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This article was written by blackrain79.com contributor Fran Ferlan.
After learning the basic rules of the game, improving your poker skills can be daunting if you’re a total beginner.
Fortunately, learning the basic winning strategy is not too difficult, and everyone can do it with a bit of effort.
In this article, we’ll go over 5 essential lessons every beginner player should know. These lessons are guaranteed to improve your game and get you on the right track to becoming a winning player.
Let’s get right into it.
Beginner Poker Lesson #1: Tight and Aggressive is the Way to Go
The easiest way to start winning at poker quickly is to learn the basics of a tight and aggressive (TAG) poker strategy.
A tight and aggressive strategy includes:
a) only playing strong starting hands
b) playing most hands in position
c) playing aggressively (i.e. betting and raising) both preflop and post flop
We’re going to break down each aspect in more detail below.
But before jumping into details, let’s examine why a tight and aggressive strategy is recommended for beginner poker players, and why it’s the most effective strategy to beat small stakes games.
TAG strategy works well in small stakes games because it exploits the weaknesses of the majority of the player pool you’ll likely be playing against.
These weaknesses include playing way too many hands preflop, and playing them passively (i.e. checking and calling instead of betting and raising).
The most effective playstyle is the opposite of the one your opponents are playing.
For example, if your opponents are too loose and are playing too many hands, the best way to beat them is to tighten up and play stronger hands than them.
In practice, this means you’re going to make stronger hand combinations than them post flop, and you’ll often be able to get paid by weaker hands.
In poker, most of the money you’ll win will come from spots where you have a strong hand, and your opponent has a weaker hand that’s willing to give you action.
This will often be the case if you play against other recreational players who love to call a lot.
Against recreational players, your best bet is to wait for a strong hand, then value bet it relentlessly.
You are value betting when your hand can get called by a lot of weaker hands.
This is the opposite of betting as a bluff, where you expect to get stronger hands than yours to fold.
Contrary to popular belief, making daring bluffs is not how you win the most money in this game.
Knowing how to bluff effectively is indeed a part of every advanced poker strategy, but it’s not the most effective way to win in small stakes games.
In fact, bluffing against recreational players is something you should definitely avoid doing as a general rule.
You should only bluff in spots where your opponent is actually capable of folding, which is often not the case when you’re playing against recreational players.
Recreational players hate folding. They play poker for fun, and folding is anything but fun.
That’s why you’re better off saving your bluffs for opponents who are paying attention and actually have a fold button.
By the way, check out my recent video with my top beginner poker tips.
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Speaking of folding, a tight and aggressive strategy will require a lot of folding on your part.
This brings us to the first cornerstone of a successful TAG strategy, and that is only playing strong starting hands.
Beginner Poker Lesson #2: Only Play Strong Starting Hands
As a general rule, you should only play about 20% of starting hands that are dealt to you.
This may sound overly restrictive at first , but it’s the best way to immediately get an edge over your opponents.
Also, the top 15%-20% of hands is just a rough guideline.
You can play a lot more hands in late positions, but you should play even less hands in early table positions (more about playing in position below).
You can play a lot more hands in late positions, but you should play even less hands in early table positions (more about playing in position below).
There are several reasons you should only play strong starting hands preflop.
First of all, most hands miss most flops in no-limit hold’em (2 out of 3 times, to be precise).
Since you always need to pay money to see the flop, the more flops you see, the more money you’ll lose.
And some hands are going to miss the flop a lot more often than others, because they have very poor playabilty post flop.
For example, hands like J♥4♣ or 9♦3♦ are rarely going to connect with the flop in some meaningful way.
And even if they do, they’ll make mediocre hands at best.
Check out my other article on the 4 bad poker hands you should definitely avoid playing.
So you should only play hands that have a reasonable chance of connecting with the flop in some meaningful way.
Here is a quick overview of starting poker hands you should play preflop:
a) Pocket pairs (AA through 22)
b) Broadway hands (high cards that can make the strongest possible straight, like KQ or AJ)
c) Suited Aces (AKs through A2s)
d) Suited connectors (AKs through 32s)
This is a big oversimplification, of course, but it serves as a good starting point on hand categories you should consider playing preflop.
Notice how certain hands are not present in these categories (for example weak Aces like A6o or suited gappers like 85s).
