Accumulator Betting Tips – Can accumulators be profitable?

Accumulator betting profits

Is there a way of making long term profits from accumulator betting?

Accumulator’s are a bookmaker’s best friend they love them.  

In fact you very rarely see a bookmaker highlighting a winning punters success. If however that punter hit a 16 team accumulator for £150,000 you might here about it.

Those bettors that are able to find value week in week out against a bookmakers odds over the long term. Will likely find themselves limited to pennies or unable to bet.

Accumulator betting profits
My weekend accumulator

Why then do bookmakers love accumulators?

Bookmakers love accumulators generally because it compounds their margins.

A bookmaker margin is basically the percentage of profit a bookmaker would make if the amount of money bet on all outcomes of a game were equally balanced.

For example if a bookmaker has a 5% margin on a game this would mean they would expect to make £5 for every £100 staked on the game. In a way this is similar to arbitrage betting if a bookmaker has a perfectly balanced book then they are guaranteed a profit no matter the outcome.

So bookmakers in general love accumulator bets because its compounds that margin for them with each selection. A 5% margin on a single bet becomes much more with each selection that you add.

Accumulator betting profits
Oddsmath shows what each bookmakers margin is. The margin is the percentage on the far right.

Making a profit from accumulator betting

It is possible to make a profit from accumulator bets and like all methods of betting its about finding value.

I have written about using Asian bookmaker to find value bets with softbooks before. We can use this same approach when making an accumulator have a positive expectation.

For this approach we need to find two or more value bets with the same bookmaker. Then put them in an accumulator.

Accumulator betting profits
Oddsmath also shows the no vig odds of a bet. This is the odds of a bet with the margin removed.

You can see from the above that Marathonbet have Osasuna at 7.10 whilst Pinnacle have them at odds of 6.61. The no vig odds are 6.74 which indicates Osasuna are a value bet.

Betting in this way is still going to be very volatile but if you are going to place accumulators bets you may as well look for value whilst doing it.

Accumulator betting profits

Using bookmaker promotion’s against them

The best way to make money from accumulator betting is by using bookmaker promotions against them. Oddsmonkey is an excellent matched betting service and has something called the “Acca Matcher” which was created just for this.

Accumulators are such a big money earner for soft bookmakers they want to entice people to bet on them. A popular promotion is “back 5 selections get a free bet if one loses.”

This offered by William Hill, Coral and Ladbrokes alongside several other soft bookmakers.

Accumulator betting tips
Oddsmonkey’s Acca Matcher find the best value accumulators available

Selections from the bookmaker are found by Oddsmonkey which are close in price to the Betfair lay odds. This means generally they are close to the true odds.

The Oddsmonkey “Acca Matcher” then uses the Betfair odds alongside the bookmakers money back promotion to show you the expected long term value of placing that bet. There is also the option to lay these selections on the betting exchanges to guarantee small profits.

This process can also be done manually by searching for odds close to the Betfair lay price yourself. Oddsmonkey just enables you to do it quicker and works out the calculations for you.

Bookmaker’s accumulator promotions are a great way of creating accumulator bets with a positive expectation.

Accumulator betting tips
Oddsmonkey’s Acca Matcher at work

I hope this article has given you a few ideas on how to make money from accumulator betting. When used correctly it can be a good way of keeping under a bookmakers radar whilst still extracting some value.

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