There’s a reason that the popularity of sports betting has exploded in recent years. In fact, did you know that during the last recession, the gambling industry relentlessly continued to grow? That’s because, in times of desperation, many people try their luck and think of ways that they can turn their hard earned money into…well, even more money. But can you make money from sports betting?
Everyone is attracted by the thought of making easy money. When you’re slaving away in your 9-5, struggling to make ends meet, it’s only natural.
But the truth is this. Making money from sports betting is HARD. Very hard. But if you’re serious about becoming better at sports betting, this article will help.
How to make money from sports betting
Skills and Attributes
One thing that you must understand when you start sports betting is this. It’s got very little to do with how good you are at predicting individual events.
You’re going head to head with the bookmaker. You’re going to war with them, so you better be prepared.
The biggest bookmakers employ hundreds of smart people to enhance their profits. They obviously make their profits from you losing. See the problem here?
Mathematicians, programmers, sports experts.; They create tools that accurately predict the probability of a whole host of events.
Maths
A strong ability with numbers is probably the number one skill you need to bet successfully. Surprised that it isn’t sports knowledge?
As I said, betting is about probability. You have to be able to compete with the statistical models churned out by teams of betting experts. The key is to find value and spot where the bookmaker has priced something incorrectly.
Sports Knowledge
To be honest, sports knowledge isn’t a prerequisite to being successful at sports betting. In can, in fact, get in the way. Your opinions can go against what the numbers are telling you.
But it does help to have a knowledge of how sport works. A passion and interest in it is also helpful, because you’re going to be watching it an awful lot if you want to gain an advantage over the bookie!
Motivation
Successful sports betting is hard work. It’s not about watching a game with your friends and opening up your betting app and placing a bet.
Successful gamblers spend hours or days planning a bet. They study the numbers and news in the minutest of details.
This is why most people aren’t even remotely successful with betting. They see sports betting as easy money and aren’t willing to put in the hard work.
Discipline
Gambling is a very emotive process. The highs and lows when you win money are some of the most compelling motivators around. It’s one of the reasons that people become addicted to gambling. They don’t bet to make money anymore. They gamble to chase those emotions.
Having discipline over your emotions and your money is vital.
Preparation
So you may have been getting the feeling so far that this isn’t going to be easy. You’d be right. But it isn’t impossible. Before you start placing bets, there’s some prep you need to do.
Bankroll
To get off to a good start, you must put your bankroll aside. Place it in a separate bank account. Then write it off in your mind, because you may NEVER see that money again.
Staking Plan
The only way to take advantage of incorrect prices is by having a sensible staking plan. The goal is for long term profit, and to do that; your stakes must be consistent.
This means only betting between 2% & 5% of your bank. The percentage you choose to place on the bet varies depending on your confidence.
What & When
Sports betting is available 24 hours a day, 365 days per year. Yes, that’s right, you can even bet on Christmas day! Once you’re done with the present-opening, Bucks Fizz-drinking and cracker-pulling, obviously…
It’s for this reason that you need to get clear on what you’re betting on and when. You need to set strict rules for yourself so that you can ensure you stick to them when your reasoning goes out of the window and your emotions are telling you to bet.
You also need to get clear on exactly what your strengths are. Where can you find the edge? Which sport? Which markets?
Don’t become a jack of all trades. The only way to get an edge over the huge teams the bookmakers employ is to become a specialist in one sport, perhaps one competition, and just a few markets.
Strategies
You need to think carefully about what strategies you bet on, and how you’re going to apply them to the markets you have chosen to focus on.
These strategies will further enhance the rules you put in place, and you must stick to them, otherwise you risk losing your edge.
Mindset
To be successful, your mindset is crucial. It isn’t an easy fix, and it’s something you need to change over time.
Here are a few things that you need to train your mind to accept if you actually want to make money:
Don’t Chase Losses
This is perhaps the most difficult thing to master when sports betting. Why? Because money is linked deeply with your emotions.
Money is the thing that your brain links to a lot of the core emotions that drive every human on earth, like fear. Fear is obviously your body’s natural emotion to help you survive.
So when you grab that money and place it on a horse, your brain isn’t thinking “Oh, I’m throwing some spare cash on this horse for fun!”. It’s thinking “Danger! Money = Food = Life or Death.”
That’s why the emotions behind your gambling can be so intense. It’s why some people feel physically sick when they lose a bet.
It’s also for that reason that people decide to chase losses. That’s why sports betting is so difficult to do in an unemotional and detached way. You are fighting the natural instincts that have been built into humans over hundreds of thousands of years!
Slow & Steady Wins The Race
The natural instinct of many people is to try and hit the jackpot every time. That is why accumulators are one of the most popular bet choices in sports betting – particularly football accumulators.
It’s important to get into the mindset of being happy with small gains. Forget the get-rich-quick mindset; This is all about small, incremental profits over a long period.
There may even be long periods of time when you go without profit. This is when you need to have faith in your sports betting strategy.
You Won’t Win Every Bet
You need to come to terms with the fact that you won’t win every bet. Far from it in fact.
It’s all about the long term process and gaining a few % of profit. That’s why your numbers need to be planned to precision from the outset.
It takes a lot of nerve to go on long losing runs. But they will come, and before you start, you have to decide whether you can ride them out.
General advice
You should, by now have got the impression that sports betting successfully is difficult. Very difficult!
Bookmakers closing accounts
We need to tell you that, unfortunately, the game is rigged. Once you start to be successful with sports betting, the bookmakers will show you the door.
They have developed sophisticated algorithms that rate every player based on their win rate, how sensibly they stake. They have a rating for every single customer.
Read our post on account restrictions.
The second that you start to show that you aren’t going to be good for business, then the bookmakers will dramatically lower your stakes. We’re talking about maximum bets of £1.
Be Sensible
It takes a special kind of person to be successful with sports betting. You must show unwavering positivity throughout.
You are going head-to-head with multi-million pound businesses on your own, and when the inevitable losses follow you will doubt yourself. That doubt is incredibly difficult to let go of.
But it’s natural, and you have to know when to quit. Millions of people know that they should quit betting, but they fail to and end up developing a problem.
Or, you could just turn the table on the bookies and stack the odds in your favour for once…
Guaranteed Profit
How many times have you heard the sentence “you’ll never beat the bookies”? Probably lots. And for good reason. It’s very difficult to do so with sports betting as the odds are stacked in the bookie’s favour.
But there is a way to completely turn that on its head and stack the odds in your favour for once.
How?
It’s called matched betting and it’s a method that is now being used by millions who’ve realised that it’s incredibly hard to win with sports betting alone.
The great thing is, you don’t have to be good at betting. You don’t even have to have placed a bet before.
Whether you have experience with betting or not, you will have seen the free bets that bookmakers advertise on the TV.
This is their way of luring potential customers. The industry is so competitive, with hundreds of bookmakers. So they need a way to hook customers into signing up for their service.
Unfortunately, there are stipulations attached to these free bets, and customers usually lose money when they sign up. Before you are allowed to withdraw the free bet, you must wager it 5x. This makes profit extremely difficult.
This is where matched betting comes to the rescue! Matched betting allows you to bypass these terms and conditions and extract that free bet. You can take that money straight from your bookmaker to your bank account with ease.
Because of the huge number of bookmakers, there is literally thousands of pounds worth of free bets. This is so much more lucrative than sports betting, and it is for that reason that the bookmakers are scared.
You see, it’s completely legal, and there isn’t much they can do to stop it. Find out more in our ‘Is matched betting legal?‘ post. Millions of people from all walks of life are now taking this path and have quit sports betting.
Want to give it a go?
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