Getting started with Betfair Trading – Dobbing
Betfair trading can seem daunting if you are completely unfamiliar with it but in truth it is a very simple process. Making a profit is more difficult but anyone can get involved and give trading a go.
The aim of trading is to lock in a profit no matter the result. Traders usually focus on horse racing because the odds are so volatile it gives them a good chance of getting in a profitable trade. The basic aim of trading is to back high and lay low.
Dobbing is one of the easiest ways to get involved in trading and is great for beginners. You don’t need any special trading software and although it helps you don’t need any in depth knowledge of what you are betting on.
You may have heard of arb betting. That is where the lay price at the exchange is lower than the back price being offered by the bookie. An arb bet can be immediately layed for an instant profit. We can use the lay calculator to lock in a profit on any arb bet.
As you can see from this £50 bet we can lock in a £10 profit by laying £63.29.
Trading is the same thing but we are attempting to create arbs by laying once the lay price comes in.
Dobbing, also known as a DOB Bet (Double or bust) is the method of laying at half the odds for twice the back stake. We don’t need the calculator for this which makes it easy to get bets on very quickly but we can use the calculate to see our profit.
An example of a DOB bet:
Here we can see Charlie Mon has a back price of 17.5. We are going to DOB as follows:
- Back Charlie Mon by clicking the blue 17.5 and place a £5 bet.
- Then we need to lay at half the odds. Betfair works in 0.2 increments so half the odds will be 8.75 rounded to 8.8. We are going to click the pink lay 21 and then change our lay stake on the betting slip. Laying £10, which is twice our back stake.
Once we have placed our lay bet we need to tick keep bet, so that the bet doesn’t get cancelled once the race starts. Chances are it won’t get matched before then. Click Keep and then click the update button to update the bet.
That is it. Now we just have to hope the bet matches in play and we will make a guaranteed profit.
Possible outcomes on this bet are as follows:
- Horse loses and our lay doesn’t match – We lose our £5 back stake and are £5 down on this bet.
- Horse loses but our lay matches – Our back bet loses but our lay bet wins meaning we are are £4.50 in profit
- Horse wins the race meaning our lay bet was almost certainly matched – we make £4.50 profit.
So this isn’t risk free but it does increase our chance of making a profit as long as we choose a horse that is likely to fall in price in play. We can use the TrickyBet calculator to see how this will work.
So we are looking for horses that are going to be contenders in the race. We don’t really care if they are going to win or not as it makes no difference to our end profit. We can use sites like http://www.patternform.co.uk to analyse how a horse has performed in the past and see the percentage of dobs that were successful.
Hi, With dobbing you are backing and laying, at the exchange, is Betfair ok with this.
All bets are done on the exchange side of Betfair. Betfair don’t care what people do here as they get their 5% on winning bets. You are betting against other punters so you are free to back and lay as you wish. Betfair are completely ok with this sort of trading and even have many blogs dedicated to the subject. The more bets people place the happier they are!
I understand that a low risk bet is one using a low stake so I assumed that a medium risk and a high risk are bets using proportionately higher stakes. However, your next day results sometimes show a win for low risk and a loss for medium and/or high, surely the result is not dependent on the size of the stake, or am I missing something?
Hi Graham
The low risk doesn’t require such a big move in the odds. The horse only needs to trade in a little bit and our bet will get matched and therefore we make a profit. With the higher risk bets the odds have to come in a lot. Hope that makes sense. Apologies for the late reply.
Hi, is there a reason for laying the bet at half the odds? Would you not be more likely to get a match at say 3/4 odds, at understandably, a lower profit, or does it just mean you have to calculate lay figures? Thanks Philip
Thanks Philip
yeah this post explains a simple double or bust bet but you are correct. You can lay at different odds for more or less profit. Check out our back to lay tips page, on there we have a calculator that tells you what to lay for low, medium and high risk bets. It also tells you the potential profit from each one. There are many ways to play it.
Thank you very much fo taking the time to reply, it makes sense now.
Phil