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Semi Bluff (Poker)
A player is said to semi bluff when he is bluffing but has cards or outs that could give him a potentially winning hand. This is somewhat different to the stone cold bluff when a player has no chance of improving his hand, but tries to force other players out of the pot with a large bet. The semi bluff requires that you have equity, or a chance of winning.
The benefit of the semi bluff is that it gives you additional chances to win the pot. Let's look at an example. You hold Q 
10 and the flop comes 9 
J 2 . Now as it stands you have nothing, only high card Queen however you have plenty of potential (outs) to win the hand (any heart, any King, and Eight and possibly any Queen or Ten). This would be a very good scenario to bet out or semi bluff as you have real chance to improve (or equity in your hand).
Let's look at a situation where you would not look to semi bluff. This time you hold 3 7 and the flop comes 5 9 
10 . This would not be a good place to semi bluff, not only as you have very little equity in your hand (chance of winning) but there are very few cards (other than miracle) that you could catch. Now of course a lot depends on your opponents. The key comes down to whether you have a good opportunity to improve or you think that you opponents will fold with a bet.
So back to the chances to win the pot - you could improve we have covered. All the other players could fold which would be the same result. This is one of the key reasons why it is better to bet out rather than call. By calling you are limiting yourself to having to catch cards to win the pot.
See - Bluffing
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