Online play money giant hits the tangible felts in Las Vegas
Zynga Poker
The largest poker site in the world is not PokerStars or Full Tilt but Facebook-based Zynga Poker that has 38 million registered users; 500 of them bought tickets to bring their play money skills to the real world in Las Vegas last week.
The inaugural Zynga PokerCon was held at the Palms Casino from the 18th to 19th of March and was the company’s first foray into organizing tournaments offline and could be the start of a major trend. Considering that 7.6 million players participate in Zynga-based action every day, the opportunities are endless for a global brand that is based on the ease and visit-length statistics that users give to Facebook applications.
Lo Toney, Zynga Poker’s general manager commented: “So many fans are so passionate about Zynga Poker and we wanted to reward them and give something back to their community … [It's a way to] have our fans meet and interact with us; interact with each other. A lot of our fans are serious poker players, but for a lot of people, this is new.” UK-based 3-D poker site, pkr, has also created a series of events of this type, proving Toney pretty much wrong in this respect.
PokerCon featured a tournament with $125 buy-in tickets online and a $100,000 prize pool. The price of the tickets included a poker clinic led by Annie Duke, a party with pros Mike Sexton and David Williams and a star-studded party.
“Our first focus is to provide the best experience as we have the largest audience,” remarked Toney. “Give back to the fans, get feedback and … incorporate their feedback into the game. [PokerCon is a] great way for Zynga Poker to reach out and embrace the poker community. Many people who have played against each other [online] haven’t had the opportunity to meet. This will be an opportunity for them to meet in person at [the tables] and some of our exclusive parties.”
Zynga offered satellites online for PokerCon and most of the winners got free entry into the event with one lucky champion earning a spot that meant he flew past the early action and sat right down at the final table. .
“We created an environment that is very welcoming, not intimidating, fun and social,” said Toney. “We have a lot of people playing who don’t have to feel that they need to know that much about poker. All the other sites are intimidating. … It’s really important for us that we keep our games social and fun. That’s what keeps people coming back. That’s retention, the ability to retain our users and come back to the game.”
Aaron Alawen from Phoenix won the event and waltzed home with the $15,000 first prize after negotiating a pact with four other final table players.
