03/20/2012 : Traffic overall fell 3.5 percent last week, with six of the top ten sites losing 5 percent or more
The independent online poker monitor Pokerscout.com reports that overall traffic last week declined 3.5 percent – the sixth straight weekly drop – with six of the top ten websites feeling the pain of 5 percent or more drops in traffic, and considerably more sites showing traffic declines than those boasting gains.
US-friendly Merge Gaming Network, Bodog and Cake Poker Network were among those that lost 5 percent or more, the reasons for the substantial fall-off not being fully apparent.
PokerStars did better than most rivals, losing only 1.1 percent, probably due to the interest in its newly released real money Zoom Poker. In the first few days after launch, approximately 25 percent of all cash game players were playing Zoom, and the variant has been racking up nearly half of all cash game hands dealt.
Each Zoom player is roughly equivalent to three regular cash game players (or one player playing three tables at once), Pokerscout explains, reasoning that by that measure, PokerStars traffic is up nearly 50 percent since the Zoom launch….and that could possibly account for the loss of traffic among major competitors.
The monitor notes that among the Top 20 movers:
* iPoker.it gained a spot, rising to 14th place.
* PartyPoker climbed four notches to 15th.
* EverestPoker.fr fell from 14th to 16th.
* Bodog, Everest Poker and Svenska Spel each lost one place, ending the week in 17th, 18th and 19th, respectively.
According to Pokerscout's ACES indicator, online poker traffic (ex-Italy) has decreased by 32 percent over the last year.
PokerStars continues to lead the field with traffic up 17 percent, trailed by PartyPoker (6 percent) and iPoker Network (2 percent), with Merge among the notable gainers – up 72 percent, along with 888Poker (64 percent), Bodog (31 percent) and Winamax.fr (29 percent).