Yesterday I turned 24, it was also the day that I got some great news, wrote a controversial blog post and had my most productive day in months. I’ve taken several steps to becoming more focused, but as we all know these things don’t happen over night.

I want to thank everyone that wished me a Happy Birthday. I got a phone call from a friend that I hadn’t spoken to in years along with a whole host of Birthday wishes from friends and gambling affiliates.

I’d like everyone to know that I have seen the Birthday wishes on PAL, I thought it would be a bit rude to snob those wishing me a Happy Birthday.

It is a bit ironic that a thread was started, after I left PAL. But in all seriousness, I have met some great friends through affiliate forums and I’m thankful people found the time to wish me a great day. I did have a great day, so thanks

I’d like to make a few comments to follow up from yesterday’s post about the sheep dynamic at PAL. My Skype was burning hot all afternoon and night, it was still burning when I woke up.

Upon reflection, I think the general consensus is that I’ve been too harsh on Brandon, not harsh enough on Greg and didn’t explain myself well enough in terms of Jeremy.

Brandon Berndt Revisited

Like I said in the original post, Brandon has always been good to me and I think he’s a good guy. When I think more about the Chan situation and the role he played there, I think I was too harsh. He was just a normal affiliate manager and was looking to cut his break in the industry.

My argument was that people wasted a lot of time and money because they were following him, but at the same time Johnny Chan is a big name in poker and it would have attracted this kind of publicity anyway. Brandon has always been the non-marketer type and has leveraged his contacts (in a good way), to get where he is.

That being said, the Aced program is a completely different can of worms. He was in charge of the affiliate operation, and must have known full well that the program sucked. Affiliates were telling their players 6 months in advance not to play there and if affiliates were not biased towards Brandon it would never have received that much publicity.

It’s not Brandon’s fault that he’s a popular guy, but at the same time this situation has been dealt with poorly. Affiliates are sick of getting shafted, the manager pissing off until it all settles down and returning with a new program.

The point that I have been trying to make for a long time now, and one that should be perfectly clear now is that gambling affiliates need to make rational decisions. It isn’t rational to assume because Brandon is in charge that it is going to be a success. It isn’t rational to think that if you promote the BB & GP programs that you will be rolling in cash.

If Brandon and Greg want to take all of the free publicity and herd sheep to their new programs, than they must take some responsibility for the outcome.

It really is that simple. They are heralded as gambling messiahs and everyone follows them around, but when something goes wrong, where are they? Where is the transparency?

Greg Powell Revisited

I’ve only been in this industry for a few months over 2 years. That is why Greg scored a 0/2, with a 0/3 in the works. Since that post I’ve found out that Powell’s record is more like 0/7 or 0/8.

The difference between Brandon and Greg is that Brandon doesn’t get involved in the marketing hype much. So I guess it was unfair to put him in that category. I do apologise to Brandon for that.

In Powell’s case though, marketing hype is his domain. I don’t particularly want to harp on about this, because honestly I don’t have too many positive things to say other than he’s done well to make a lot of money.

Greg has always been fair to me on the few times we have talked. He has tried to contact me, but I’m not overly interested in talking to the people involved. This is not an attack on Greg, but allowing everyone to see the facts that should be readily available.

The Point Reiterated

Let me reiterate the point. It is that gambling affiliates shouldn’t follow GP and BB like lost puppies. With records like 0/2 and a possible 0/7 or 0/8, affiliates need to make rational decisions. Not based on the BEST AFFILIATE PROGRAM EVER!!!! hype.

Jeremy Enke Revisited

Jeremy is a guy that I have a lot of respect for and we have always got along well. He is also one of the most diplomatic characters you’ll ever see.

The way the system is set up, the hype can be geared and targeted in whatever manner he pleases. It also gives him the option of throwing up his hands and saying it has nothing to do with him and the forum is in the hands of the users.

We all have friends in this industry, but a certain level of accountability and transparency has to occur in situations like these, IMO. Berdnt and Powell need to be treated like any other affiliate manager. Not given a free reign with no accountability. Other affiliate managers are held accountable for their actions, why aren’t they?

Focus Manifesto

Moving on from the negative energy, I’ve found a great site written by Zen Habits author Leo Babuta. Focus Manifesto has opened my eyes up to a lot of things.

