The online and mobile sports betting market is growing at a feverish rate. This explosion of sportsbooks globally gives bettors a plethora of options when it comes to choosing who to wager with. This begs the questions; why choose just one sportsbook and are there any advantages in spreading your action across multiple sportsbooks? The following article examines, in depth, the pros and cons of holding accounts with multiple sportsbooks.
Why hold accounts with multiple sportsbooks? The benefits of owning accounts with more than one sportsbook outweigh the cons. It is entirely legal, potentially lucrative and often thought to be the move of sophisticated bettors. It allows bettors to take advantage of promotions, chase the best odds and avoid being limited by sportsbooks. Here is the complete list of pros and cons:
The List of Pros and Cons
| Pros | Cons |
| Access to the Best Odds Reduced Sportsbook Juice Capitalize on Promotions Avoid Being Limited Gain Incentives to Deposit After Inactivity Exposure to Obscure Betting Markets | More Money Required to Stay Active inAll Accounts Difficult to Keep Track of Win/Loss Record Time Intensive Switching Between Platforms Reduces Loyalty Rewards The Perception You Are A Gambling Addict |
Note: School of Bets does not recommend or condone an individual opening multiple accounts with the SAME sportsbook under alias or false identity. This is referred to as ‘gnoming’ and is illegal.
The Pros of Using Multiple Accounts
1. Access to The Best Odds
The most significant benefit of holding accounts with multiple sportsbooks is the ability to compare and contrast odds for an event and ‘buy’ the best.
Historically a bettor trackside at the thoroughbreds would be able to enter the bookies ring and find the bookmaker offering the longest odds on the horse of their choice. Mobile and online sports betting should no different. In fact the experience of comparing odds should be dramatically enhanced by the mobile betting technology.
One of the most critical factors in becoming a profitable sports bettor is to grab the best odds available as often as possible. When dealing with small margins any edge is vital. A bettor with just one online account is forced to accept the odds on offer by their sportsbook without any ability to shop around. For this reason multiple accounts for a serious sports bettor is an absolute no brainer.
The ‘best odds’ scenario is no more apparent than when betting on the point spread. Sportsbooks intend the point spread odds to attract money to both sides of the market allowing them to take a nice cut regardless of the actual result. If betting is heavily favoring one side, instead of adjusting the odds, the book will adjust the handicap. For this reason it is possible to find different points spreads at different books, effectively finding the best odds for the market.
For example in the NFL a team may be a -3.5 favorite at one book and -3.0 at another. Clearly if the bettor is looking for the team to cover then the -3.0 is significantly better. If the team goes on to win by a field goal the bet is a push instead of a loss. In the long run it is these types of small margins that pay off big time!
2. Reduced Sportsbook Juice
In addition to finding the best odds on the market, owning multiple accounts allows bettors to avoid markets where books are looking to increase their juice (profit margin). Interestingly sportsbooks can, and do, vary their juice depending on the market. Where a book has a smaller margin on one sport they may increase it on another and often out of step with other books. Examples of this occur all the time in less mainstream sports such as esports (quickly becoming mainstream) or in second tier competitions like the baseball minor leagues.
Using the minor league baseball example, a particular book may only be willing to offer -115 on the over/under run total as they find it difficult to get up to date accurate information on team selections and form. The increased juice is their way of mitigating risk. Another book may be more confident in their baseball odds makers and leave the profit margin at normal levels (-110). The bettor with multiple accounts is all over these discrepancies!
3. Capitalise on Sportsbook Promotions
The competitive space of online and mobile sports betting means that sportsbooks are heavily involved in the customer acquisition game. The majority of the time, acquiring and retaining customers comes down to the quality of betting promotions on offer which add to the user experience. Typically the most lucrative promotions are reserved for the new customer at the sign up and initial deposit stage. Collect all of these!
On a week to week basis most books will offer on selected markets, odds boosts, bonus bets, cash back, parlay refunds, special props and other promotional markets. Most times the promotions vary significantly from book to book and the multiple account bettor can pick and choose which best suit their needs. A bettor limited to just one book misses these opportunities.
Consistently winning at sports betting is a difficult proposition so using the sports books promotions to benefit your bottom line is an absolute must!
4. Avoid Being Limited
The bain of any successful sports bettor’s existence is being limited by a bookmaker. This is where the sportsbook limits the amount a bettor can place on a market. This is totally legal and written into the terms and conditions agreed to at the sign up stage. Sportsbooks reserve the right to act on the limiting clause when they feel their risk has become too great. Being limited by a sportsbook, while completely frustrating, is very much a badge of honor for any sports bettor. Usually being limited means the bettor has been pretty successful over the journey and the books is happy to let your business. Having said all that if possible avoid being limited!
The best way to avoid the inconvenience of being limited is to hold accounts with multiple sportsbooks. Spread the love so to speak. By spreading bets across the many books and reducing some of the volume with any particular book keeps the bettor under the radar somewhat. It is believed one of the key triggers to being limited is bet size, especially when a bettor crushes a certain market with a well above trend bet size and that bet wins. If a betting plunge had come for that market from sophisticated bettors as well, then sportsbooks may feel the bettor is ‘in the know’ and it is worth their while limiting them.
Many bettors will still maintain a preferred sportsbook where the majority of their bets are placed but when they come across a ‘great bet’ that they wish to go after hard they will break their stake up into portions and spread that across many books. Thus appearing to have only bet reasonably small on the market. A little bit of extra work but an excellent way to keep your betting habits less predictable.
