Check out our brand new Local Poker Communities! Get updates and interact with poker players in your area.
Visit the United States Poker Community | Visit the California Poker Community | Read more about the Launch of P5s Local

Why UB satellites aren't big

Reply to Thread
  1. TTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTT is offline

    Posts: 51
    Joined: Dec 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 7:50pm)

    There are at least 3 reasons why the satellites for the $200 and $500 aren't as popular as they could be:

    1) You can't win multiple seats for either tourney. I was told by Shawn that you can, but I e-mailed UB just yesterday and they said that you can't. I would play every single satellite for both of these events if cash was awarded for multiple wins, and I am guessing there are many others who would also play as many as possible if this were true.

    Even if my information is wrong and you can indeed win multiple seats, if nobody knows about it then it doesn't matter! The tourney lobbies should say "Your account will be credited with TECs for multiple wins" and/or an e-mail should be sent to all members of UB informing us of the policy change.

    2) UB players don't rebuy as much as stars players. This is true for a couple reasons. First, the $10r and $20r sats give away only one or two seats. People aren't going to rebuy at the start and add-on at the end if they're playing for one seat because the odds aren't good. Second, you only get 1500 chips for an add-on. This should be changed to 2500 or 3000.

    3) Because only one or two seats pay, people are discouraged from even signing up. The solution here is simple: guarantee 4 or 5 seats per satellite. I like to say "If you guarantee it, they will come."

    Brian
  2. DrewGOP DrewGOP is offline

    Bloomington, IL
    United States

    Posts: 115
    Joined: Sep 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 7:59pm) in reply to TTTTTTTTTTTTT

    agreed,

    especially the part about guaranteing more than 1 seat for a satelite

    DrewGOP
  3. AngryTeeTee AngryTeeTee is offline

    Sewell, NJ
    United States

    Posts: 805
    Joined: Jul 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 8:08pm) in reply to DrewGOP

    I agree with all of the above. If I am not mistaken on party if you win multiple entries your account is credited. Am I correct? The idea of a certain amount of guaranteed entries per tourney is an excellent suggestion.
  4. brsavage brsavage is offline Spontaneous Benefactor

    Denham Springs, LA
    United States

    Posts: 2,877
    Joined: Jan 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 8:31pm) in reply to TTTTTTTTTTTTT

    Brian,

    I believe UB will just never listen. Higher ups have ALWAYS been convinced that rebuys don't work, and thus their marketing of the tournaments creates a self fulfilling prophecy.

    I can offer empirical evidence as to their popularity but they will still find a way to dismiss rebuys as viable.

    A couple of years ago when several of us met at Beanies request to discuss what tournaments were the most popular and at what times, there was a consensus. All of us acknowledged that the rebuy tournaments at several sites, whether small or big buy in, were just exploding. In particular, we took notice of the meteoric rise in popularity of the Paradise $30 rebuy.

    UB put the tournaments in place, a $10 rebuy monday night, a $20 rebuy tuesday night, and a $30 rebuy for thursday night, all with nice guarantees to attract players.

    That first monday night the $10 rebuy tournament actually crashed from HAVING TOO MANY PLAYERS! Apparently the UB software was literally not capable of processing over x amount of rebuys and add-ons and the tournament crashed. I made a long post defending UB, that at least the problem was a result of UB trying to offer something the players wanted, that we needed to be patient while UB went through what I called "growing pains" (of course my positive posts are never remembered, only the negative ones). UB managed to fix the software glitch for the subsequent rebuy tournaments and they were wildly successful. Players that had never played at UB before were now trying some UB tournaments.

    So, here's what they did. They simply cancelled any further rebuy tournaments! The reason given was that UB believed they were better off courting cash game players as they were more profitable. I was just a little stunned. Basic common sense would dictate that you would emulate successful business plans put in place at other larger sites, but you see UB had it's mind made up, there was no convincing them that other sites were using tournaments to draw players who may ultimately become cash game players.

    So, time passed, and now Paradise which has enjoyed a much better increase in market share than UB is now running rebuy tournaments to EVERYTHING, and doing so with such a wide buy in range and frequency that all types of players have something to fit their personal preference.

    Some of the single biggest fields and prizepools at Poker stars are guess what, rebuy tournaments. Stars runs an $11 rebuy tournament with a $45k guaranteed prize pool and it regularly eclipses $60k.

    The large majority of the players that UB should be courting are the average Joe's who are willing to put up a small to medium amount of money to try and win a piece of a big prize pool or a seat to a WPT event. If you change your business model to one that caters to these players then you would watch over time as UB's business would prosper.

    Unfortunately, UB has never committed itself to allowing these tournaments to become entrenched, and thus be successful, which is why in the past many players have considered UB to be wishy washy in it's commitment to provide what the players want.

    The sad part is that I'm quite sure that both Paradise and Poker Stars has increased it's customer base exponentially, and I'm also positive that a lot of these new customers are contributing to Stars bottom line by participating in cash games and sng's.

    I may not know much, but I know a failed business plan when I see it. If the mechanisms aren't in place to ensure the customers will not only come, but stay, it doesn't make a difference if your Phil Hellmuth, Annie Duke, or Spongebob Squarepants, the players will not stay, but this is a lesson that already should have been learned.

    I promise you this, Chris Moneymaker, Greg Raymer, and Joe Hachem may help promote and bring new customers to Poker Stars, but the reason the players stay there is because they provide what the players want in both menu of games and tournaments, and a first class customer service department.

    The jury is still not out on this issue, as UB certainly has made earnest attempts to fix some things that were broken. Just about everyone concedes that UB software and structure is the best. I just have a gut feeling that we are about to go down that same road again, and UB will tell us once again what isn't working, even though it is working everywhere else, and they will do so without ever really commiting itself to give these tournaments a chance.

    Gl,

    Chris.
     1
  5. Skoky Skoky is offline

    Bateman
    Australia

    Posts: 432
    Joined: Dec 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 9:01pm) in reply to brsavage

    BR
    I think Annies new thread answers and provides solutions to what you are saying with the new sats she has got UB to add
  6. cracknaces cracknaces is offline

    Las Vegas, NV
    United States

    Posts: 630
    Joined: Jan 06

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 9:04pm) in reply to TTTTTTTTTTTTT

    They will give you TECs if you email them (done it twice).... They are getting better, sounds like they are introducing some sort of T$ system comparable to stars soon. Give them a month or so?
     
  7. dd dd is offline

    Monroe, LA
    United States

    Posts: 1,596
    Joined: Apr 05

    Jan 27th, 2006 (1/27/2006 9:41pm) in reply to cracknaces

    T$ and W$ are the nuts.
Reply to Thread

Similar Threads