These weak to mediocre hands will often get you in trouble post flop, usually due to an inferior kicker.
A kicker is the card in your hand that doesn’t help you make a certain hand combination, but can determine the winner of the hand if both players end up with the same combination.
For example, if both players have a pair of Aces, a player with the stronger kicker wins.
If you play hands with weak kickers, you run the risk of your hand being dominated.
A dominated hand is the one that’s unlikely to win against another hand due to an inferior kicker.
You always want your hand to dominate your opponent’s, instead of the other way around.
For example, if you hold Ace-King, you are dominating all the other Ax hands. If you play a hand like A2, on the other hand, all the other Ax hands are dominating you, instead.
This is why you should stick with only playing strong starting hands preflop.
If you do that, you will often make stronger post flop combinations than your opponent, instead of ending up with only the second best hand, which is the worst hand to have in poker.
Now, folding 80% of hands may seem boring, and fair enough.
But winning poker, especially at the lower stakes, mostly comes down to discipline, which means enduring a bit of boredom from time to time.
If you just want to have fun and play some cards, you can play just about any hand that’s dealt to you.
But you can’t expect to win any money that way over the long run.
Enduring a bit of boredom for the prospect of earning money from a hobby seems like a fair tradeoff in my book.
With that in mind, this doesn’t mean you should just doze off when you’re not directly involved in the hand.
In fact, you should use this downtime to observe the action and try to pick up on tells from your opponents.
You can observe the action sequence, pay attention to the betting patterns, physical or timing tells and so on.
You should especially be on the lookout for hands that get to showdown (when your opponents reveal their hole cards).
This can give you insight into the way they play, which you can use later to adjust your strategy against them.
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Beginner Poker Lesson #3: Play Most Hands in Position
Another crucial aspect of a successful tight and aggressive strategy is playing most hands in position.
Playing in position means being the last to act in a betting round.
Playing in position is a huge advantage to have for multiple reasons:
a) you have more information than your opponents.
By being the last to act, you get to see what they did, and they have no idea what you are going to do.
b) you can control the size of the pot.
If you’re the last to act, you get the final say at the size of the pot.
If you have a strong hand, you can bet or raise to inflate the pot size, and if you have a mediocre or a drawing hand, you can call or check behind to keep the pot size smaller.
c) you can bluff more effectively.
Since it’s harder to play out of position due to the informational disadvantage, players will be less likely to fight back for pots.
This means you can push them out of pots more easily with a well-timed bluff.
If you’re using a hand tracking software like PokerTracker 4, you can check your stats to see how much money you earn in position as opposed to playing out of position.
In poker, the money always flows from the players out of position to the players in position.
So how does playing more hands in position look like in practice?
You simply open-raise more hands in late table positions (namely the cutoff and the button), and open-raise less hands from earlier table positions.
When you play on the button in particular, you are ALWAYS going to have the positional advantage post flop.
For this reason, the button is going to be by far the most profitable table position over the long run.
The further you are from the button, the less likely you are to play in position post flop, meaning you’ll need stronger cards to play the position profitably.
This means you need to tighten up your open-raising ranges the further you are from the button.
When you’re playing in the blinds, you will always play out of position post flop.
The only exception to this rule is when you are playing in the big blind against a small blind.
Due to the positional disadvantage in the blinds, these seats won’t be profitable for you over the long run, no matter how well you’re playing.
This is simply how the game is set up. The best you can do is try to lose as little as possible when playing in the blinds, then try to make up for the difference when from other positions.
Of course, this doesn’t mean you should simply fold all the hands that are dealt to you in the blinds.
If you do that, you leave yourself vulnerable to getting exploited by the players who will try to steal your blinds any chance they get.
This means you will need to defend your blinds from time to time to discourage other players from exploiting you.
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Beginner Poker Lesson #4: Value Bet Relentlessly
So far we’ve covered the importance of playing only strong starting hands and using the power of position to your advantage.
Now let’s talk about the third key aspect of a successful tight and aggressive strategy, and that is aggression.
If you only take one thing from this article, let it be this: winning poker is aggressive poker.
As mentioned, the majority of the money you’ll win in this game will come from your strong value hands.
So if you have a strong hand, you need to be able to build up a big pot with it.
