where should you call your poker home? Like we show you on our homepage, pokerwebsites.com, it’s completely your preference. We built a state of the art sorting system to help you with your choice and are the only ones to have an advance charting system to let you specify what fits your need. Most players will tend to choose a site with the most traffic, which is a good way to start. After all, a poker site will have a lot of customers for a reason.
3. Putting money into your account to play with isn’t rocket science, but it can be one of the biggest deterrence to playing online. Unless you are a lucky one and a credit card is easily used, or you have the option of echeck there is a good chance you’ll have to open up an account at what they call an “ewallet”. Usually they require a lot of verification such as utility bills, social security numbers, and bank accounts. It a major pain in the butt, although once it’s done all is good. Hopefully you’re a lucky one and a credit card works for you but because of US gaming laws, they can be difficult to deposit with.
4. Start out slow and your bankroll will last. There is no time-out in online poker. The game goes quick, and if you’re not paying attention you can auto-fold winning hands or check the nuts. I’ve seen it countless times where people check down the best possible hand because they were playing too many tables at once “multi-tabling”. Maybe if you’re not accustomed to playing online, play a few hands at the fake money tables just to get accustomed to how the software works. I have included an article on how to stop tilt because I believe it to be one of the most important aspects to winning online.
5. Fraud and cheating will always be an issue with online poker. The most common case is called colluding. This is where two or more people tell each other what hand they have via the telephone or chatting system so they can get an edge at the table. At higher stakes fraud is usually easily detected by better players but it’s just one of those things that does go on, but it shouldn’t scare you away from playing online. You will eventually sit at a cheating table, but the percentage of doing so isn’t very high.
6. There are many different software tools that people use to help their game. The most popular is called pokertracker. I’m not a big “analysis” fan so I don’t use any of these programs. Most high stakes pros swear by them so they can keep track of other players betting patterns and find holes in their own games. If you’re into Sit and Go poker games then I suggest sharkscope. It shows you how much your opponents have won or lost over their lifetime of playing online at that poker site, pretty cool.
7. Play tournaments that have overlays. An overlay is basically a tournament that needs to fill up past a certain amount of players, for example 100 players for the guaranteed prize pool to be reached of $10,000. Many times only 50 or 60 people will play, so the poker website has to fund the rest of the tournament. This means you are playing against less players for the same amount of prize money. They are great finds but usually only occur at newer poker sites.
8. You can spot tells with poker players online. The most common tell is when a player almost lets the time run out, then raises you. This can usually mean the other player has a very large hand. There are some good resources online where you can find a whole slew of poker tells.
9. If you get disconnected or your internet goes out you’re pretty much out of luck. It happens to everyone at one point in time where a power outage or bad internet connection will cost you money. The one good thing is that it DOES happen to everyone so it will usually work to your advantage a few times as well.
10. Cashing out is simple and you can usually have your money in a few days. I always use Fed-Ex to get my money, but there is usually a $50 fee to get the money fast. In most cases you can’t put money back onto your bank card if that is the way you deposited. Snail mail checks are free but take a few days.
These 10 tips should get you started. Remember, online poker is a different game than playing live. Take your time, ease into it and you’ll soon find that playing at poker websites is a great experience.
Author: Joseph Falchetti
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