In the past few weeks I have been disconnecting from Facebook more and more. I deleted almost all gambling affiliates from my account. I don’t need to be hearing about work in my private life and vice-versa. The problem I had was that I have 3 different kinds of audiences; friends, family and work colleagues. I found it hard to keep these three separate so I deleted work from it and have found it works a lot better for me.

I’ve also been spending a lot more time outside and enjoying life. I’m writing this post on my back verandah so I can enjoy the day as well as the sun.

Programs to Help you Focus

There are a few tools I have found that are great with helping me to focus. The first one is Stay Focusd. It is a Chrome add-on so you can limit your time on certain websites. It is automatically set to ten minutes, but you can change that.

I have a word processor for my PC and one for my Macbook. The PC one is use is Q10 , which is a full screen word processor. There are others that look the same but have green writing, Matrix style.

The Mac word processor I use is OmmWriter. It is in Beta version so you have to sign up to get it. It is full screen, but the difference is the music and background. It has a serene background and plays zen-like music to help you concentrate. This is great if you don’t need to be on the Internet to write your article.

One of the keys to my change in focus has been my ability to rely less on the Internet. If you can copy the information you need into the word processor before you start, then you can focus on the task at hand. The constant flicking between tabs, websites and info can break concentration easily.

When you are in the zone you can tune into what you are writing and start to create articles and content that you are proud of, content your visitors will love, and add great value to your website.

The last thing that I have done is make this blog even more minimalist, and taking off the ability to comment. This makes the blog simple and I don’t have to worry about replying to every comment.

Thanks for the overwhelming support I received about the article yesterday and again to everyone who wished me a Happy Birthday!

Disconnect from your distractions and make today a winner.

For those of you that are gambling affiliates, you’ll know of Poker Affiliate Listings (PAL), the website of choice for poker affiliates. Over the past months I have grown weary of the constant battle to get affiliates some transparency to make smarter decisions.

I’ve decided to leave PAL for a number of reasons, for real this time. I’ve done it several times before, for a couple of months at a time. There is a cycle that I’ve been going through for a while now. It involves a 2 month break, returning to the forum and posting again… then getting pissed off with the bullshit and posers until I leave again.

I’m not the sort of person that would normally make a big deal out of these sorts of things, which is why I didn’t make a post on the forum itself. I simply changed my email and password so I won’t be able to return, and changed my status to “no longer a member.”

I feel that nobody has the balls to tell the truth anymore in this business, in relation to gambling affiliates, other than Jim who is known as Poker Prop. The only other person that is doing a decent job of commenting on the industry is Bill Rini. I’ve had the pleasure of having beers on several occasions with Bill, and he really knows his stuff and a guy that I trust a lot.

That being said, why is everyone afraid to speak out? I know it’s just not me, because on a daily basis when I post something “controversial” I’ll get multiple messages like “dude, you said everything I was thinking, but didn’t want to say!” That’s close to a direct quote from yesterday after I tried to tackle the latest issue of the Aced affiliate program shutting down.

Gambling Affiliate Program Failures

Brandon Berndt was in charge of the Aced affiliate program from the beginning. He has widely been built up as one of the great minds of the industry and the best affiliate program coordinator.

I haven’t met Brandon, but he has always been good to me. This isn’t a personal attack on him (or anyone), but I feel it is important to state the facts here instead of all the bullshit arse sucking going on at the forums.

Since I have been a gambling webmaster Brandon has been involved in two different affiliate programs, which to the best of my knowledge, he was in charge of. The first one was Chan Poker, it closed down and all the players along with the affiliate program was moved to Aced. This was dealt with swiftly, to his credit, but everyone is missing the point. The program closed down. How many mini sites did the affiliates build? How many sites did they add Chan Poker to because Berndt was in charge? How much time was put into promoting them by affiliates? How much money was spent purchasing links and promoting? The list goes on.

Noone was told what the real reason was. When approached many months later, some answer of “there’s nothing to tell” was given. This in itself is bad enough, after all the time and money that had been pumped into this program.

Now we move onto Aced. The program that had been pumped up as the knight in shining armour after the Chan Poker accounts were moved to them. Let’s be honest though, this room sucked from the get go, and is on the Merge network that sucked. You’d think people would have learned not to push programs based solely on the affiliate coordinator, but no.