And you do this by value betting relentlessly.
You are value betting when your hand can get called by a lot of weaker hands from your opponent.
Value betting is the opposite of a bluff, where you’re hoping to get stronger hands than yours to fold.
As mentioned, you should keep your bluffing to a minimum if you’re playing against a lot of recreational poker players.
Another common mistake you should avoid is slowplaying your strong hands.
Slowplaying means playing your hand passively (i.e. checking and calling) instead of aggressively (betting and raising) in order to conceal your hand strength.
A lot of amateur poker players are under the impression that winning poker is all about deceiving your opponents.
There’s certainly an element of truth to that, but it’s not the whole story.
The better way to look at it is that winning poker is about identifying and exploiting mistakes in your opponent’s game, while avoiding making any mistakes of your own.
With that in mind, slowplaying against a bunch of recreational players is not the most effective strategy.
When you’re slowplaying, you are relying on your opponent to build up the pot for you. This can be an effective strategy if you’re up against an overly aggressive player who likes to bluff a lot, for example.
Check out my other article on when to slowplay for a deeper dive on slowplaying.
But if you’re playing against a bunch of passive players, you can’t rely on them to build up the pot for you.
If you are slowplaying against a passive opponent, you are basically leaving money at the table.
A far more effective strategy is to simply play your strong hands straightforwardly, i.e. bet and raise a lot.
Since most recreational players make the mistake of overcalling, the best strategy against them is to simply value bet your strong hands, and let them call you down with whatever remote piece of the board they happen to catch.
Here are a few key reasons why recreational players tend to call too much:
a) recreational players play for fun
Playing poker is not a lot of fun when you’re folding all the time, which is why recreational players usually don’t fold.
b) recreational players love to chase draws
Recs aren’t overly concerned with concepts like pot odds and implied odds, and will chase every draw hoping to get lucky. You should punish this tendency by charging them a premium for their drawing hands.
c) recreational players get too attached to their hands
If a recreational player gets something they perceive to be a strong hand, they will usually play it to the bitter end, even though they’re clearly beat.
d) recreational players love to hero call
Recreational players are often under the impression everyone is out to bluff them all the time. Don’t prove them right.
Save your bluffs for players who are actually capable of folding.
Beginner Poker Example Hand #1
Cash Game, Effective Stack Size: 100 BB
You are dealt J♠J♦ in the MP (middle position). You open-raise to 3x. BU (button) calls. SB (small blind) calls).
Pot: 10 BB
Flop: A♥J♣2♥
You: ???
You should c-bet 7.5 BB
In a spot like this, there's no point in slowplaying.
You have flopped a set, which is a very strong hand. You should bet big, because you can get action by a lot of weaker hands.
You can get called by a number of Ax hands, drawing hands like KQ, KT, and a number of flush draws.
Another reason to bet big here is that there's a flush draw on the board. You don't want to give your opponents the chance to get a free card here.
If they want to chase their draws, you should charge them a premium for it.
Beginner Poker Lesson #5: Make a C-bet on Most Flops
Being the preflop aggressor gives you the opportunity to continue the aggression post flop in the form of a continuation bet (or c-bet for short).
A c-bet is a bet made by the previous street's aggressor.
C-bets are usually profitable, so you should be inclined to make one on most flops unless there’s a very specific reason not to do so.
You can make a flop c-bet either for value, or as a bluff. A bluff c-bet is also known as a light c-bet.
Let’s break down c-betting for value first.
You can c-bet for value when you expect to get called by a lot of weaker hands.
If you follow the previous tip on only playing strong starting hands, you will connect with the flop more often than players who play just about any two random cards.
This means you can continue building up the pot with your strong value hands, and get paid off by a lot of hands you’re comfortably ahead of.
As mentioned, the vast majority of your profits in poker will come from spots where you have a strong hand, and your opponent has a weaker hand that’s strong enough to give you action.
Unfortunately, you won’t have a strong hand on most flops, because really strong value hands don’t come around often in no-limit hold’em.
Most of the time, you’re going to miss the flop completely (2 out of 3 times, to be precise).
This is the case even if you only play strong starting hands with good post flop playability. If you play a lot of junk hands preflop, you’re going to miss the flop even more often than that.
However, even if you miss the flop, you can still consider making a c-bet most of the time.
