As recapped in our Top 10 Poker Articles of 2013 post from about a week ago, last year was a banner year for us here at the Cardplayer Lifestyle poker blog. We hit a number of high notes over the course of 2013, with expectations having been exceeded on a number of fronts. That said, something I didn’t do last year was set concrete goals for growth.
If you’ve visited this poker blog before, you know that I’m a huge Daniel Negreanu fanboy. If he, a 6-time WSOP bracelet winner with numerous other poker accolades, still sets big goals for himself, then I can too. I saw a sign once that said “Shoot for the moon – even if you miss, you’ll be sure to land among the stars”. With that in mind, here are my top 10 poker and poker blog goals for 2014:
1. Publish 100 posts
Last year I wrote a post detailing why I don’t blog about poker more often. Fact is, I’ve still got a full-time job and 3 (amazing!) kids. Nonetheless, I managed to publish 83 new articles in 2013, an average of 7 per month. I doubt I’ll discover a way to create more free time in my schedule to write more often but if everything works out as planned, hopefully you’ll all be seeing some additional posts from guest bloggers and our top Contributors.
2. Hit 1,000 followers on Twitter and 300 fans on Facebook
Over the past year, our audience of poker lovers grew from about 130 Twitter followers and 125 Facebook fans to 465 Twitter followers and 200 Facebook fans, respectively. Fact is, as the amount of content we’ve published has increased so has our fan base and following on social media. I believe there’s a bit of a snowball effect involved. The hardest part has been packing together that initial ball of snow, but now that it’s begun to “roll downhill” and pick up steam, the growth will quicken – and hopefully you guys will continue to engage with us as well as share and RT your favorite articles to broaden our reach even further.
3. Increase traffic to 6,000 monthly visitors
By extension of hitting goals 1 and 2, I hope to hit this 3rd goal. The Cardplayer Lifestyle poker blog currently gets 4,000 monthly visitors on average. Assuming our reach on social media broadens and we publish more top-quality poker content that you guys like, it stands to reason more people will flock here to read what we have to say.
4. Have one monster cash game or tournament win
In the past I’ve written extensively about dealing with poker downswings, not letting bad poker results get you down, and bad beats. Sadly, much of the material for those blog posts has come from personal experience. Though I’ve still been a winning poker player overall in each of the last few years, I’ve endured many longer- and harsher-than-usual stretches of really bad runs.
The reason it’s a goal, not a hope, to have one monster cash game session or tournament win is that I’ve worked hard on my game, especially my mental game of poker. I’m positive that the maths and variance will balance out sooner rather than later and I’m giving myself the best possible shot at maximizing the heater when it finally comes. You can be sure that if and when it does, you’ll be hearing about it.
5. Interview another WSOP Main Event Champion
This year started off with as bang, as we had the honor and privilege to interview 2005 WSOP Main Event Champion Joe Hachem. It’s one of the most exclusive clubs in poker, so when a champ speaks, people listen. Based on the success of Joe’s interview, we know that you poker fans would love to hear from another popular champion of years past. We’ll do our best to try and make that happen.
Which champion would you like us to try and get an interview with? Let us know in the comments section below.
6. Get linked to by PokerNews.com
This is one of those “holy grails” to me as a poker blogger. After 4+ years of writing about poker, a link from the world’s #1 poker news site still eludes me. On a positive note, however, over the past few months I’ve had the distinct pleasure of connecting with a number of writers and staff members over at PokerNews via social media, including Senior Writer and WSOP bracelet winner Chad Holloway as well as their illustrious Editor-in-Chief Donnie Peters.
What all this says to me then is that in order to be linked to by the best in the business, you’ve really got to earn it. Challenge accepted! Consider us motivated to turn out even better content this year that PokerNews will deem worthy of being linked to. Achieving this goal would mean tremendous validation that the hard work put into making Cardplayer Lifestyle a great poker blog will have indeed paid off.
7. Have one article go viral on The Times of Israel
Recently, I was tapped by The Times of Israel to write a monthly article or two for their Start-Up Israel section. Living in Israel, working full-time in the online gambling industry, running this poker blog, and having co-created a live poker note-taking app gives me a pretty unique perspective and the ability to tie together the worlds of Israeli hi-tech and online gambling. Here’s hoping one of my articles can “go on a heater” and attract lots of additional eyeballs to the already-largest English language news site here in the Holy Land.
8. Go on a poker vacation with my buddies
All work and no play makes Robbie’s poker writing very dull. Alright, I won’t butcher The Shining any further but there’s a reason my motto is “work hard and play hard”. You gots to recharge dem batteries once in a while!For ages, my buddies and I have talked about going on a proper poker vacation together. Given our common bonds of being married religious Jewish fathers to young children and living in Israel, many thousands of miles away from the bright lights of any land-based casino, a poker vacation isn’t exactly something simple and inexpensive that can be done over any random weekend.
To make this a goal rather than a hope, there actually has to be a plan in place. The opening shots have thus been fired – wives: you’ve been warned! … er, alright, respectfully suggested to :-).
9. Get Followed by Daniel Negreanu on Twitter
Much like goal #6, I feel like this poker goal needs to truly be earned. I may be a huge fan, have interviewed his personal assistant, Patty Landis, and have written about him countless times (who in poker hasn’t?!), but a Twitter follow is not something that can be taken for granted, especially one from Daniel Negreanu. His notoriety and clout in the poker world are practically unmatched and though he follows a good few hundred people, I’m positive that the overwhelming majority of them have earned it.
When one of the most influential people in poker is tuned in to the messages you’re broadcasting, it sure means a hell of a lot.
Admittedly, this goal of mine is purely subject to Daniel’s whim, but darned if I won’t keep trying.
10. Actually start writing my (first?) poker book
For a couple years now I’ve been toying with the idea of writing a poker book. I’ve got my topic, title, target audience, and points for many of the chapters. Every so often I think of an idea I’d like to add and I jot it down, but the project inevitably “stays in the file drawer”.
With my plate so full I know it’s too much to set a goal of finishing the book, but to at least get off to a running start and make it a real, official poker project would be a big step forward.
Thanks, as always, to all our new and regular readers for your support. Cheers, and here’s hoping that you realize all of YOUR poker goals for 2014!