Breakthrough Stories: Leo McClean PokerStars - YouTube Leo McClean was a project manager with a passion for poker. He qualified for the EPT 10 London live tournament in an online satellite on. Personally, if I was a good and loyal customer for 3 years, and a company just shut down my account with no explanation, and didn't respond to my e-mails, I would take my business and my money. PokerStars LITE is the online poker app that allows you to play poker games with millions of real players, on the most fun and exciting play money poker app out there. Join today to get 35000 free chips as a welcome bonus. Whether you want to compete for huge prizes in our multi-table poker tournaments or prefer playing heads-up poker games, PokerStars offers any poker game available. PokerStars created a campaign for their gaming app with Mahendra Singh Dhoni. We talked to Jay and learnt the complete campaign story. Read on to know how they conceptualised the ad, why did they choose Dhoni and how they measure success of their campaigns. Are you paying high? According to Severin Rasset, PokerStars director of innovation and poker operations, 'There are tools that provide their users with sometimes small and other times clear advantages over others.

“The more you deep-dive into the understanding of the who, what, why, when and where, the easier it becomes to create stories that are not only creative but also effective.”

Online gaming industry has been rising in India. The notion which brands are creating is – a level playing field/ platform for everyone irrespective of anything else.

PokerStars created a campaign for their gaming app with Mahendra Singh Dhoni. We talked to Jay and learnt the complete campaign story.

Read on to know how they conceptualised the ad, why did they choose Dhoni and how they measure success of their campaigns.

Are you paying high? Check – Global Video Production Price guide

Pokerstars Stopped Working

1. “MS Dhoni vs Bansilal Tiwari, Usha Sampat & Roy Kuriakose”, is an interesting idea of providing a level playing field – how did this idea come and how did you build on this?

You see, the game of poker is truly a level playing field – an equalizer of sorts. As much as the game is about winning, it is also about losing.

But it’s how you handle a loss that makes you a winner – especially in the long term. MS Dhoni, as a sports personality, is generally perceived as unbeatable, don’t you think?

I mean, it’s Thala we’re talking about here. But if there’s one game regular folks like you and I have a chance to beat Dhoni in, it has got to be poker.

People of all walks of life are welcomed by PokerStars. Our ad-films show Dhoni, a cricket champion, playing heads-up poker against three very unique personalities who are also champions in their own right:

– Usha, a 73yr old marathon jogging champion who always comes 1st on sports day

– Bansi, a bodybuilder and fruit seller who has won weight-lifting championships with his hard-work and the hearts of people with the fruits he sells

– Roy, an ace mathematician and crazy metal-head who sees knots everywhere but truly knows the science of kindness

Dhoni can be seen enjoying a game of poker while inviting others to join in the fun game of skill and community.

All three ads showcase that poker is not only a game for all but the winner is never pre-announced.

It celebrates the attitude of PokerStars and its players who are always seeking to challenge themselves and each other, jump into new experiences and learn new skills.

Our goal was to create a series of ads that showcase MS Dhoni as a poker player enjoying a game of poker and not just another celebrity brand-ambassador promoting yet another product in yet another traditional manner.

The idea is a result of having a great understanding of the game, a strong yet fun brand philosophy, playing with genuine insights, having a great reference and giving immense creative freedom to the production house to bring it all to life.

Invitation to join Global Video Marketers Community

2. How should Marketers go about hiring celebrities to endorse their brands?

I’m not sure if there’s “one size fits all” advice for something like this considering there are multiple factors at play but if I had to use Dhoni and PokerStars as an example, I’d say be true to yourself (by that I mean your brand) and do everything in your capacity to find a perfect match for your brand.

Dhoni is literally everything that you’d want from a celebrity ambassador of the game of poker – actually plays and loves the game, a great poker face, calm under pressure, super strategic/thinking ability, preempting opponents’ moves and a personality who’s loved and trusted by all.

And to top it all, he’s an actual fan of PokerStars.

Check out – Top 25 Global Video Marketing Disruptors

3. How do you measure the success of a video campaign at PokerStars?

It depends on the KPIs we define and track considering not all our video campaigns have the same marketing goals.

Broadly speaking, if our goal is to get consumers to “Think poker, play PokerStars” – typically we want to increase awareness and consideration and ultimately influence action.

Considering most of what we do is digital, it’s fairly standard for us to be able to measure the metrics and optimize accordingly. From time to time we go beyond the tools by running consumer surveys.

Get updated with Latest Video Marketing News

4. What advice would you like to give to our community members regarding video marketing campaigns?

Don’t just create for the sake of creation and don’t try to disrupt for the sake of disruption.

Sometimes the strongest and most innovative of ideas lies in the most basic of truths or insights.

So the more you deep-dive into the understanding of the who, what, why, when and where, the easier it becomes to create stories that are not only creative but also effective.

Learn from Video Marketing experts

5. Please name the team behind this.

Sachiko Gaming (PokerStars India) and Walkabout Films

Here are the Top 40 Video Production Companies in India

About Jay (in his own words)

I grew up in Mumbai, was never really a fan of studying although I did acquire a passion for design and writing fairly early in life.

I pursued a BSc degree in Multimedia Systems (Hons) from London and my professional career started in 2004 after my return to Mumbai. I began designing and writing for friends and family – it helped me create a style of my own.

I benefited from the experience of working with different markets, various brands and nurtured my love for design, writing and strategy over the following years. In 2014, after spending close to 10 years in the world of digital advertising, I decided to leave.