Affiliates continued to spread the word about how great the Aced poker program is, with little or no consideration of the company itself, how bad the network is and the past performance of a Berndt run program. In the end, as many of us warned people, the program shut down. Gave people no notice even though another affiliate stated that he knew this 6 months ago, and the accounts have been moved once again.

I’m sure you are now thinking that people have finally caught on? Nope. The general consensus is that “programs fail all the time” and “Brandon Berndt is still awesome.” Now that’s a mighty fine reputation for someone with a record of 0/2.

What’s going to happen now? My prediction is the same as what happened when Greg Powell and any other issue at PAL that paints the clique in a bad light. Berdnt will now go missing for a month of two. He will then return in magnificent fashion with a new program he is in charge of. It will be plastered all over the forums as the best program in the history of poker, and that if Brandon Berndt is in charge, you can be sure that you’re in good hands and won’t be fucked over. To make money in this industry you need to get behind programs with solid people in charge, and he’s going to make you a ton of cash!!!!!!!!!!!

Shows that knowing the right people can get you a long way in this industry, despite your performance. The score 0/2.

Now let’s move onto the next member of the clique, Greg Powell. Greg is widely acclaimed in this industry for being a great mind as well. He is Jeremy’s right hand man, and gets the most coverage on the forums because of it.

Cardspike is one of the modern day fuck ups, the program that cheated affiliates and players out of money, a lot of money. Who was at the helm during that time, Greg Powell. He went “missing” during the time is all went down… even though he was seen browsing on other affiliate forums. He never answered any questions, and was never held accountable for his actions. The forums on PAP were on fire calling for his blood. Lucky he knows the right people, who were able to cover him up and clear the way for him to return months later without any sign of a tarnished reputation.

The issue was put down to Greg being ignorant about the whole thing and having his hands tied due to contractual arrangements. What a load of fucking bullshit. Seriously, Lou who was found to be a main culprit was well known to be a cheater and scammer. I had been in the industry for less than 6 months at the time, and even I knew what was going on behind the scenes. But, Greg was ignorant of all this, despite knowing Lou for years and most significant people in the industry.

How Greg Powell got away with this can only be put down to well known influences on PAP and PAL smoothing it over on his behalf. If Greg wasn’t friends with Jeremy and other significant people, he would never have been able to get a job in this industry ever again.

Moving on now, after somehow this all blows over, Greg returns to the forums several months later with a big bang! The Tower affiliate program. A program that everyone knew of, but didn’t really push, for a reason. But now that Greg was there, it was slammed all across PAL as the next big thing. People were shitting themselves to be apart of the Greg Powell bandwagon.

Senior members even got in on this one, after feeling he got a rough deal out of the last one. Tower went up on affiliate sites all around the Internet. It was pumped up to be one of the best converting programs, with numerous threads going on about how it was the hottest shit going.

The result on this one, can only be reported in terms of hearsay. I talked to between 8-12 different affiliates, with a wide range of incomes. I didn’t talk to one affiliate, who said they made remotely the amount of money they were expecting. The income was little to none, in every case. And I know some pretty damn successful affiliates. Throw in some PAL moderators as part of the group I’m talking about.

In my eyes, and the affiliates that promoted them, it was a huge flop. Powell went from a program that blatantly stole from affiliates, to one that flopped on them. Sure, Tower is a decent program for some, but was nowhere near the heights that PAL and Greg built it up to be.

The Final Score – 0/4 and Counting

• Brandon Berndt: 0/2
• Greg Powell: 0/2 (1 more flop pending)
• Jeremy Enke: Nothing to do with him, right?
• Affiliates: Screwed, fucked, robbed for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Nothing to do with Berndt, Powell, Enke or PAL right? Nope, just happened to be that no less than 4 programs in a row failed, flopped or stole without their knowing.

The point I am trying to make here is purely about the performance of the PAL clique programs. When will people finally wake up and realise they get massive sign on bonuses for just being who they are… which is a friend of Jeremy’s and an avenue to slam free ads on a popular affiliate forum. Sure we all have to do what we can to make a dollar, but at what point do they become accountable? How can so many failures result in a strong reputation?

