PokerStars…Full Tilt Poker…partypoker…Adjarabet? We are used to seeing those first three names at or around the top of the charts in the online poker industry, but that fourth one? Most people probably don’t even know what Adjarabet is. As it turns out, according to PokerScout’s cash game traffic rankings, the Georgia-based online poker room (Georgia the country, not the Peach State) is currently sitting as the fourth largest poker room or network on the internet, beating the likes of the aforementioned Full Tilt and partypoker, as well as all of PokerStars’ regulated country-specific sites.
The meteoric rise of Adjarabet, says PokerScout, comes thanks to a promotional battle the site has been having with Georgia rival, Europe-Bet. Adjarabet’s latest promo began last Monday and is slated to run for five weeks. In “PokerMasters,” players get points for accomplishing certain cash game tasks. These points are tallied and the top points earners each week (Monday to Sunday) win a share of 110,000 Georgian Lari (GEL), or about $62,883, for a total of 550,000 GEL or $314,415 across the entire promotion. Some of the tasks are only counted once per week, such as playing at least one hand for three consecutive days, while some are counted once daily, such as playing two or more cash game tables at the same time. The majority, however, can be accomplished an unlimited number of times. Some are very easy and award few points; getting dealt pocket Aces or winning a hand from the small blind fit this bill. Others, such as getting dealt pocket pairs on four consecutive hands, are rare and thus award lots of points.
The kicker to the promotion and what is likely the big reason for its ability to draw so much traffic, is that it does not appear that there is any differentiation made between stakes. Thus, low stakes players, who make up the largest percentage of any site’s player base, have as much of a chance to win the big bucks as do high stakes players. And because so many of the tasks don’t even require a player to win (one actually requires a player to lose with Aces at showdown), even the lowest-skilled players can hit the big money, given enough dedication.
Europe-Bet just saw its “Two Kings” promotion end on Sunday. It was a similar promo in which players needed to simply play poker to earn “tickets” on the leaderboard. Tickets were earned by winning or losing (more tickets were awarded for losing) hands with a pair of Kings or higher. At the end of the promotional period, the top 200 ticket earners won a share of 200,000 GEL, or $114,333. Everyone was also entered into a drawing for one of three crazy Emperor 1510 chairs, valued at $5,950.
Adjarabet had previously gone to war against Europe-Bet with the “Hand Battle” promotion.
According to PokerScout, Adjarabet’s seven day average of 1,900 cash game players is 60 percent higher than last week’s number, which was already swollen from the promotions. Traffic is double what it was about a month ago. Adjarabet now sits behind only PokerStars, 888poker, and the iPoker Network on PokerScout’s charts. Europe-Bet, though looking like the runner-up in this contest, has also done well for itself, rising to 17th in the rankings. Under 300 players not long ago, Europe-Bet now has a seven day average of 550.
