Bonus Guide

Here’s An Easy Guide To All The Different Types Of Poker Bonuses

There are several types of poker bonuses and rewards out there, and in order to get the most out of them, you have to be very familiar with the different types and how to best take advantage of them. So for the benefit of those who may not be perfectly familiar with all of these types of rewards, here’s an easy to follow guide for you.

Before I get started though I want to emphasize the importance of making the most out of all of the different types of offers and rewards that are out there. Cashing in on poker bonuses and rewards is a lot like ordering something over the internet and putting in a coupon code versus not putting one in. Of course you get the better deal with the coupon code, as who doesn’t want to save money.

So this is a pretty simple process, although you have to be in the know in order to know what coupon code to put in. We are there to provide you with everything you need to know here. However, things are a little more complicated when it comes to poker bonuses and rewards, as there are many offers out there and several types of them as well.

So this guide will provide to you the basic knowledge that you need here, and we’re also here to further guide you every step of the way as you visit the various parts of our site and learn more about our top recommended poker sites and poker deals. So now let’s move on to the general information that you need to be aware of:

Poker Room First Time Deposit Bonus

Poker rooms of course compete for your business, and one of the ways that they do so is to look to entice players who have never tried out real money poker at their site before. So they offer generous bonuses to encourage people to make their first deposit with them.

The idea is to get people to try them out, so if you have played real money poker at a particular poker site before, they will know this and you unfortunately won’t be eligible. However that doesn’t mean that you can’t take advantage of welcome bonuses at other poker sites, and if you have never deposited at a poker site before, they will be more than happy to offer you their first deposit bonus deal.

Not every poker site out there is worth trying though, so it’s important to make sure that you are sticking to the ones that are worth your while. As generous as these deals are, they really aren’t a bonus if the competition is too tough, and you end up losing your bonus money and all of your deposit money as well without even having a fighting chance.

There’s also the matter of your chosen poker bonus deals having enough action to make it worth your while. If you sign up and deposit at a poker room, and they require you to play a certain amount of hands to collect your bonus, but there’s very little action there, you may not even be able to collect it. Having too thin traffic isn’t something that you really want to see anyway, bonus or no bonus, so it’s important to stick to the sites which at least have enough to make having an account there worthwhile.

So one of the biggest things that we do here at PokerBonusCode.net is to make sure that our friends are given the best advice out there on which deals are worth pursuing, so they can stick to the good ones and avoid the bad ones. Many players who go off on their own here learn some hard lessons, and we don’t want you to be among them, as we’re sure you don’t either.

With that said, we do have a very good amount of welcome bonus deals for you that pass our standards, both in terms of the bonus deals themselves and even more importantly, the quality of the poker rooms themselves. We just don’t tell you which ones to take advantage of, we also tell you why, in considerable detail, so you are as informed as possible.

Bonus Code Or No Bonus Code?

In order to be eligible for the best first deposit bonus deals out there, you often need a bonus code. Some poker rooms give everyone who makes their first deposit there the same bonus deal, while some others require that you have a bonus code or be referred to get the best deal.

So as you are looking to take advantage of these offers, you won’t really know if you are getting the best deal unless you rely on bonus experts like ourselves who are always completely in the know about these sort of things.

So if there is a bonus code that you need to put in, we will give it to you. With a lot of deals we’ve arranged with the poker rooms to have you just go through our link to them and this alone will automatically entitle you to their best deal.

So in all cases, you need to visit them through our links, and if there is a bonus code that you need to put in, you can rest assured that we will be providing it to you. We want to make sure that you get every last dollar that they are prepared to give you.

The More You Deposit, The More Free Money You Get

The most basic welcome bonus offer is expressed in both a percentage amount and a maximum bonus amount. So for instance if you see the deal expressed as 150% up to $1000, then this means that the amount you initially deposit gets multiplied by the percentage amount, and that’s how much you are eligible to receive.

So for instance if you deposit $100, and they are offering 150% of your deposit in bonus money, then you are eligible for $150 in free money. If you deposit $1000, then you would be eligible for $1500 at the 150% percentage, but since the maximum in this case is set at $1000, that would be the most you could receive with this deal.

So the larger your initial deposit is, the more free money you will get, up to the maximum. So it pays not to hold back here, and it’s even a good idea to look to go bigger by using more of your credit limit on one of your credit cards if necessary.

Since the payout here is so nice, you want to take as much advantage of these deals as possible. You only get one welcome bonus deal in your lifetime at a particular poker room, and while we have a very good assortment of different ones out there, each one is gold and you don’t want to waste gold.

The Benefits Of “Bonus Whoring”

However, if you do not have that much to deposit, then you need to get started somewhere. So the best strategy here is to not wait and jump right in with whatever you have right now, and look to build your bankroll with each successive deal. This is in fact how a lot of players have started out, where they just threw in a little of their own money and then watched it grow large by getting different poker rooms to help them out with it.

In fact this practice of taking advantage of many poker welcome bonus offers has been given it’s own name, which is “bonus whoring.” Poker sites don’t care how many other welcome bonus offers you have taken advantage of, so this lets you cash in on as many as you want along the way.

As long as you play the minimum amount of hands necessary to collect all of the bonus at a particular poker site, you are free to take your money elsewhere if you wish. One of the best reasons to move on is that another poker room is looking to pay you as well to try them out.

This bonus whoring isn’t just for smaller players, and in fact, if you have a larger sum to get started with, it gets even more exciting. Now, you can get a grand or two or perhaps even more for each poker site you try out. If you are starting smaller, if you follow our advice, then you will be able to build up your bankroll so you can start maxing out these deals yourself in no time.

