Considering placing bets on sports or otherwise – our article will help guide you to better betting and gaming online.
1. Create a Unit Size and Manage your Bankroll
It’s crucial that when sports betting, you decide exactly how much money you are willing to dedicate towards betting on sports. Of course, this mainly hinges on your financial situation as an individual. Still, it’s generally unwise to bet money that you can’t afford to lose.
With a pre-ordained bankroll established, you now want to decide on the unit size. It’s recommended that beginner bettors stake only about 1% to 5% of their bankroll for each bet they make.
This is importantly the first crucial step when it comes to becoming a professional and successful sports bettor. Each single “sharp” regularly scrutinizes their unit size and bankroll. To learn more about this, check out our detailed guide on sports betting money management. On Green Betting Sites, you will discover the best promo codes for sportsbooks so that you can get an extra bang for your buck on the different online sportsbooks.
2. Understand your Personal Goals and Risk Tolerance
Different kinds of betters will make different kinds of bets. The sooner you decide the kinds of bets you prefer to make, the sooner you will be able to perfect your strategy and start to win.
Some people like betting on highly improbable events while others prefer betting on significant underdogs. Some are attracted to the longest of long odds, and these are the same ones who will be more inclined to create huge parlays and make bets on games like the Browns beating the Patriots on a Monday night.
Others prefer to take on smaller events or smaller profits, but more likely outcomes. And while welcoming short odds and betting on favorites might not lead to big payouts, these kinds of bettors are more likely to win more often.
Some bettors like to think strategically, with a longer-term view of the teams and players. These betters typically spend much of their time and bankroll within the futures marketplace.
You may stay active in sportsbook live betting or bet once a week, placing lots of bets every day or multiple bets on the same event. Of course, none of these bets are exactly mutually exclusive. Some seasoned sharps are very active in all kinds of wagers, regardless of whether it has short or long odds attached.
You should consider focusing on one type of betting if you want to improve your odds of success quickly.
3. Have Realistic Expectations
What’s considered a successful sharp wins about 54% of the time. A historically great “sharp” tends to win at about a 60% clip. These are some of the best sports bettors on the planet. The desire to achieve similar results at the jump or within a certain time frame is quite the toll order. This is something that can’t be stressed enough.
Even if you end up winning your first 10 bets, which is unheard of, the law of averages suggests that you will, unfortunately, come crashing back to earth at some point. Realizing this and developing realistic expectations could help you avoid doing anything rash.
Never deviate from the methods or strategy that made you win 10 in a row in the first place.
4. Have a Record of your Bets, Review them Regularly
While this method might seem rather unsexy, it’s still very important. it‘s understandably not fun to revisit your losses, but when you do, you might avoid making similar kinds of mistakes again. Sometimes, you may lose bets even after doing everything right. In other times, you might have been aware that you were reaching but made the bet anyway. Correcting your misguided reasoning will benefit your performance in the long run.
Occasionally taking your time to retrospect on your failures and successes will undoubtedly offer you a long-term boost to your bankroll.
5. Always Bet with your Head, not Your Heart
Most sports bettors started betting simply because they were sports fans. For this reason, they probably had an allegiance to one team or another. If this is something that applies to you, you should abstain from betting on events related to your favorite (or most hated) team or teams.
Loyalty can easily cloud your judgment, which is a bad thing as you should always be rational and measure while sports betting. Bias could easily affect you in both conscious and unconscious ways, which is why you should skip lines where you have personal interests or are emotionally invested.
6. Account for the Sunk Cost Fallacy
For this tip, consider this standard notion in behavioral economics – sunk cost fallacy. It means that the more money or time a person spends on something, the harder it becomes to abandon it. This applies to everything from investments to bad relationships.
Decisions can be tainted or colored by accumulated emotional attachments related to the investment. When blinded by sunk cost fallacy, you may end up throwing more money at a venture or project that’s doomed, just because you have already invested much time in it. You’ll be too involved to know when to cut your losses.
This applies to sports betting just as much as it applies to business investments. If you’re having a bad day, just cut your losses. Never add the size of your bankroll to recover from a nasty losing streak.
7. Bet on One Sport
Just as Warren Buffett Says, always invest in what you know. This also applies to sports betting. If you’re new, it’s worth sticking to the one sport you know the most about. You will already be ahead in terms of the strategies and methods that can give you an edge over the bookmakers, all based on your pre-existing knowledge of the game.
You are already well-informed on how to assess teams and players, and where you can get more insights into the sport. This is critical when it comes to uncovering the smartest wagers.
