There is no point in having the best sports betting picks and tips if you cannot manage your money correctly. It is very important not to “bankrupt yourself” in the world of sports betting. The exact same principles apply to similar worlds of stock trading. If you understand that no matter how good you are at your trading/betting, it is conceivable to go on a run of 10 consecutive losses and be bankrupt before you have even really started. The guidelines below should help, whether you are a serious bettor(or intend to be one) or even just a casual one.
I want to make a consistent long-term profit from my Sports-betting
Not for you to blow all of your disposable income on a couple of risky parlays (or Accas as they call them in the UK). To make a steady income follow the following guidelines, all taken in part from the world of stock and commodity traders-
- Know what your bankroll is, in other words, your ‘investment capital’. What is the total amount you are willing to ‘invest’ in your sports betting?
- Diversify your risk, unless you have genuinely cracked some guaranteed money-making betting strategy, you are far better off spreading your bets to a reasonable degree. That can be by sport or type of bet or a whole variety of factors. Basically do not put all your eggs in 1 basket. Luckily enough, our sports betting tips and picks are diversified across 6 sports.
- Never bet more than 5% of your investment capital in 1 bet
- A reasonable long-term strategy is to divide your capital into ‘units’ of 1% and bet as follows
- Low return or average bets – Bet 1% or 1 unit
- Bets you like -Bet 2%
- Only ever go higher (to your maximum of 5% or 5 units) when you genuinely believe the expected value of the bet is exceptionally high
- To some degree, the grading system we follow for our expert picks is related to the above. Silver is close to A and Gold closer to B. Platinum tips can either be close to C or they can also be riskier bets demanding a lower bet amount.
- Assess your bets using expected value and ROI concepts–
- Expected Value is basically your interpretation of the value in a bet. Let’s assume that the ‘Vig’ in a sportsbook is normally 10%. You think you have a bet where the odds are off by 20%. You might therefore anticipate that the expected value in that bet is 10%
- The ultimate measurement of your performance is ROI, the return on your investment or your capital. Anything around 20-30% per annum is good. This is much more important than other measures such as Win-Loss ratio, which do not account for the risk/reward in the bets. For example, you could bet very safe moneyline bets and have a high win-loss ratio, but still be losing money because of the poor odds. This is an important concept to understand to make sure you get the best sports betting tips and picks
- In our opinion, the best betting sites should always focus on ROI more so than other measures such as win/loss ratios and units won. Unfortunately, we find that many sites that charge an awful lot for their expert picks almost completely ignore ROI. For us, this is either a sign of poor financial understanding or more cynically, a sign they do not want you to know the (poor) results. It is easy to show something like ‘XYZ expert is up $10,000 on the year as it sound good. However, if that profit was based on say 10 games a day by 35 weeks (an average season) betting say $500 a game (5 units they like to call it), the total investment would be $1,225 million. This would be a very poor return on investment of less than 1%. Certainly not worth the risk.
- Measure and record your bets and learn from this how you can get better. Where are you losing, what mistakes did you make? Develop your own tracking system. The point is to learn from both your mistakes and your successes in order to become a better trader/sports bettor
That sounds too much like hard work, I just want to have some casual fun with my Sports Betting Tips and Picks….
Yes, sports betting is fun, and if you are reasonably sensible, it can help you enjoy your sport even more. However, a causal version of the rules above will ensure you enjoy it even more. Unless you are one of the only people in the world who likes losing money on a regular basis. A more simplified version of the above for you might be-
- Know what you are prepared to lose of your disposable income each week. Don’t bet more than 10% of this on 1 bet
- Try to avoid betting with your heart only. If your favorite team are the only ones you are going to bet on, at least try to make sure the odds of the bet represent some semblance of value
- When boasting to your friends about your big win, please also reflect in a quieter moment on your losses. This way you can learn from them
Let’s hope the above guidelines can make you enjoy your sports betting more and please bet responsibility. If you combine this advice with our sports betting tips and picks, you should be ”onto a winner”.