As a digital nomad, regardless of size and importance, I embarked on a journey (Asia and Africa) of doing things for the first time, helping selective brands while on the move and exploring a whole new world of creative opportunities and challenges.

On paper, it was a journey of making mistakes, failing and probably wasting time. Although the adventure brought back my lost love for problem solving and creativity.

And that’s when PokerStars India happened to me.

Know the New Things happening in Video Marketing

About Vidsaga

Vidsaga is a global marketplace for Organisations to create Videos. Consider it as “Upwork/ Fiverr for videos” with Creative script writing and professional project management.

Join 52,000+ Global Video Marketers’ Community

Isai Scheinberg and his son Mark are winners, hands down, when it comes to online poker. In 2000, Isai, who worked for IBM in Canada and Israel, founded PYR, a software development company. In 2001, Isai and his son started PokerStars, the one and only one client of PYR. PYR’s primary job is to develop and maintain all of PokerStars online gaming software.

PokerStars has grown into the world’s largest online poker site. It has 35% of the world market share, and to date, is home to more than 26 million players across the globe. PS has the biggest tournaments and some of the softest competition on the Internet. Over the years, PokerStars.com has made the poker dream of winning big or playing in a live tournament, such as the annual World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP), a reality for so many players. They have sent the most players to WSOP, WPT, and EPT events combined and continue to payout some of the largest jackpots every weekend via their Sunday Millions tournament. Based in the Isle of Man, UK, the company has built a reputation that other online sites envy.

It is generally accepted that Isai and Mark own the vast majority of shares in Rational Entertainment Enterprises Limited. PokerStars, owned by REEL, is in not a publicly traded company; therefore, details about the firm’s structure are not known to the public, as privately held companies aren’t required to disclose information.

You don’t get as far as the Scheinberg’s do in gambling industry by not taking risks. Isai and his son Mark are shrewd and gutsy businessmen. Back in 2006 when federal lawmakers passed the US’s first anti-online gambling law, the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), some online sites cut and ran. PokerStars, however, hung in there and quickly became the biggest site in the world’s gaming market, and as of today, has an estimated annual revenue of $1.4 billion and some $500 million in profits. Although the US Justice Department has taken the position that online poker violates US law, PS says they have received legal opinions from several US law firms stating that they are in fact not violating US law.

In 2008, the US Attorney General in Manhattan froze some $34 million owed to poker players from companies that processed payments for poker games hosted by PokerStars and Full Tilt. Even though PokerStars maintains that it was under no legal obligation to do so, they did refund their customers.

THE VALUE OF THE PLAYER

PokerStars has a strict “no rakeback”policy. Even though they don’t offer rakeback, they still attract some of the biggest names in poker because they have one of the best VIP policies. They reward loyal players with a program which earns them gifts including electronics like a 60″ Plasma HDTV and a PlayStation 3 Slim.

Pokerstars Stock Symbol

The VIP program is based on the number of Frequent Player Points (FPPs) a player accumulates each month. The highest level you can reach is Supernova Elite, and to get there you must earn at least 1,000,000 FPPs per year which is not easy, but the rewards are pretty awesome. They include special access to the Supernova Elite VIP store where you can buy a Porsche Cayman S with your player points or any two packages from the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, the World Series of Poker Main Event, the European Poker Tour Monte Carlo, or the Asia Pacific Poker Tour Sydney. A third Supernova Elite option privilege is free entry into the online main event for the World Cup of Online Poker.

One thing PokerStars knows how to do well is listen to feed back from their customers. Over the years they have taken constant feedback from the players to help build the best and safest online poker software. The following are a few of its features:

• Re-sizeable Windows. Are you a multi-tasker? You can re-size the poker interface to make it a small screen that you can place at the bottom of your monitor.
• Speed. Because PokerStars doesn’t use fancy graphics, their software is the fastest of all the online sites. This means less lag time and a faster game.
• Custom Avatar. Upload a picture from your computer and use this as your avatar. Use your imagination.
• Show Folded Hands. Folded your hand but want to know how it would have played out if you stayed in? PS software enables you to see your folded hand by simply scrolling your mouse over your avatar.

THE FUTURE CHALLENGE

Security breaches are hands down the biggest concern for customers. At PokerStars all software updates are reviewed by several people before being deployed. All sensitive changes are also personally reviewed by the chief software architect to help ensure they are stable and secure. They are aware that there are some programs that claim to make it possible to see other players’ cards, and they have investigated many of these programs and have not found any of these programs actually do what they claim to do. Some of them are actually malware programs that compromise the security of whoever installs the software. But mostly they are simply scams, attempting to con players out of their money who incorrectly believe that these programs will give them a competitive edge. They do not, however, compromise PS security.

PokerStars states, “We have a large team of Poker Specialists in our Support Team who review all suspicious situations and escalate to the Game Security team if they find anything, which in turn will escalate to the senior management team if any serious problems are found. The security and integrity of our games is of paramount importance to PokerStars.”

According to eGaming Review, PokerStars has chosen a new CEO, Gabi Campos, to take over some of the duties of founder Isai Scheinberg. Campos will come on board in October and Isai will remain as Chief Technical Officer, while his son, Mark will move into the Chairman’s seat. In an internal memo received by eGaming Review, Mark Scheinberg stated: “Both Isai and myself will continue to be closely involved in the company’s strategic direction and building on the success we have all achieved together as a team over the last 10 years. We are excited about this new chapter in the PokerStars story, and look forward to Gabi’s leadership in taking the company forward to continued success.”