Poker King took a leaf out of PokerStars’ marketing playbook by pitting Phil Ivey against basketball legend Allen Iverson in a series of one-on-one challenges.
The online poker site has been using its partnerships with Ivey and Tom Dwan to good effect in recent weeks. Candid interviews with the often elusive high-stakes stars have generated more than 1 million views on YouTube.
The latest video offering introduces what appears to be a new mini-series called Double or Nothing featuring Ivey and Iverson.
Ivey and Iverson Go One-On-One
The 1.37-minute video doesn’t provide a huge amount of detail about what the two icons are doing. However, we get to see them engaging in, and betting on, a series of challenges.
In addition to racing trikes around the grounds of a mansion, Ivey and Iverson can be seen playing beer pong, shooting hoops, and building card monuments. The climax of the video (see below) is a heads-up match where, as you’d expect, Ivey wins.
It’s not clear whether or not Poker King intends to parlay this into a full-scale promotion, but it’s certainly a play we’ve seen before. When PokerStars drafted Kevin Hart and Usain Bolt, the two celebrities competed in a series of challenges known as #GameOn.
Poker King has the opportunity to do something similar with Ivey and Iverson. The former is a proverbial poker legend. The latter is known to basketball fans around the world.
Iverson was an NBA All-Star and MVP during his career. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, and is regarded by many as one of the sport’s most influential players.
His storied career is backed up by a healthy following on social media. In addition to 1.2 million Twitter followers, Iverson has 8.6 million fans on Instagram. That’s a lot of potential customers for a fledgling Poker King to tap in to.
What or Who is Poker King?
The Poker King Phil Ivey and Tom Dwan endorse is not the same site that operates on the Winning Poker Network (i.e. PokerKing).
This Poker King is based in Asia and launched in 2018 as an app for Chinese Poker. It’s since evolved, and now offers all poker variants.
It claims to have 1.2 million customers, all of which must come from Asia, as the site is only licensed by First Cagayan in the Philippines.
An interesting parallel here is GGPoker. That company started in Asia and built up a solid base of players before acquiring licenses in the UK and other regions. GGPoker is now one of the biggest sites in the world.
Poker King may be looking to emulate that success. A series of promotions featuring Phil Ivey and Allen Iverson will certainly help, particularly if they can strike a chord with the latter’s fanbase.
