- GGPoker has announced that social media influencer and poker enthusiast Dan Bilzerian has signed on as a Brand Ambassador.
- GGPoker will be celebrating the signing with a $100,000 freeroll that will coincide with Bilzerian’s 40th birthday on December 7.
- Bilzerian will sit at the same level as Daniel Negreanu, Felipe Ramos, ElkY and Fedor Holz.
GGPoker has announced that social media influencer and poker enthusiast Dan Bilzerian has signed on as a Brand Ambassador representing the operator in both the live and online sphere.
GGPoker will celebrate the signing with a $100,000 freeroll that coincides with Bilzerian’s 40th birthday on December 7.
Bilzerian will be joining the company in the top tier of sponsored pros, company officials confirmed, sitting alongside Daniel Negreanu, Felipe Ramos, ElkY and Fedor Holz.
It marks the second mainstream celebrity to work with the operator, with GG previously partnering with Tennis legend Boris Becker.
“Dan joining Team GGPoker is a huge win,” GG Ambassador Daniel Negreanu said via press release. “No one in poker has a bigger reach. He has won millions in cash games and isn’t afraid to get into the mix against the sharks in the high-stakes streets at GGPoker.”
He certainly has very wide reach: If GG can turn even a fraction of his 32.6 million followers on Instagram into new poker fans, then the partnership will be assuredly worthwhile.
For a long time, operators have sought the endorsement of celebrities with appeal outside the core poker demographic.
Comedian Kevin Hart, with over 100 million followers on social media, currently represents partypoker. PokerStars has netted ambassadorships with a wide variety of stars covering sports, TV and film. Most recently, it worked with UK-based YouTubers Sidemen and True Geordie, who combined have over 10 million subscribers.
Bilzerian has made a name for himself over the years, capitalizing on his a sex, drugs and rock-and-roll lifestyle to building a huge Instagram following.
However, he remains a divisive character. There are long standing feuds with prominent poker players such as Doug Polk and his signing will likely cause much debate among the poker Twitterati.
The GG signing is well timed for the star. The self-proclaimed King of Instagram has had a rocky 2020 to date, with Forbes revealing one of Bilzerian’s businesses on the verge of collapse.
This is certainly not the first time Bilzerian has tied his name to a poker product. Most recently, he made moves in the Indian online poker market, with BlitzPoker taking over FTRPoker and becoming part of the Spartan Poker Network. BiltzPoker is dubbed “The Official Poker Room of @danbilzerian” and it remains to be seen how this will fit in with his new role at GG.
It was at this time that pokerfuse spotted Bilzerian at the WSOP GG 2020 tables with custom avatars, hinting at a potential ambassadorship. However, at the time the operator denied any form of partnership was on the cards.
The celebratory birthday freeroll to mark the signing will run as a progressive knockout for depositors using a special promotional code.
The winner will take home a first prize of $10,000 plus a further $3000 as a buy-in to a “once-in-a-lifetime heads-up series vs Dan,” the company stated. More details are to come.
The Birthday Freeroll features special bounties on Bilzerian’s head as well as his special guests—yet to be confirmed—and other GGPoker sponsored pros. If a player knocks out Bilzerian they will win an all-expenses paid trip to Las Vegas in summer 2021 to party with the man himself. Extra Spin & Gold tickets will be awarded for knockouts of other ambassadors and guests
“In these crazy times, GGPoker is the best option to get my poker on—they cater to the recreational players and that’s the future of poker, not a bunch of math nerds,” said Dan Bilzerian via press release. “I’ve battled guys from the $2 buy-in to the $200,000 buy-in tables at GGPoker, and will be working with GG to make cash game tables even better for the average player out there.”
