Top Five Poker Tips

These top five poker tips are fairly basic in nature but they are important nonetheless. In poker, there are certain fundamentals that must be covered to ensure you build a strong base. The five poker tips listed here are what I consider to be the most essential tips for all new internet poker players. Check these tips out and prepare yourself to become a more profitable internet poker player.

Poker Tip #1 – Choose Your Starting Hands Carefully

Your entire poker strategy begins with the hands you play before the flop. The biggest mistake new poker players make is to play too many starting hands. Most new players have heard things about poker such as “any two can win” and “you can’t win if you don’t play.” As catchy as those little tidbits sound, they are actually terrible pieces of poker advice.

Most winning poker players fold anywhere from 75-80% of their starting hands. If you think about it, most hands are junk anyways. Hands such as K2o, Q7s, and such rarely turn into stronger hands. The only thing these hands accomplish is costing you money. Sure, any hand can win a pot but that doesn’t mean you should play every hand. In poker, money comes from making mathematically correct decisions over and over again over a long period of time.

Starting hands in poker should either start out strong or be able to quickly turn into strong hands. In early position, you should stick with premium hands such as AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AK and AQ. This needs to be your tightest position because you have to act first during the entire round. As you get into middle and late position, you can also start to play hands such as KQs, small pocket pairs and suited connectors.

Poker Tip #2 –Open the Pot with a Raise

If you’re the first person in the pot, you should almost always enter with a raise. Starting hands that aren’t strong enough to enter with a raise should just be folded. If other people have entered the pot in front of you, this rule doesn’t apply (unless you have a premium hand). The point here is that opening the pot by limping in is a weak move. It gives control of the hand to anyone out there who wants to take it.

By opening pots with raises you take control of the hand and force the other players to play a more straightforward manner. It’s more expensive for them to bluff-raise because you have already raised. It also makes it expensive for them to play weak, drawing type hands. The preflop raise establishes your dominance during the hand and adds more weight to bets you make after the flop.

Poker Tip #3 – Play Aggressive After the Flop

By “aggressive” I don’t mean to just blindly throw out bets and raises left and right. What I mean is that you should play a game in which you are quick to fold your weak hands and quick to bet your strong hands. Calling is a weak play and usually incorrect in Texas Holdem.

The problem with calling is that it doesn’t accomplish your goals. It doesn’t get more money in the middle when you have strong hands and it doesn’t save you money when you have weak hands. Sure, there are exceptions (such as when you have a powerhouse and want to slowplay it for a street) but generally you should avoid calling. If your hand isn’t strong enough to bet or raise, it probably isn’t strong enough to call.

The same thing goes for draws. You should not chase draws after the flop unless you are getting the odds to do so and the draw is to the nuts. Chasing draws against the odds is an effective way to throw your money down the drain.

Poker Tip #4 – Don’t Play While Tilted

Tilt occurs when you let your emotions affect your play. Any time you lose a big pot and feel that surge of anger or desperation, you may be about to go into tilt mode. Under no circumstances should you ever play poker while feeling upset or angry. Playing poker while under the affect of your emotions is a recipe for disaster. Not only will you play worse on accident, but you might actually make bad moves (such as going all-in) out of spite.

It’s hard to quit after going on tilt but it’s even harder to rebuild your bankroll from scratch. I’ve known many talented poker players who made a lot of money and then blew it all by going on tilt and not quitting. Remember that with poker, there’s always a new day. If you feel that tilty feeling, just turn off the computer and get out of the house. There’s a big world out there outside of poker.

Poker Tip #5 – Play within Your Bankroll

You should always keep your poker money separate from the rest of your personal finances. This special money is your “poker bankroll” and you should treat it like gold. If you always practice smart bankroll management, you can grow a huge bankroll without ever having to add outside money to it. Plus, you’ll have an almost zero chance of growing broke.

We have an entire article dedicated to bankroll management so I’m not going to list the recommended bankroll for each poker game type. What I will say, though, is that you should always play in games for which you are properly bankrolled. Even if you have a tough week at the tables and have to move down, that’s better than playing outside your bankroll. If you always move down when you take a hit in your bankroll, you will never go broke. The fastest way to kill your poker bankroll is to play in games that are too high for your bankroll.