That’s because your opponent is just as likely to have missed the flop as you, meaning you’ll often be able to take down the pot with a light c-bet.
Since you are the preflop aggressor, you are the one that’s perceived to have the strongest hand.
This means you can credibly represent a lot of strong hands and generate a lot of folds from your opponents.
The only exception to this rule is when you’re playing against recreational players who refuse to fold if they catch any remote piece of the board.
Against recreational players, it’s better to keep your c-betting value-heavy, meaning you only bet with strong hands and avoid bluffing altogether.
Against more observant opponents, on the other hand, you can throw out an occasional light c-bet to always keep them guessing.
If you only bet the flop with your strong hands, other players may pick up on it, and simply refuse to give you any action unless they have a very strong hand themself.
If you make an occasional light c-bet, on the other hand, you will always keep your opponents guessing, and they will have a harder time reading your hand.
Beginner Poker Example Hand #2
Cash Game, Effective Stack Size: 100 BB
You are dealt A♦Q♦ in the CO (cutoff). You open-raise to 3x. Villain calls from the SB (small blind).
Pot: 7 BB
Flop: J♥5♠2♦
Villain checks.
You: ???
You should c-bet 3.5 BB.
In this spot, you've missed the flop, but that doesn't mean you should give up the pot altogether. You can make a light c-bet and take down the pot if your opponent folds, or you can improve your hand strength on future streets and win that way.
Let's break down why a c-bet is all but mandatory here.
Preflop you have a standard open-raise with a strong broadway hand.
You miss the flop, but you still have a lot of ways to improve your hand on future streets. You have two overcards, so any Ace or Queen gives you a top pair hand.
You also have backdoor straight and flush draws.
A backdoor draw means you need both turn and river cards to complete your hand combination.
Also, the flop is fairly dry, meaning your opponent could have missed the flop just as easily as you.
And since you are the preflop aggressor, you can credibly represent a lot of strong hands on this board.
You're also playing in position, meaning you can exert a lot of pressure on your opponent who will have a hard time calling you down with marginal hands.
5 Poker Lessons All Beginners Need to Know - Summary
If you’re a beginner poker player, you don’t need to learn a lot of advanced poker strategy to start winning at poker.
All you have to do is follow a few simple tips that are the cornerstone of the proven tight and aggressive strategy.
To sum up, here are 5 simple poker lessons every new player should know.
1. Learn the basics of the tight and aggressive poker strategy
Tight and aggressive (TAG) strategy is the best strategy to use as a beginner poker player because it exploits the weaknesses of a number of recreational players you’re likely to play against.
It includes only playing strong starting hands, playing most of them in position, and playing aggressively both preflop and post flop.
2. Only play strong starting hands
Most hands miss most flops in no-limit hold’em, so you should only play hands that have a reasonable chance of connecting with the flop in a meaningful way.
This includes pocket pairs, suited connectors, suited Aces, and strong broadway hands. The rest is trash and should be thrown away.
3. Play most hands in position
If you are the last player to act in a betting round, you have an informational advantage over your opponents, you can control the pot size, and you can value bet and bluff more effectively.
You can play more hands in position by simply open-raising more hands from the late positions (the cutoff and the button), and playing less hands from early table positions and from the blinds.
4. Value bet relentlessly
In poker, most of the money you’ll earn will come from spots where you have a strong hand, and your opponent has a weaker hand that’s willing to give you action.
As a general rule, you should avoid slowplaying if you’re playing against a lot of weak and passive players, because you can’t rely on them to build up the pot for you.
Instead, you should value bet your strong hands yourself to build up the pot.
5. Make a c-bet on most flops
C-bets are usually profitable, so you should be inclined to make one on most flop unless there’s a very specific reason not to do so.
You should c-bet your strong value hands, but you should also make an occasional light c-bet (aka a bluff c-bet) in order to always keep your opponents guessing at your hand strength.
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This article was written by Fran Ferlan
Poker player, writer and coach
Specializing in live and online cash games
For coaching enquiries, contact Fran at email@franferlan.com
Or apply directly for poker coaching with Fran, right here
Lastly, if you want to know the complete strategy I use to make $2000+ per month in small/mid stakes games, grab a copy of my free poker cheat sheet.
