Surviving “The Dip” as a Sports Bettor, Part 2

Have you reached a point in your burgeoning career as a professional sports bettor where it feels like you are pouring time and energy down a black hole?  If so, you may have reached what Seth Godin referred to as The Dip in his New York Times Bestselling book by the same name.  Godin’s book was about entrepreneurship, but that makes it 100% applicable to you if you are trying to launch a full-time career in sports betting.

Simply put, “The Dip” happens when you put the same amount of time and energy into your betting as ever (maybe even more), but the returns you get are decreasing.  “Returns” here could be measured in terms of finances or intangibles such as knowledge and skills. 

This concept is intimately tied into the issue of quitting, because “The Dip” is exactly what prompts so many entrepreneurs to throw in the hat.  That goes for sports bettors too.  It is beyond frustrating to invest money and hard work into a pursuit that isn’t paying off.  You may love sports betting, but at some point, you need it to love you back to continue.

That is why Godin subtitled his book, “A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick).”  I actually think that this prompts several different questions for struggling sports bettors:

• Should you quit betting with real money?
• Should you quit the betting strategy you are using?
• Should you quit any services you are using?
• Should you quit betting as a serious pursuit or maybe even altogether?

I want to address each of these in turn in more detail.  It is common to think of “quitting” as something which is just inherently bad, but the matter is never that simple.  The question always comes down to cost-benefit analysis.  Nor is there always a concrete answer.  In many ways, your pursuit of sports betting as a career is itself a bet, one you might win or lose.  Your job is to analyse that bet from multiple angles and try to figure out whether it is still a good investment.  Read on Surviving the Dip as a Sports Bettor Part 3 and part 4 for a more in-depth look at whether or not you should quit, and what you can do to survive the dip.