Whether you like it or not, the answer is Jeremy Enke. They are successful by association, Powell especially. I’d be willing to bet a fair amount that if he wasn’t friends with Enke, he wouldn’t have a future in this field.

It’s time to wake up and realise you don’t have to be friends with the clique to be successful. You don’t have to be scared of posting the truth and you don’t have to be in fear of your reputation being tarnished.

Instead of coming to me and thanking me, grow some balls and speak out. I can understand that people don’t want the drama and the bullshit that goes with not going with the grain. But come on, do you want to be a sheep all your life.

I’m not sure about you guys, but I can make decisions without unsubstantiated hype. I don’t need to follow a crowd to be successful, especially one that is only concerned about their own back pocket.

With over 1000 posts I’ve found it necessary for me to move on. The information being posted is weak at best, if not deceiving. There are some moderators that simply can’t be trusted, and I’m not willing to participate where people are afraid to say what they want for fear of not fitting in with the crowd. It’s mind boggling to me, how many full time affiliates feel the same way as me, but don’t want to say anything. Maybe they are making a smarter business decision by being friends with everyone, but I’m not one to sit and take it up the arse.

Confirming My Point

A perfect example of what I’m talking about is the hype surrounding Eduardo. I personally know of five other people that have been fucked over by him in recent months. His designs are copied and ripped from previous jobs he’s done, they aren’t unique and his communication is appalling. With cases ranging from him simply refusing to change things because “he knows best” and that he wants to send it to the coder because the design is awesome, when the client is clearly unhappy. The two hour, $700 jobs he pushes through are low in quality and IMO, complete rip offs.

Out of the people I know that have had these problems, two happen to be a super affiliate. One replied “there’s no point trying to convince the Eyenod fans” and another exclaimed “wow, I thought I was the only one. Most of the people on PAL don’t know shit anyway.”

Why don’t the majority of people know about this? Arse sucking and clique members approval of him. Plain and simple.

Don’t be a sheep. Trust you own instincts.

Over the past few days I have done three particular things that have increased my productivity. Let’s jump straight into them.

1. Stop wasting time at affiliate forums – “I am not a sheep waiting to be prodded by my shepherd. I am a lion and I refuse to talk, to walk, to sleep with the sheep. I will hear not those who weep and complain, for their disease is contagious. Let them join the sheep. The slaughterhouse of failure is not my destiny.”

That quote is from a book that I’m currently reading and will do a review on in a couple of days. The amount of time I waste waiting around for replies that aren’t even going to help me is just plain stupid. It even gets to the point where I site there clicking refresh. How the hell is that a smart business strategy? Sure, forums were great in the beginning, reading all the posts. But now they serve no purpose to me other than going to the market place or keeping in contact with people.

What do the forums actually help you with? Is the information you gain easily found on the Internet from a more reliable source? How much time do they take of yours? Is it worth it?

Today was the least I had visited the forums, it was also my most productive day in a month. Funny that.

2. Delete the parasites and non-friends off FaceBook – In the last couple of weeks I have gone from 451 friends to 135. The change has been a little weird but I am better for it. No longer do I have a busy FB where I aimlessly read and comment on stupid crap.

There are a few different types of people I deleted off my FB:

• The first group is all the people from my home town and my high school that I was never really friends with. You know all those people in the grade above or the grade below? How about the people from other schools that you know from a friend of a friend but if you saw them it would be awkward? I deleted all of those people.
• The next group of people I deleted from my FB really needed to go. The gambling parasites. Why do I want scammers, spammers and ethically challenged affiliates on my FB. I think FB is kind of personal so there is no need to have them on there. Do I really want a third invite to your stupid freaking gambling group? Do I need this scum person on my FB just because they are well known?When I sit down and think about why I have certain people on there I worked out it is because everyone else does. I guess it was a popularity thing. I don’t like the people, they offer no value and they are emotionally draining.
• Affiliates I have never talked to – Some affiliates and “regular” people add me and never even introduce themselves. I have never communicated with them before and I don’t know why they were on there. I’m cool with networking, that’s why I accept friend requests. But don’t just add me to inflate your friend total count or whatever you are trying to achieve.

I also wasn’t comfortable with some of my personal details that were available through FB. I did a number of security changes to accommodate this fact. When non-friends do a search for me they have to be logged in to view (I believe). When they do view my profile all they can see is my pic and a “add to friends” button. They can’t see who my friends are or any of my details.

