A betting odds monitoring service is typically a site that compares bookmakers’ odds and betting exchanges. This is especially useful in the world of sports betting. Factors such as player injury or bad weather can affect the chances of various outcomes of a sports fixture. With the advent of the Internet, real-time changes in betting trends such as dropped odds and blocked odds are readily available. Monitors troll the World Wide Web in search of different betting offers in an attempt to help you maximize your success rate and find a surebet. They will often present the average change in probabilities as a percentage.
By following dropping odds it is possible to make money by betting with a bookie who is unaware of the most recent tendencies of the market. In other words, if the majority of bookmakers think that the chances of an event have fallen, they will lower the odds. Perhaps there is a bookie who has not yet cottoned-on to this trend. A monitoring service scans numerous bookmakers’ offers, highlighting such discrepancies. The results are two fold: the astute punter will take advantage of this inconsistency and stands to get a larger return on his winning bets. On the other hand, a monitoring service allows bookies to check their odds against others in the industry.
Some services allow you to follow blocked odds. These are the odds that are no longer accepted by bookmakers. Betting on these probabilities with bookies that are still taking these bets can be extremely profitable.
Services that monitor various gambling odds are especially useful in pointing out arbitrage betting opportunities (also known as arbs, surebets or miraclebets). A typical arb is usually about 2% but can be lower or much higher (5% or so). Basically, the greater the percentage that the odds have dropped, the more money you stand to win with a bookie who is not on trend. The arber must exercise caution though, because bookmakers do not take kindly to this practice. Disgruntled bookies have been known to limit or even freeze accounts of suspected arbers.