Easiest Poker Sites Online
Playing at the Easy Poker Rooms - How to Find the Fish?
One factor should matter above all others when it comes to selecting an online poker room: How easy are the games? Ultimately, it doesn't matter how great the software is, how wonderful the promotions are or even how many different types and limits a poker room might support - if you can't beat the games at that site, you shouldn't be playing at that site.
What Makes Some Online Poker Sites Easier Than Others?
Some people undoubtedly think that all online poker rooms are more or less the same. After all, if you had two live casinos right across the street from one another, you would likely conclude that play in one poker room would be quite similar to play in the other.
As it happens, there are a number of characteristics that can distinguish online poker rooms from one another when it comes to the softness of their games. Understanding these characteristics and analyzing them when considering an online poker room can help increase your chances of finding softer poker rooms right from the start.
So, all things being otherwise equal, poker rooms that are on the easier side of the spectrum will tend to feature:
Promotions that cater to casual players. A wide - and constantly refreshed - pool of casual players is critical to fostering soft games at an online poker room. You can generally get a pretty good sense of what audience a poker room is attempting to reach by the promotions they offer (and also by which promotions they highlight). Rooms that tout high cash back rates via complicated VIP programs are probably more geared toward intermediate to serious players. Rooms that offer small deposit bonuses (think $10 for $10 or something along those lines) and low-cost satellites to mainstream poker events like the World Series of Poker are obviously working to attract a more recreational class of player - exactly the type of opponent you'd like to see at your tables.
Simple deposit and withdrawal methods. While some parts of the world are always going to have to jump through a couple of hoops to make a deposit at an online poker room, most casual poker players simply aren't willing to put up with complicated deposit and withdrawal processes. They just want to put a few bucks online and play some poker. You should be looking for rooms that facilitate easy banking - rooms that offer popular payment methods like PayPal or Moneybookers. Take notice of your own experience making a deposit or a withdrawal from a room - if it's more complicated than you'd like or takes longer than you'd like, you can be sure a casual player will steer clear of that room.
Engaged customer support. While playing online poker seems like a simple process to those who have been doing it for years, for new and casual players the process can be a bit intimidating - even overwhelming. That's why an engaged customer support staff that can allay those anxieties is critical for developing and maintaining a base of recreational players. Hop on live chat or shoot an email to customer support with some basic questions about how the room works (banking is another great topic). Don't be afraid to ask what seem like obvious or even stupid questions. Take note of how long it takes customer support to respond and the quality of the response you get. If you find either lacking, you might want to move on to the next room, because a casual player is highly unlikely to trust a room after experiencing subpar customer service.
What's the Easiest Poker Site for US Players?
Given the relatively short list of options for US online poker players, choosing the softest site is a somewhat difficult task; most of the rooms have significant overlap in their player pools and offer very similar promotions and features. With that said, Lock Poker is the best choice for poker players from the US looking for the easiest poker site. The room has generated an intense amount of press in the last few months via their acquisition of the Cake Poker Network and the subsequent rebranding of the network to Revolution Gaming. Lock also has a global promotional focus that ensures a steady flow of players from around the world into the room, while some other US-facing rooms are more or less focused exclusively on the US market (where casual players are now few and far between).
What's the Easiest Overall Online Poker Site?
The clear winner in the race to attract the most casual players in the European and global poker market is 888 Poker. 888 has a number of things going for it; first, the company operates a full range of gambling products - including an extensive social gaming presence - that feed recreational players into their real-money poker room. Second, the company has done a great job of focusing on spokespeople who have broad, mainstream appeal - as opposed to the limited appeal that even famous poker players suffer from. With stars like Shane Warner and and MMA legend Georges St-Pierre promoting the 888 Poker brand, you can feel confident that the room is reaching well beyond the traditional online poker market and into demographics that other rooms simply don't seem to know how to reach.
Finally, 888 offers a number of software features that are clearly designed to attract and retain casual players. Whether it's their 3-D software, webcams, Team Poker or any of a dozen other features that hardcore players would scoff at or ignore altogether, 888 clearly understands that their platform is an important avenue for distinguishing themselves from the rest of the market in the ongoing competition to attract recreational online poker players.
