Link Exchange

I receive about ten link exchange requests every day and I estimate that only 1 or 2 out of every 100 link exchange requests receives a link on my site.. I will respond to your email within a week ... but only if I decide to post your link on my site. If you do not receive a response from me within one week, I will not be posting your link on my site. Sending me multiple requests will hurt your chances of receiving a link from me.

Your link exchange request will be judged solely on the value of the poker content on your web site. I do not care what your Google page rank is. I do not exchange links in the hopes of improving my page rank or your page rank ... I exchange links to provide valuable information to my readers.

I will probably post your link if you are a poker chip, poker table, poker clothing, playing cards, or poker accessories vendor. You must post my link of your site before you email me with your link request.

If you send me an email stating that your link page is under construction and you will place my link on your page as soon as your link page is ready -  I will ask you to contact me again after you have finished your page and posted my link on your site. It is unreasonable of you to expect me to post your link on my site and then force me to check your site every couple days/weeks to see if my link has been posted on your page.

Your link will be placed on the most relevant page (Poker Chips, Poker Cards, Buy a Poker Table, etc.) on my site and may be placed on more than one page. General-interest links that are highly related to home poker tournaments will be placed on my Poker Links page. Links that are not highly related to home poker tournaments will be placed on my More Poker Links page. Most pages on HPT, except the home page, have a Google page rank (PR) of 3.

These things guarantee that I will probably not link to you ...

• Your home page consists of reviews of poker rooms. Please note that 50% of the link requests that I receive fall into this category ... and have absolutely no chance of getting a link on my site.
• I visit your home page and am bombarded with poker room affiliate links but almost nothing else.
• You have 5-10 pages on your site - a small page about holdem rules, a small page about poker supplies, a small page about poker news, a small page about poker tournaments, a small page about poker books, a small page about the history of poker ... and 100 affiliate banner ads for poker rooms, with poker room reviews.
• Requesting a link on my home page.
• Your link to me uses a redirect.
• You have a general-interest gambling site with one or two pages about poker.
• It is would be too difficult for the average user to find my link on your site. Your links are hidden or buried too deep.
• Your 'robot' sends me an email stating that you think my site is great and that you wish to exchange links!
• Your email contains one or more of the following statements: "Hi, I am the link manager at", "and adding your link would make a great addition to our own site!", "would benefit both our sites", "as you know, Google rewards sites that link to each other", "and we could both improve our Google page rank", "please send me a list of the pages that you have available and I will send you a list of the sites that I represent", "your link will appear on our site within 24 hours, after our next scheduled links update", "on a page without many outgoing links", "I am not interested in links on inner pages, only on your home page", "I expect a link back to me on a page with a similar or higher page rank", and, my favorite ... "We have posted your link on our site. We do not insist on a link back to our site but will have to remove your link if our own link is not posted on your site within two weeks - it would be unfair to our other link partners". Then two weeks later ... "We cannot find our link posted on your site. Please be advised that we will remove your link from our site unless you post our link within 24 hours. If this email has been sent in error please contact us at". Then 48 hours later ... "Your link has been removed from our site. If this has been done in error please contact us at". Then the entire process repeats itself three months later ... "We have posted your link on our site. We do not insist on a link back to our site but will have to remove your link if our own link is not posted on your site within two weeks - it would be unfair to our other link partners". Then two weeks later ...

How to Request a Link Exchange

A properly formatted link exchange request would include the following information ...

Link: www.your-site.com
Title: Your site's name goes here
Description: Description of your site goes here
My link to you is at: www.your-site.com/page-with-the-link-to-HPT

My e-mail address is ...

I will respond to your request within one week, but you will only receive a response if I decide that I will post your link on my site. If I do not respond, I will not be posting your link on my site.

HPT Link Information

Please link to ...
Home Poker Tourney (www.homepokertourney.com)
using this description ...
Advice on how to host and run a no-limit Texas Hold'em poker tournament in your home

or ...

Please link to ...
How To Build a Poker Table (www.homepokertourney.com/tables_build.htm)
using this description ...
How To Build a Poker Table

or ...

Please link to ...
Home Poker Tourney Forums or HPT Forums (forums.homepokertourney.com)
using this description ...
Discussion forum specializing in poker tournament structures and rules, poker chip distributions, and poker products

Here are some images that you may use to link back to me. To save the image to your hard disk, right-click and choose Save As. Please do not hot link to these images, host them on your own site.