Sports betting and gambling in general have always been plagued undeservedly by people's misconceptions regarding the loss of money. This has led many people to view betting as a vice, when in fact, it is anything, but that.
The reason for this is the fact that many people have lost substantial sums of money on sports matches, giving sports betting a bad name in the process. This is quite unfortunate, as all of this could have been prevented only if people have heard of bankroll management. Bankroll management in sports betting is the allocation of money from your regular monthly budget which goes to your betting budget and the percentage of money which goes from this betting budget into a single bet.
Knowing how to manage your money when you indulge in sports betting is one of the key things in the whole process, if not the most important one. This is because even though many people will say that they bet only for fun, most of us know that the monetary reward at the end of the betting process is what makes betting so alluring. Winning a bet makes all the hard work put into it worthwhile. Losing money on a bet however, is one of the worst feelings related to betting.
In this article we will look at the advantages of having good bankroll management, how this can be achieved and the different ways and methods in determining how much you bet when you place your wagers. Stick with us as this might just be the most important lesson in betting you will ever read.
This one is strictly for beginners in betting who have absolutely zero experience when it comes to wagering. The smartest thing which they can do when they are betting for the first time is to set themselves a starting budget which they will be prepared to lose. The likelihood of this happening is very big, and not thinking or worrying about the money being lost will greatly help new players when they are learning how sports betting is done.
This is the starting point of your betting endeavor. It is crucial that you don't skip this step, as everything else which we are going to write about, depends on having a fixed amount of money in your betting budget. When we say fixed, we mean it in a relative way, as this amount may rise or fall in time depending on the variations of your monthly budget which you also use to pay the bills and buy groceries with.
This means that if you have a monthly living expenses budget of $1000 and you spend $800 by the end of the month, you can automatically work with the remaining $200. You may put $100 in a savings account and use the other hundred as your monthly betting budget. It is really important that your betting budget doesn't interfere with your living expenses budget since this is the root of all betting related problems.
Never bet with money you need for living expenses. Gambling is still just that - gambling. Even if you are good at betting, you can never know when you will hit a downswing and lose a big chunk of your money.
After you have allocated a monthly betting budget you are ready to start placing your wagers. However, this is when another important step in bankroll management should be implemented into your betting routine. It is called a staking plan.
A staking plan is the amount of money which you are going to deposit when you are making a wager. This amount of money can be fixed or variable depending on how you organize your budget. The important thing here is that you should never exceed your monthly betting budget. If you see that you have emptied your budget, you should stop and wait for the next month to come. It is as simple as that.
A fixed staking plan can either be a fixed amount of money plan or a fixed percentage from the budget plan. Either way it is within the limits of the budget which cannot and must not be exceeded.
If you adhering to a fixed amount of money plan you are basically going to bet the same amount of money on every bet until you run out of money. For example, if you start with a $100 budget and you always bet $2 on sports tickets, you will be able to place wagers on a minimum of 50 tickets a month.
If you lose money before the month ends, you stop betting. If you win money on the other hand, you either continue staking $2 per wager or you put the remaining money in your savings account if the month is over. As you can see with the fixed amount of money plan you are always betting the same amount regardless of whether you win or lose.
With the fixed percentage of the budget plan it is a little different. This is because with a percentage staking plan you are always betting the same percentage and not the same amount of money.
This would mean that if your budget starts to dwindle because of a losing streak, the percentage of budget money you stake will stay the same, but the amount of money wagered will decrease. The opposite will happen if your betting budget increases.
For example, if you have a betting budget of $100 and you always place 10% of your budget on a wager, you will place a bet which is equal to $10 at the start of the month. However, if you start losing money and your budget goes down to $70, you will be forced to adjust the amount of money you put at stake and place your next bet at a $7 stake. If, on the other hand, you win some money and you increase your budget to $150, you can start placing $15 wagers.
Fixed staking plans are simple and almost anyone can make good use of them. Both the fixed amount of money plan and the fixed percentage from the budget plan are much better than having a no plan at all. However, if you are a real betting pro you will probably be much more interested in our next section on variable staking plans.
These staking plans can vary from one bet to another based on the level of confidence we have in the bet or based on the potential winnings we want to obtain. The crucial element in a variable staking plan is to have a high level of self control since a variable staking plan can quickly turn into a no plan at all under the justification of the bettor that he is working with something which is variable and susceptible to change.
When you form a variable staking plan based on the level of confidence you have in a bet, you basically set yourself with a percentage limit. This means that if you feel confident that a bet will come to fruition, you can bet 10% of your monthly budget. If you are mildly confident that a bet will be a winning one, you might bet 5% of your monthly budget. And if you are not very confident of how successful your bet will be, you may decide to go with a lower stake and go with 1% from your monthly budget.
For example, if you have a betting budget of $100, you will bet $10 if you feel confident about your bet, $5 if you are mildly confident and $1 if you are sure that it is going to be a difficult ride and you want to minimize your losses.
The plan based on the potential winnings you can obtain revolves around the notion that you are placing bets which always amount to a similar amount of money you are entitled to win. This means that if your betting slip is with low odds, you will have to put a higher stake on it. On the other hand, if the odds on your slip are higher, you are going to put a lower stake. Both the high and the low odds betting slips should come to the same potential amount you are entitled to win.
For example, if your betting slip winnings should always constitute 100% of your betting budget of $100, you are always going to try to take the final winnings amount to somewhere around $100. If your betting slip odds are 50.00 you are going to bet $2. If, on the other hand, your odds are 10.00, you are going to put $10 at stake.
This technique is not related to your staking plans, but is closely related to maintaining a stable bankroll. This is because when you are safeguarding your bet you are actually wagering money on the opposite outcome of your original betting slip in order to ensure that you win, even if those winnings will be much smaller. Let's illustrate this with a simple example. Let's imagine that you have a betting slip in which you have accumulated 5 matches and 4 of them have finished with your desired result. The potential winnings from the ticket are $100 and you have put $10 as an initial stake.
Since the last match starts a little later than the other matches, you have a chance to stake some money on the opposite outcome of that match and to safeguard your bet. The odds for the opposite outcome on that match are 3.00, so you have decided to place a $30 stake on that outcome. With this adjustment in the bet, if your original betting slip is a winning one, you are bound to make a profit of $60 ($100 winnings - $10 initial stake - $30 safeguarding stake). If, on the other hand, the opposite outcome occurs you will be entitled to a profit of $50 ($90 winnings - $10 initial stake - $30 safeguarding stake).
Having a decent bankroll management plan and sticking to it will greatly help any punter. The most important thing which should be remembered is that you should always allocate a betting budget which doesn't interfere with your living expenses budget. In addition, you should always stay within the limits of your betting budget and never exceed them no matter how tempted you might feel.
Finally, you should put in place a firm staking plan to which you are always going to adhere to. Fixed staking plans are much simpler and are better if you are not a full time betting aficionado, whereas variable betting plans are better for betting professionals who look at betting as a full time job.