Many of today’s top online players, the ones with multi million dollar bankrolls, started out small and just worked their way up. Welcome bonuses definitely accelerate this process. So while once again you do need to be selective here, relying on our bonus and poker room expertise will give you all the help you need to start your climb the right way.

So if you look at all the bonuses that we have for you, all at poker rooms definitely worth trying out, then you will easily see that even if you are starting out with a small deposit, you will be able to add an incredible amount of free poker money over time with all of these offers.

You Have To Play To Earn Though With Most Of These Offers

While some regular welcome bonus offers do give you a little money up front, the whole point of these deals from the perspective of the poker rooms is to have you try them out, and that’s what they are paying you for, so you have to do your part.

However, you’re looking to play real money online anyway, so this is all the same to you, and therefore there’s no difference on your part except for your getting paid to play. While poker sites do pay you to play as far as providing you with frequent player rewards, which all of our recommended poker rooms offer, welcome bonuses are even more lucrative of course due to your being able to earn more reward money in a shorter period of time.

Most of these poker bonuses are called incremental, because they generally get paid out in increments. Some do make you wait until you have played the required amount to collect it all in one lump sum, which are called lump sum bonuses. Players prefer not to wait though, and in fact if you don’t end up sticking around at the poker site to play enough to collect it all, with lump sum bonuses you may not collect any bonus money at all.

So a lot of players aren’t fussy about this, and so that’s why we prefer to offer the incremental version with almost all of our poker deals. It’s also better to get a steady diet of smaller bonus payments into your account, allowing you to use this money in your bankroll sooner, rather than having to wait.

On an exception basis, if a poker room is a particularly good one, we will recommend it even though it may have a lump sum style bonus payout, but the trend is quickly moving away from this method and it may not be very long before no one no longer offers these anyway. Free money is free money though, so if it comes down to your never trying this site, and the site is worth trying, then any bonus offer is a good one.

How Incremental Bonuses Work

Poker rooms tend to vary as far as the requirements that they set for you as far as the schedule of bonus payouts. There usually is a set amount of points that you have to earn to get a payout, which are earned by playing real money hands and paying tournament fees. Each poker site clearly sets out their requirements though, and they also all track these for you automatically so you don’t have to.

So all you really need to do is just play poker, whatever game and stakes you want and for however long you want, and whenever you get enough points for another payout, the poker site simply deposits it in your account. These payouts may be a fixed dollar amount, like $10, or they may be a certain percentage of the bonus money that you are entitled to, like 10% for example.

In any case, this really doesn’t matter and you don’t have to trouble yourself with figuring any of this out, as once again, they do all of the work for you.

Up Front Bonus Deals

Some bonus deals give you either a portion of your bonus up front, meaning prior to your playing your first real money hand at their poker room. It’s always great to get some money up front, although there is no big difference really unless you are only putting in a very small amount, where in that case with this bit of money up front, you are more likely to be able to withstand the ups and downs that often come with playing poker for real money.

Some deals though will even give you a little poker money even prior to making your first deposit, which can be a very nice way to try a poker site out. Since these deals are outright free money without requiring you to do anything, they do tend to be of smaller amounts, but if you don’t have the money to deposit yet and want to give one of these poker rooms a try, you can’t beat an out and out handout, which this is.

Finally, there are deals out there which will set you up with even more free poker money, provided that you show them that you know what you are doing. If you are looking to take advantage of one of these deals, you generally have to read through some lessons and then pass a test, to show that you are worth the investment that these sites are going to be making for you. The idea is for you to not just blow the bankroll they give you.

Always Play Within Your Ability And Bankroll

So these up front deals once again will appeal to smaller depositors, and it’s always true that whenever you are only depositing a small amount, even if you know what you are doing, you really need to make sure that you are playing stakes appropriate for your bankroll.

If you are not a proven winning player yet, no stake is too small for you, as you will not have the positive return that it takes to avoid going down over time. If so, then playing higher will just accelerate this. The idea should be for you to look to limit the cost of your poker education by losing as little as possible as you learn the game enough to be profitable.

It’s also the case that at the lowest stakes you will find the easiest players to beat. It’s even more important to play at the poker sites with the easiest players to beat period, which is why you want to stick to our list of recommended poker sites. This list is plenty long enough though to give you a multitude of opportunities to rack up thousands of dollars in bonus money over time.

Even if you are already a good player, it pays to always stick to stakes where you can withstand the normal variance. In other words, you don’t want a simple run of bad luck to put the hurt on your bankroll or even put you on the sidelines if you manage to go broke. If you can easily re-deposit, then this isn’t a big deal, but if you may have to wait a while to put more money in, it pays to play stakes where you can withstand this variance and stay in the game to allow you to stick around to allow for luck to even out and therefore allowing for your superior skills to determine your ultimate results.

So Let Us Guide You On The Path To Poker Success

How well you do at online poker has a lot to do with the quality of help that you receive along the way. Many players choose to pretty much go it alone, perhaps getting poker room recommendations from friends or other people online, or getting caught up in the slick marketing tactics of some of the bigger poker rooms.

Your online friends may be as lost as you are, and the poker rooms only care about your playing there, so these aren’t the ideal sources of information on where to play and how to go about it. The ideal way is to go with an experienced independent source like ourselves whose only interest is seeing you do as well as you can.

So it is with this goal in mind that we have been offering top quality advice on this site for many years, and delight in the thousands of players who have prospered by taking our advice. So the next step is to check out all of the information we have here on this site for you and let us lead you on the best path toward your online poker success!