[00:00] This is one of the most popular bet builders on Betfest Sportsbook. At the time I recorded this video, 2,460 people had backed it. But did they realise how bad this bet builder really was?
[00:12] In this video, I'm going to uncover the truth about bet builders, why bookmakers push them so hard, and whether you should adjust your betting strategy before placing one yourself. I'll use this real example throughout the video to prove my points,
[00:25] but first, a few basics so that anyone watching can understand. So regardless of which bet you're placing on a sportsbook, their odds include a margin. Adding extra legs to a bet adds more margin to that bet.
[00:38] So think of accumulators, for example. Those margins are multiplied against each other, giving you worse value overall for the entire bet. But bet builders are a bit different, and we'll go deeper on that in just a moment.
[00:51] First, why are bet builders so popular? Well, quite obviously they feel logical and they offer a far bigger payout for a very small stake, which makes them attractive to the general betting public.
[01:03] You're actually building a story inside your head, not placing some random bets. You thinking about in time what is actually going to happen in the match Essentially it feels like you using your football knowledge more than you would usually However those bets on the bet builder are correlated events Now if you take a look at this example it explains what I trying to say here
[01:25] If England dominate the match, then Kane likely scores and potentially will get fouled. So the story inside your head says that this is really quite likely to actually happen and come off and give you that bigger payout for that small stake.
[01:38] It's a psychological bias of play for the bet. it gives you the illusion of control. However, that illusion also masks some hidden maths that are actually happening inside the bet between those different correlated prices. So we'll get
[01:52] to that in a second, but are bet builders worse than accumulators? The difference really is that ACKers are based on independent unrelated events, whereas bet builders do the opposite. Now those
[02:04] related events must be repriced because they are related and it makes it very hard to compare bookmaker prices to exchange prices say. So if we take a look at our example here on the exchange
[02:17] we've got a few slightly different lines. We've got Kane as anytime goal scorer at a price of 2.7. We got Kane of first time goal scorer priced at 5 and we got Kane for two plus goals at 10 Now think about that just for a second because if we go back to the sportsbook bet builder the entire four bet builder is just priced at just 8 So they not directly
[02:42] comparable but hopefully this puts some kind of illustration around the pricing into perspective. Also I want you to bear in mind that on the sportsbooks the big companies typically load
[02:54] these pre-loaded bet builders with ancillary style markets markets that are off to the side that are harder to price that are more subjective that include very large margins in those individual bets such as shots on target or fouls it's not a coincidence the bookmakers absolutely love bet
[03:13] builders and with very good reason it's why you'll see their mainstream advertising pushes over on tv via social media on different platforms email in your inbox and even those sign up offers when you
[03:25] open a new account now typically they put bet builders with those sign up offers because it looks attractive to the average recreational gambler also you might want to bear in mind that the affiliates on social media push them a lot because they get 20 to 30 percent of your losses
[03:39] if they're sending you to a sports book and they have a good deal so when should you actually think about betting on a bet builder and are bet builders actually truly worth it or not Well there are a couple of exceptions to bear in mind here First of all there software out there that can identify bet builders at positive expected values
[03:58] Outplayed is one of them. I'll leave a link in description if you want to check it out, but they have a bet builder finder and what it does is it trawls all the different lines and bet builders that are available with different sports books out there. It prices those different lines
[04:10] and the expected return for the bet and tells us whether over the longer term, this is a good value bet that's likely to leave us in profit or not. Secondly there's those bet builder promotions where the sports books throw them out but don't ask you to actually stake more
[04:25] of your own money in order to get your hands on the bet builder. They're obviously a lot rarer and typically at smaller stakes but they can be useful so just knock yourself out why not. Looking at the example this is a great example of a very bad value bet builder. Honestly this is the
[04:43] kind of thing that you probably want to be avoiding because over the long term there is absolutely no chance of you coming out on top yes you could win in the short term this weekend have a little win but you're going to lose more than you win constantly by placing on these because
[04:57] they're very very bad value however there is a way to flip all the numbers on their head when you start using smart betting strategies there's one explained here in the end screen so please do go and check it out thanks for watching i'll see you next time