5. Gain Incentives to Deposit After Inactivity
Inevitably when betting across multiple sportsbooks a particular account may hit a rough patch and the funds may become depleted. Sportsbooks want volume and will use many tactics to encourage clients to keep money in their account, deposit more often, and continue to bet. A bettor whose account lays empty or idle for sometime will soon enough receive ‘encouragement’ from sportsbooks to get back into the game. This mostly comes in the form of deposit bonuses.
A bettor who is turning over many bets with other books may give off the illusion that they are not actively betting at all since their account balance is zero. When the promotional incentives start to come in, and they will, the bettor quicky loads into them and gains maximum benefit. Often they just shift funds from another book thus not actually having to contribute extra to their overall bankroll.
Sportsbooks are fully aware of this practice but in a competitive market place they are chasing your business and won’t for a second mind taking your trade from their direct competitors. It is worth more to them than a few bonus bets and free plays.
6. Exposure to Obscure Betting Markets
The online and mobile sports betting industry is truly global. Most sportsbooks are owned, at least in part, by multinational entities whose game is gambling. It is for this reason that some sportsbooks will offer markets on seemingly obscure offshore sporting events. In actual fact many of these are events are not obscure at all they are just not popular, and lack main stream media attention, in the place a bettor lives. The betting opportunities, particularly in overnight markets, are what sophisticated bettors are looking for. A successful bettor who turns a profit is after turnover to supercharge their return.
Not every sportsbook will offer markets on all these events but most events are covered by at least one home sportsbook at any one time. For US based bettors this may mean exposure to huge betting markets like the Indian Premier League Cricket (IPL), the Australian Football League (AFL) and the Super Rugby. Multiple accounts equals exposure to the entire world of sport. A little culture never hurt anyone!
The Cons of Using Multiple Accounts
While there are clearly many huge benefits of owning multiple sportsbook account, there are a few downsides that need to be considered. These are by no means deal breakers, just points to be aware of as you continue on your sportsbetting journey.
1. More Money Required to Stay Active in All Accounts.
The most obvious downside to owning and using accounts at a number of sportsbooks is the spreading thin of the bankroll. Depending on the amount of active accounts, having money residing in each account means that more of the bankroll is tied up. There is no point withdrawing all the money from the account at the end of a period of betting, as most books have a minimum turnover requirement. That is, money deposited may need to be turned over more than once to be eligible for withdrawal. Therefore it makes sense to leave some money in the account, unless of course the account has busted.
The other purpose for leaving a reasonable balance in the account is to allow the bettor to remain agile when searching out the best odds. Sometimes a discrepancy in odds may only last for a matter of minutes and the bettor needs to be able to act in an instant. Deposit timelines with some books can be quite long, depending on the accepted mode of depositing (some will astoundingly only accept deposits in person). It is quite frustrating to find a market with enormous value only to be prevented from betting due to a lack of funds in the account.
2. Difficult to Keep Track of Win/Loss Record
Sophisticated bettors always keep track of their win loss record (betting history) in order to analyse their progress and to keep improving their systems. With bets spread across many books this can become more challenging and time consuming. Time that could be spent researching markets.
The way around this is to keep a personal betting history on spreadsheet. Most online or mobile sportsbooks will allow bettors to export their betting history in file form compatible with most spreadsheet programs. A simple request and a few clicks and the betting history from all a bettors accounts can be merged into one master document. Yes a little more time consuming but well worth the trouble.
3. Time Intensive Switching Between Platforms/Apps
Our world is a busy place and the eternal struggle is to be more time efficient in all we do. A definite downside to utilising multiple sportsbooks is the time intensive nature of switching between betting apps and platforms. Even with express login and apps running in the background, the time to negotiate these sites can be surprisingly long. Some books have invested more money into there online and mobile apps to improve efficiency. Nevertheless flipping between accounts can be a hassle.
While switching between sportsbook platforms is a necessary evil, there are ways to increase the efficiency of this exercise. Making use of odds comparison sites (there are some good ones out there), lets bettors see markets from many books at the one time. Be sure to check out the lag time on these sites as some are quicker than others and the value odds may be gone quicker than they appear!
4. Reduces Loyalty Rewards
The competitiveness of the sports betting industry means sportsbooks are always looking for ways to retain a bettors business. One increasingly popular method is to offer reasonably generous loyalty rewards programs. The fact these programs even exist shows the industry knows the temptation for sophisticated bettors to use multiple sportsbooks is acted on regularly. The bettor that does this is missing out on gaining full rewards point value for their betting activity.
In the long run this really is not an issue. While the rewards programs are good, and getting better, they are no substitute for the wonderful promotions available across sportsbooks almost daily. Taking advantage of those outweighs the rewards benefit.
Not all is lost on the rewards front anyway. Many sports bettors who work the benefits of multiple sportsbook accounts, still use one account as their primary account. This account may see 60% of their betting volume. While that means 40% goes elsewhere, there is still useful turnover to build towards some decent rewards benefits.
5. The Perception You Are A Gambling Addict
Don’t be too concerned about this one. People who are not day to day sports bettors often consider placing even a single bet on an event like the superbowl as a step towards lifelong addiction. While gambling addiction is a huge problem within the community in general, being a sports bettor and owning several accounts across many sportsbooks is not in any way a sign you have a problem. It is in fact the opposite. It is calculated, tactical considered and in many ways a sign you are in complete control of your betting activity. If perception with family or friendship groups is a concern for you, then perhaps keep your account activity details to yourself or go the extra mile and explain your strategy in full.
The Game Starts Now!
While there are a few hurdles to overcome when owning multiple sportsbook accounts, the benefits outweigh the positives almost immeasurably. It is a rite of passage for any bettor as they progress from the occasional recreational wagerer to well informed winning sports bettor. The game starts now!
