It's that time of the year again. The World Series of Poker is less than two weeks away. I plan to make my annual journey to play at least one event. Since I don't play no limit hold'em I have to plan ahead. I'll be playing in the May 30th $1500 Omaha High/Low. What will you be doing during this summer's biggest poker event?Hundreds if not thousands of poker related businesses will be using the opportunity to market to the biggest live poker crowd you can find. Some will set up booths, some will broadcast their news stories, some will send their players in their logo wear. Maybe you are a small affiliate and can't afford to send players to play wearing your logo, set up a booth or afford a license to broadcast the event. What can you do?One of the best ideas is to play in one of the smaller events. While I'm there I plan on wearing either a PAS or RakeTracker shirt. In the other events I've worn the shirt they have become conversation pieces. You will be at the same table for hours and it will drag. People will want to discuss anything to pass the time and your subtle advertising will be an easy conversation starter.Even if you don't play poker or don't think you are good enough to cash in an event at least making an appearance will be a good idea. You never know when you might run into a player that will now be able to put a face with your affiliate business. The more a player or customer knows about you the more likely you are to convert or retain them.

I started working for PAS in March 2008. I set up an office in the basement of my house in a spare bedroom. It seemed like a dream to be able to work from home and watch the kids grow up. As time went by and the workload from PAS grew it became more and more difficult to stay efficient. I started to associate work with home life and it all seemed to blur together. It became especially hard as my now 3 year old daughter grew and always wanted to play which interfered with work.Since I live in a remote mountain community the only place away from home that was close with the internet was the local tavern. It is a rowdy, smoky hole in the wall biker bar with a small casino in it. Not exactly the place to be productive although it was nice to get away to a change of scenery.Recently PAS hired a former coworker of mine Craig from Bonus Whores aka Gonzo787 to help with the ever growing content needs of PAS. He lives about 15 miles from me so it was decided PAS would expand into a second office. We now have a "PAS West" office. I had mixed feelings. I knew a change of scenery for work would help with my productivity and Craig and I needed a place for training and meetings. We rented a small office about 12 miles from my house. That sounds far but most of the drive is scenic mountain two lane roads and there isn't anything closer.We have been in the office for two weeks and there is a noticeable change in my productivity. The location change certainly helped with some of the inefficiencies and more importantly it gives me somewhere mentally to leave my work. I can leave the stress at the office and go home and enjoy my two kids and wife's company.If you work at home and feel home and work becoming one consider finding a professional suite or small office where you can leave work behind. The office I found was very inexpensive. You might just find the small expense of an office will help your productivity skyrocket and make your home life happier.

It has been exactly one month since PlayersOnly and Sportsbook.com moved to Merge Gaming. There were a couple of servers issues at first but for the most part it was a smooth transition. Looking back over the last month it is safe to say this was a successful move for both Merge Gaming and Jazette, parent company of PlayersOnly and Sportsbook.com.Using the traffic figures from Poker Scout Merge Gaming traffic nearly tripled overnight. On April 14th the traffic peaked at 381. The next day it skyrocketed to 996. The traffic peaked on May 10th at 1204 but the numbers have been consistent. What does that mean to you, a PAS publisher?I can tell you from answering support tickets that players interest in Merge Gaming is higher than it ever has been. The new signups to the network are higher than ever. If you have not moved Carbon Poker and PlayersOnly up in position on your site it isn't too late. There is still plenty of interest from players. Adding some custom content and using the SEO features in the PAS CMS will also help you capture more exposure in the search engines. If you write a blog you can also post about the explosion in game selection and how the games on Merge Gaming might even be the best available for U.S. players. Make sure to link to your Merge Gaming offers in that blog.Having worked closely with PlayersOnly, Carbon Poker and Merge Gaming over the last two years I can tell you that this group has high expectations and will work hard to make sure these expectations are met. If you have any questions about the PlayersOnly move to Merge Gaming or anything else about the network don't hesitate to contact us or post in the PAS forum.