Some of you might know about a topical article I wrote recently about data selling. I hunted a guy involved down via social sites. On the flip side, I was getting stalked by several different people. A lot of people were doing searches on my name to find out who I was, FB was a natural answer. Gambling companies even added me to chat to me.

• Clean up your IM – Do you have a shit load of people on MSN and Skype that you don’t chat to, don’t like or have no reason to have them on there? I know I did. I have cleaned up my MSN to get rid of stupid chicks from high school and other gambling scum and the like. I’ve gone from over 200 contacts on MSN to around 80. I feel so much better about it. I also cleaned up Skype to a lesser extent. Do you really need affiliate managers on there from programs you were once thinking about promoting?

  I guess the reason I wanted heaps of people on IM is to feel part of the crowd. IM makes you feel like you aren’t going to miss out on anything. My thinking was if I had all these people on IM then I would be the first to hear about some magical million dollar turn of events. Really? Maybe not to that extent, but you get my picture. I don’t want to be involved in affiliate politics. Gossip drains my energy.

This post probably makes me sound like a bit of a douche who thinks he’s too cool and smart to talk to anyone. I don’t want it to come across that way though. I’m always happy to help and network with like minded people. Steps just needed to be taken to eliminate the energy draining activities and people out of my life.

For those of you that want to feel the love with me you can add me to Facebook at facebook.com/GamblingAffiliate. Alternatively, my Skype name is nickhaslem.

Let me know what you think about my culling of these energy drainers.

What the hell does this even mean? This has got to be the most overused, cliche phrase that affiliates use. Not only that, it is contradictory to what they actually practice. This idiotic phrase is used by people almost every time they are asked what advice they would give new affiliates. It is idiotic.

Why is it idiotic? Because it gives no information. It is what lazy affiliates say so they fit in with the crowd so everyone will congratulate them.

Affiliates often say “think outside the box” for what reason? The only one I can think of is so they don’t do the same as everyone else. To think of a million dollar idea that noone has come up with. Well derrr, obviously you should try to come up with a million dollar idea that noone else has thought of yet?

All over the Internet, there are countless times where the advice is to “think outside the box.” You know why that is stupid? Because those exact affiliates are the same ones to jump down the throats of someone that tries something different. They will jump in and say “blah blah, that won’t work, you have to do it this way.”

The same people will flame and scutinize other affiliates for running SEO tests. They will often jump in and say “SEO guru xxx does it this way. Don’t even bother trying.” How can people think outside the box when they are being conditioned to act just like everyone else?

Here is a link to someone offering awesome advice. I know they are just trying to help, but come on. Everyone jumping in and commenting how wonderful that advice is. Give me a break.

Let’s go through these great pieces of advice one by one.

1. Never stop learning

How is this ever going to help me? Do affiliates consciously think “wow I’m glad that was said, now I’m going to remember to keep learning?” Do affiliates really think that when they start earning x amount, they never have to learn another thing in their life? This comment in broad, vague and generally useless.

2. Never give up

Are you for real? Your advice on how to be successful as an affiliate is to never give up? This point offers nothing, to anyone.

3. Think outside the box. We have been through this above. It offers me nothing.

4. Focus on the proven programs/casinos and forget the rest.

How contradictory does this statement want to be from the previous point? So you are telling me to think outside the box, but only promote what everyone else says is good? I do agree that you should steer clear of dodgy programs, but what about thinking ahead of your competitors? Programs don’t become “proven” from nowhere. This advice inhibits “thinking outside the box.”

5. Keep up with the current news at GPWA.

This actually made me laugh. So I am supposed to think outside the box, while following what everyone else is doing and saying at the forums? Whether you like it or not, the more you hang around forums, the more likely you are to act like your competitors. Again, I find this advice idiotic. In fact, I would advise against following this.

I would like to add a disclaimer that I do not know the person that was being interviewed. This is not a personal attack on whoever it is.

I will be doing some follow up posts in the near future about how ridiculous some affiliate advice really is. Whether it is intended to be helpful or not is another story.

So before you give advice to a new affiliate, think about what you are saying. Don’t just go through the routines and say what everyone else does. Think outside the box.