They say that you get nothing for free in this life. However, when it comes to football betting, that is strictly not true. If only because bookmakers are always ready to hand out free bets to both new and existing customers.
A wager that is completely risk free in terms of placing a stake, all you need to do is make the correct selection and wait for your winnings to be returned. Although there is a small catch when it comes to the value of a free bet.
Something that can be explained with this dummy free bet:
A DUMMY RUN
Let’s say a well-known bookmaker is offering a free bet for the World Cup clash between England and France and the odds are currently as follows:
England 3.00
Draw 3.20
France 2.40
You Won’t Be A Dummy After Reading About Free Bets
If we placed a £5 bet on England to win and used our money, this is how it would pan out with a Three Lions victory in 90 minutes.
Now if we took the same backing of Gareth Southgate’s men and also took advantage of the generosity being afforded to us by the bookmakers, here is where the previously mentioned catch comes in to play.
Because in terms of a free bet, the stake is not factored into any winnings that you would collect and therefore, the sum would be as follows:
Stake £5 * Odds 3.00 (2/1) = £10 return (£10 winnings and £0 free bet stake)
Which means although you have not collected as big a return than when placing a bet with your own funds, your lesser returned is one that is steeped with no risk at all and in the grand scheme of football betting, a win must always be considered as a win.
Now that your appetite is whetted, you are probably wondering just how to get a free bet. Thankfully such gifts are regularly handed out by online bookmakers, and they are act as a fantastic promotional tool during any season.
Especially in tournaments such as the World Cup and with their being so much betting activity that takes place across the four frenetic weeks of action, there are also plenty of opportunities to test your betting acumen.
DRAW YOU BACK IN
Sometimes these offers can be handed out to potential new customers and if you do not have any existing betting accounts at the time of reading this article, you will have plenty of offers to be plucked from the gifting tree.
Because these gifts are considered as the perfect hook for bookmakers to reel you in and especially if you win with your free bet. Should this be the case, then you are likely to roll the dice with your newly gained winnings.
Free Bets Are The Perfect Way To Hook You Back In
However, there is also a possibility that when you roll the dice with your own money, you fail to have the Midas touch once again and the £10 that you earned in our example earlier has subsequently been grabbed back by the bookie.
If anything, free bets are considered as nothing more than a loss leader by those who offer them out in the first place. Rarely does someone use a free bet, back a winner and simply withdrawal their riches.
While if they do, those are the people that the bookmakers are never going to fall in love with. However, the people that they will fall in love with, are the punters who keep coming back to try their luck.
Of course, free bets are not just a tool to entice new customers, they are also a perfect way to reward regulars at the same time. With that said, their gifts can be handed out in a slightly different manner.
A new trend with online bookmakers is the gamification of free bets and instead of just simply being gifted £5 for logging in, you instead must earn any prize that comes your way. An example of this could be by predicting Premier League scores.
Sometimes You Need To Earn A Free Bet
You may be given four matches and here you have to predict the outcomes and depending on how many you get right; the size of the prize will change accordingly. For example, it could look like this:
1 match correct – £0
2 matches correct – £2.50 bet credits
3 matches correct – £5.00 bet credits
4 matches correct – £10.00 bet credits
Should you be lucky enough to get anywhere between two or four match outcomes correct, you will then be rewarded with an amount of bed credits. Once again, the free bet staking rules apply and more importantly, these are not cash in anyway.
GETTING IN CREDIT
This obviously means that you cannot withdraw the bet credits, they have to be used on a betting market and sometimes there can be another hurdle for you to climb. One that requires minimum odds to be staked when making a free bet.
Because if you were fortunate enough to win £10.00 on bet credits, in some cases you cannot just bet on a 1.10 favourite to win a match and convert that into £1 cash. Even if you could, it would make little sense to place such a bet.
Usually, the minimum odds must be 1.50 or above. A price that although is still steeped in your favour, just creates an element of jeopardy at the same time. Jeopardy that still allows the bookmakers to potentially come out on top.
While even if you have not been on top for a while and you have left your betting account dormant, a free bet can often be a good way to reignite your interest. Back a winner with a gift and you may soon get a winning streak under your belt.
Which is why you should always keep abreast of any communications that bookmakers try to make with you. Sometimes it may be nothing more than a marketing email but on other occasions it may be a free bet waiting to be used.
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