Bookmakers Make Money?

The growth in sports betting’s popularity across the US is extraordinary. A single state can place around $4.6 billion sports bets in a single year, and 84% of these bets are placed online.

As you would expect, the size of the market means that bookmakers can turn a huge profit. But how can you cash out as a budding bookmaker? Read on to answer this question and to learn how you can collect the dough that you crave.

How Much Can Bookmakers Make?

There’s no set amount of money that a bookmaker can make when working with sports bettors. This may be a disappointing answer, but it’s actually extremely fortunate. You can make as much money as you want by putting more effort into signing on new customers.

The amount of money that you make is largely contingent on the number of players that you sign on. If you have a small number of players, you may not make more than $20,000 per year. This is a fairly decent price for a side gig, but it definitely isn’t a reasonable amount of money to live off of.

This amount is nothing to stick up your nose at, though. If you have a single avid bettor that puts down only $50/game but bets 10 times a week, he’s still going to lose around $2600/year. This is a decent amount for you to pocket off a single bettor.

However, this is still a tiny amount compared to what you’ll get if you invest in growing your business. Bookmakers with 100 players (or more) can easily make between $5000-$10,000 in a single week. This amounts to around $2.5 million to $5 million annually.

How Can They Make This Money?

At this point, you likely are wondering: how can you make this money?

The answer to this question lies in your mindset. You need to remember that a sportsbook is, above all, a business. You can only make money by treating it as such.

Setting Revenue Goals

The first thing that you need to do for your sports gambling business is to set goals and objectives. Ask yourself:

  • How many players do you want to sign on in a month?
  • How many do you want to sign on in your first year of operations?
  • How much money do you want to make annually?
  • What about in shorter-term intervals? How much do you want to make quarterly?
  • What do you want your rate of monthly growth to be over the course of your first year?
  • How much additional money do you want to make around major sporting events (Super Bowl, World Series, etc)?

Make sure that your goals are both realistic and quantifiable. If they aren’t, you won’t have the means to know whether or not you’re meeting them.

You also should reassess your revenue goals during the course of your year. If you’re facing more challenges than you anticipated, your original objectives will seem unrealistic.

Having attainable goals is essential for success because unrealistic goals lead to lower levels of success. You’ll become discouraged if a goal that you set months ago without the information you have now is unmeetable, so make sure you’re flexible and adaptable.

Considering Market Projections

To set initial revenue goals, it’s critical that you consider market projections in the sports betting industry. You’ll need to analyze trends from previous years to see when the sports betting market booms vs when it has lulls. You will naturally make more money at times when there are major sporting events such as the World Cup.

When you set and reassess your goals, it’s important to take these high and low periods into account. Your quarterly goals should be based on seasonal projections.

Also, make sure that you save some money from booming periods to get you through off-season lulls. You’ll need the funds to continue your ad campaigns, add new features to your website, and grow your business.

Set Up a PPH Platform

To be a successful bookmaker, you’re going to need an online platform that works for both you and your players. Pay per head (PPH) services are perfect because you pay a small fee of around $10 for each player that you sign on. It’s flexible, scalable, and ensures that you never will need to pay for more than you’re using.

PPH platforms are also effective in growing your sportsbook because they’re fully managed. Ace Per Head’s experts provide automated updates and security features. Scores, bets, and lines will be updated in real-time so both you and your players will constantly know who owes who money.

Boosting transparency is a good way to build up a positive reputation. Since people are willing to invest money in platforms with good reviews, this will help you to make more money.

You also will be able to provide the best possible customer service without doing anything yourself. Our 24/7 call center is there to field calls from players and help to ensure that they remain satisfied with your bookie business. 86% of bettors will be willing to pay more for quality customer service, so this sets you apart from the competition.

Creating Effective Marketing Schemes

Because PPH sports gambling platforms are websites above all else, you have an easy way to market your business. You can create Google Ads and link them to your official PPH site. This is a great way to drive inbound traffic and get the word out about your platform.

To market appropriately, it’s also critical that you use social media the right way. Make sure that you use Facebook Ads (and Instagram Ads) in the appropriate way. Enter the demographics that you’re most looking to reach- those in certain industries and people with higher incomes that might bet more money.

Finally, make sure that you post frequently on a blog linked to your website. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a great way to get more traffic to your sports betting platform and encourage people to bet on their favorite events. Make sure that you find keywords related to the appropriate season- if baseball’s ongoing but hockey isn’t, you want to emphasize baseball.

How Do Bookmakers Deal With Winning Bets?

Dealing with those who win bets may sound like a challenge, but luckily it’s easy to prepare for. Since all bets have a house edge, you’re certain to win more often than you lose. That’s the nature of gambling, and it greatly benefits you as an agent.

You need to allocate a small percentage of these winnings to go towards those that hit the jackpot.

If you have fewer clients, you shouldn’t take bets with jackpots of several thousand dollars. Wait until you’ve grown to offer high-stakes betting. If you don’t, you might irrevocably tarnish your reputation (or put your PPH business out of money by offering more than you have).

Some other things you can do to deal with winners include:

  • Shutting down/freezing the accounts of people who win too frequently
  • Track down information about clients to see how often they win on other sites
  • Bar professional gamblers from using your platform by seeing who has placed their bet days before the game (those people are the pros- most people simply bet right before a game)
  • Use vig strategies by charging players for placing a bet

How Do Bookmakers Collect Payment?

Now that you know how you can make money as a sportsbook, you likely are wondering how you can collect payment.

When you use a PPH platform, accepting payment (and giving winners their earnings) is easier than ever before. You will already be linked to the source of their payment. Whether this is a debit account, a PayPal wallet, or a cryptocurrency wallet, you can immediately withdrawal and deposit money into their account.

Because PPH sites transparently show both the agent and the bettor who owes who money, there will never be any confusion.

Additionally, we recommend that you accept payments in bitcoin. This untraceable cryptocurrency safeguards both your identity and your players’. Since privacy is a huge consideration for those who bet online, offering this option is a surefire way to get bettors to choose you above competitors who do not.

Become a Profitable Bookie Today

While there are many factors that go into how much bookmakers make, ensuring that your sportsbook is lucrative is easier than ever before. Now that you know how you can make cold, hard cash as a bookmaker, it’s time to get started.

Schedule a demo of Ace Per Head’s PPH services. You not only can get an agent demo to try out this technology on your end, but you can also sign up for a player demo to see what your bettors will experience. We offer a 6-weeks free if you like what you see, so we look forward to working with you soon.