Matched betting is simply a term used to dress up the idea of sports arbitrage, which has been around a long time.
What is sports arbitrage? Well, it’s when you buy and sell promotional bets at different prices at multiple places to convert offers bookmakers offer into cash. Check out my matched betting for dummies guide for step by step instructions.
I personally made about £2,000 when I tried matched betting and I only started with a few hundred pounds. The best part? It’s still a legit way to make money and is easy to grasp. So if you want to make some quick cash I would highly recommend it.
But as a long term strategy, matched betting is a terrible way to make money online. And is, in fact, impossible to sustain in the long term.
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Why can’t matched betting sustained?
The answer is simple: betting companies are not charities, they are in the game of making money, not the other way round. They have promotional offers for a reason: to attract and keep new customers. But not just any customers, they only want those who are profitable for them. In other words, they want customers who lose more than they win.
Even if you are a genuinely great sports bettor, these betting companies will do whatever they can to make life difficult for you.
There is a goal behind the offers: bookmakers know that a promotional offer is a fixed cost of getting your business. They know that in the long-run the potential return of a new customer is a lot a higher than their promotional offer.
Here are some reasons why I believe matched betting cannot be sustained in the long-run:
- Most betting companies won’t give out regular offers, especially if you are consistently winning on their platform.
- A lot of betting companies are aware of matched bettors and now offer bonuses with complicated conditions attached, like high turnover requirements, instead.
- Betting companies share information between them. You’re likely to get banned by other bookmakers if you get flagged as a matched
bettor by one particular company.
Surely there must be a way
There is one way you can make matched betting work in the long run: conceal your intentions. You can do this by making sure betting companies don’t leave cookies in your browser and you consistently lose money on their platform. But even then, I think they’ll be able to work out that you’re an arbor.
Conclusion
As I’ve said before, matched betting is a one-off opportunity through which you can make decent money. But that’s it, a one-off opportunity. And although you could make a couple of grand a year from matched betting, I would recommend you to take advantage of all the welcome offers, run and invest your profits into starting a real business.
And think about it, if matched betting guaranteed wealth, everyone would be doing.
Other ways you could make money: