How to make a living from sports betting?
For many punters, making a living from sports betting is the dream. The idea of waking up to check the day’s events, placing your bets and winning wads of cash from the bookie is understandably appealing - yet in practice, so few are actually able to pull this off successfully over the long term. So what does it take to make a living from sports betting, and what are the tips to succeed as a professional sports gambler?
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Prepare your sports betting: research sports and betting markets
No one ever succeeded in making a living from sports betting without first doing their homework. Understanding sports and keeping up to date with the latest goings on across your chosen markets is the first step, if you’re to have any hope of betting on sports professionally. In practice, many professional sports gamblers hone in on one or two sports, so they can build an encyclopaedic knowledge of the current individuals, teams and their form. The more you know, the better able you’ll be to make the informed decisions you need to stay ahead.
The same applies to betting markets too. You need to know the betting markets in your chosen sports inside and out. What type of markets are available, and what odds do they tend to offer? This will allow you to drill down into where the value is to be found, so that you have a better chance of developing a winning strategy.
If you want to make a living from sports betting, you need to treat it like your job. That means knuckling down with professionalism and purposes to learn the markets and sports you want to bet on - before you start risking your money. Preparatory work into your chosen sports and betting strategy will give you the best chance of hitting the ground running.
What are the methods for making a living from sports betting?
There are typically three different types of betting strategy that can work to your advantage in delivering consistent, measurable wins - sure bets, value bets and sports trading.
Sure bets
Sure bets are bets that are certain to win, when all the odds have been added together. That means win, lose or draw, your bets will pay a profit - usually as a result of an anomaly in the odds, or discrepancies between the odds quoted across different sports betting sites. These are effectively a type of arbitrage, where you can win a small margin in a guaranteed way, whatever happens.
While these are not common, opportunities like this do arise - often with a margin of 1-5% in the bet. That may mean you’ll need to bet a lot to make a small amount of profit. But when you are mathematically guaranteed to win, this feels like a risk worth taking. Some sports gamblers who deploy this method will find themselves with tens of thousands on the line to make a few hundred in profit - it works, but it’s not easy to scale.
Value bets
The second type of bet here is the value bet - bets where the odds quoted by the bookie seem to contrast with the true odds of an event happening. This is where the bookie has under or overpriced an outcome relative to your perception of the actual odds. While this is much more speculative, this is where the majority of professional sports betting gamblers find their wins. You need to accept you will lose some of these bets - but by playing for mathematical value for money over your portfolio, you stand a better chance of turning a profit overall.
Sports trading
The third strategy is sports trading, which happens on betting exchanges like Betfair. This is where you have the option to buy and sell bets, similar to trading on the stock market. You buy the bet to open a position and sell it to close out, with the gap in the middle being the profit (or loss) you take on the trade. This still requires the same knowledge and approach of professionalism and research, but you benefit from market driven odds that aren’t marked up by the bookie in the same way.
Trading via software can give you an advantage here, so you can buy and sell bets in real time with quick execution. Professional sports traders will often follow the action on TV in real time, and make their decisions quickly to take advantage of changes in the odds markets for their bets.
Arguably better suited to more serious professional gamblers, there are opportunities to trade sporting markets, similar to stock markets, for those who conduct the appropriate analysis and research into their positions.
Controlling your risks in sports betting
Success in sports betting also demands a keen focus on the downside. Your bankroll is your lifeblood, so protecting it at all costs is essential to medium and long-term success. That means not being afraid to cut back on losing positions early, and effectively managing your exposure to different bets to ensure you’re sufficiently diversified across different markets.
The better you are in controlling your risks, the more funds you have available for making money with your betting. By taking a portfolio approach where you look to spread risk across a wide number of bets, while being cautious about the potential for bad trades, you put yourself in the best position for succeeding over the long run.
The life of a professional sports gambler is by no means an easy one. Like anything else, when you’re doing it professionally, sports betting becomes your job, rather than a form of entertainment. The more dedicated and disciplined you are, and the more closely you stick to your chosen strategy, the better your odds of succeeding long term.
Remember that bookies are a business - their mission is to win money at your expense, rather than the other way around. In order to beat the level of insight, analysis and experience of the bookies, you need to bring your A-game day in, day out. By developing and executing your strategy with the appropriate research, budget and risk management, you can give yourself a fighting chance of making gambling your career, and finally making a living from sports betting.
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