I Aim to make $50 Writing & Selling a Series of Poker Articles Within 3 Months

I was going to ask if there was still a market for poker related content but couldn't really find the right board for it so I thought here would be a good place to not ask a question and just try selling some and post what happens instead. I plan to spend no money on promotion or marketing.


I am not an internet marketer. I am an online retailer.

I have sold one article on poker for $15 nine years ago but not any other content.

I know a fair amount about live tournament poker.

I can string words together quite well when needed.

I have so far written 7 related high quality (!) articles on one particular aspect of poker and intend the total to be 15-20 articles averaging 600 words apiece.


So as someone who has done retail, selling mainly through ads, marketing as such is not something I have done much of. It would be pointless for me to illustrate how to produce from scratch and /or sell a particular physical product on eBay or Amazon in this particular thread because that would be quite easy for me to do and this isn't a retail forum. I would learn nothing and I may suggest dong things the reader cannot do - or in other words, what I take for granted may be an alien concept to some. Just like running an AdWords campaign would be to me. So perhaps look on me as a novice at internet marketing for the purpose of the exercise.


With that in mind I will try and approach this with a totally different way of doing things. I'm not a professional writer - $15 dollars in 9 years isn't good earnings. I do not do marketing. I only have a half to a third of the material I will need. Social media is something I find a little bit unsociable at times.


I wrote the articles over Christmas. Mainly for personal reasons but also for possible monetization purposes in a very peripheral way. They turned out so well that I then ensured they were unavailable for viewing. There is a tiny possibility that they have been seen - and possibly copied - but it's very unlikely. Why this matters may be explained later.

Another motivation is that I like a challenge and this seems doable. $50 in my pocket would be good. Showing others how they might go about doing something similar would be good. Getting feedback and advice would be good. Learning anything at all would be another bonus.


The quantity of articles or blog posts or whatever they might be will need expanding. 15-20 would make a coherent and chunky enough bundle to be attractive to potential buyers. That might be the first step. They need to retain consistency and focus so as to be capable of being read in a linear and proper fashion so as to provide the highest amount of comprehension. Each article would be a stand-alone piece and would not necessarily have to be read subsequent to the last in the series but I think it vital that things are not out of place. Once they are sold it doesn't matter.


Who will I sell to? That is a very good question and I don't know. If you had asked me that same question 10 years ago you would not have asked me the question because there would have been no question: the articles would have been wanted/obtained/published (possibly for free) on a poker forum.

So I can't do that now then - no? Who knows? Things have moved on and poker is more or less banned in the US - the only market worth bothering about.



So:

We are on the way to completing a poker info product.

The market for such products has dwindled drastically.

There may be no buyers.

But the writing is good enough to slap on a blog or a gambling site or a YouTube video (even with an auto reader/ robot voice just repeating the content might be a thing for someone to do - no idea) or for someone to flip to an article marketing website.

Also the price would seem quite cheap. One visitor who is attracted to a gambling site because of the content may be worth hundreds - thousands even - of dollars to the operator, so from a business point of view it might make sense.

The goal is small but achievable, I think. If it worked I would possibly consider doing more of it. So in theory it could turn out to be a long term profitable project. But I have other projects, long term/short term goals, personal interests and hobbies to get on with so it isn't priority. If I were just concentrating on this the goal would be around 2-3 weeks at most.

I cannot post any of the articles for what should be obvious reasons. Were I to want better money for the writing I would have to ensure accuracy. I could not effectively ensure this myself because it's just one of those things best left to professionals - that's why many writers need editors and why books need proof readers. I would at least need to get all of the articles peer-reviewed. And that might cost money unless it could be done gratis by an amenable poker writer.

But I will be asking what I estimate to be a very reasonable price and pre-sale checks by a third-party isn't included. Any possible buyer will need to know what they are doing but any potentially interested parties are almost bound to know whether or not the information is reliable, so that's not really an issue anyway.


A timescale of 3 months is long for this so the task should be completed in one way or other by then.


I will post on this thread at the absolute minimum once per week.

I will answer all questions as they come along as quickly as possible.


The probability of this succeeding is definitely above zero. As a poker player and betting man - but not a gambler - I fancy my chances to be higher than 50%, especially with the motivation to not look like a complete plonker. One useful calculation to make would work like this: If I had $100 dollars to bet on my success, how much of that $100 would I bet? It could range anywhere from the entire bankroll down to just a cent. I either win that amount or lose that amount. That could then be turned into a percentage and that could be used to determine confidence. I don't think it is a calculation that many or any poker players or gamblers make but I find it handy in some situations. The apparent contradictory percentages are the result of completely different calculations and the two are not directly related. It may look odd but it's the usefulness of the two figures we need to look at as opposed to coming to an average or choosing one figure over the other. Maybe they are supposed to match - never asked.

So how much of my $100 bankroll would I bet on this working? Wagering on the average Joe being able to roughly refurbish/clean/list any charity shop (goodwill) random1960s Fender guitar and sell it on eBay for at least $2,000 or more is something I would maybe bet around $80-90 on. The chances of finding such a guitar in such circumstance is, however, not very likely, so I would bet 10c on that possibility.

The amount I would bet on the articles selling for $50 would be around $20. Turning that into a percentage we get 20%, which is odds of 5/1. Or to finish the calculation: for every 5 times something exactly like this is done it will only succeed once.


So there seems to be quite a reasonable chance of this working in my view. But if it doesn't? The work may turn out to be substandard or unwanted. So what? Put it away for later or reduce the price. Or utilize in some other way such as article marketing, which seems easy enough. With perhaps affiliate links and whatnot at some juncture. Could even make more than $50, in theory. Or give the articles away to someone who wants them and can make use of them. There will still be options.


I would be more than happy to portray the kind of thing I am hoping to write/sell by way of a fresh paragraph or two. I could be 'tested' by another member. This would enable members to have more of an idea of what kind of product I am selling and to critique style/content/presentation, which wouldn't hurt.

The question needs to concern the subject at hand though: I can't predict who will be the next WSOP major event winner. It would need to concern either probability or psychology, especially poker tells - my specialty poker subject.

No knowledge of poker would be needed to ask - you may find a poker puzzle or question on PokerStars' website, for instance, relating to the above subjects, but for guidance my articles mainly concern those aspects within the context of live casino tournament play. Then you could check my answer against the given answer. But please bear in mind that if they don't tally there is a greater than 50% probability that the given answer will be incorrect


Thanks for reading and I hope the thread turns out to be of some use or interest to those who may follow it.