Kelly criterion is&nbsp;a mathematical formula that gives a stake size that will maximise the expected growth rate of your bankroll.

When using methods such as the&nbsp;<a href="https://outplayed.com/what-is-matched-betting">Matched Betting strategy</a>, you'll be laying off your bookmaker bets at an exchange to often guarantee a profit from offers, hence the name Matched&nbsp;Betting.

Ordinarily there's rarely a need to think about how big your stakes should be. After all, you're balancing it out with the exchange lay anyway, so your risk is minimal. Moreover, most of the offers where you're laying your bets will have a set stake size in order to qualify for the promotion (e.g. Bet £20 Get £10 Free Bet).

This all changes completely when you delve into the world of value betting.&nbsp;For example, if you go for a "No Lay" strategy for <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/extra-place-offers">Extra Place offers</a>, or you know a bookmaker has a selection that is overpriced and you can't/won't lay it.

Here, since you're not balancing out your bets with an exchange lay, the amount you stake on the bet is very important. You don't want to stake so much that you risk rapidly losing your whole <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/matched-betting-bankroll">betting bankroll</a> (and thus don't have the money to take advantage of future profitable bets). But at the same time, you don't want your bet sizing to be so small that you're not gaining as much value from your bets.

This is where the Kelly criterion comes in.&nbsp;It takes into account all the important things: the size of your bankroll, the payout if you win, the loss if you lose, and the probabilities of these outcomes happening.

Within the Settings of the <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/extra-place-master">Extra Place Master&nbsp;</a>(when you have No Lay mode selected), you'll see the option to fill in your bankroll amount and also select Kelly staking:

And that's all the hard work done for you in terms of calculating how much you should stake!

Now when you load up the calculator for a selection, it'll give you the recommended stake based on your bankroll and all the other important information specific to that bet.

Before we go into how the Kelly stake amount is derived, it needs to be said that the stake the Kelly formula gives is often pretty brutal. That's to say that the stake that's optimal for growing your bankroll is bigger and therefore riskier than is really necessary.

This is why Outplayed's software defaults to fractional Kelly stakes. It simply takes the optimal stake that the Kelly formula would give and then divides it. The recommended amount is 0.25 (i.e. the stake that will be recommended by the software is a quarter of the optimal Kelly stake).

This will give a much more sensible and balanced stake amount.

So are you throwing away value by not betting with the fully optimal stake amount?

Well, yeah, some.. But the upside is you can stake a much smaller amount and still achieve a similar value in terms of bankroll growth rate. This means much calmer downswings to your bankroll and a much smaller chance of having the doomsday scenario of losing your entire bankroll.

Let's take a look at an example bet with the following info:

The Kelly Criterion maths (which we'll go into more detail with later) gives the optimal stake to maximise the expected bankroll growth as £62.50. This is the stake where the growth rate peaks on the graph below (the green point). It gives an expected bankroll growth rate of 0.74%.

The orange and yellow points show what happens to the growth rate if you go for a much smaller stake of £30 or £15. The £30 stake gives a growth rate of 0.55%, and the £15 stake gives 0.32%.

They do indeed lead to a lower average growth than a £62.50 stake, but are much less risky since they require a much smaller chunk of your bankroll.

The graph also shows that betting more than £62.50 in our example is completely redundant. The growth rate will only get further away from the maximum of 0.74%, and so you'll be taking on more risk for less reward.

Outplayed makes life nice and easy in terms of the Kelly calculations. But let's take more of an in depth look at how the stake amount is calculated and how it can apply to other betting situations.

When I say a "standard bet", I mean one that can only have two outcomes: win or lose. Also, in the event of a loss, you'd lose the full stake amount (there's no partial money back going on here).

The formula to work out the optimal Kelly stake (S) is as follows:

This can look a little complicated at first, so let's go through it step by step with an example to show how you take all the information and calculate the stake size. I'll use the same example as the section above:

This would be a great value bet to place if the bookie was offering odds of 5.0, but you believed that the true chance of that bet winning was more like 25%.

Step 1: Subtract 1 from the odds. 5 - 1 = 4

Step 2: Multiply this by the probability of the bet winning. 4 x 0.25 = 1

Step 3: Subtract the probability of the bet losing. 1 - 0.75 = 0.25

Step 4: Multiply by the bankroll amount. 0.25 x £1,000 = £250

Step 5: Divide this by the "odds - 1". £250 / 4 = £62.50

So we now know that the stake size that maximises the expected long term bankroll growth is £62.50. You can now apply the fractional Kelly as mentioned in the previous section.

It'd be as simple as taking the £62.50 and dividing it by 4 (or whatever other fraction you deem sensible). £15.62 is the new stake amount after doing this. It'd be a good idea to round this up/down to £15 or £20 so you don't stand out like a sore thumb to the bookie.

Each way bets work a little differently to your usual bet. They're essentially two bets in one. One of these bets on the selection to win, and the other bet on the selection to place (e.g. finish 1st - 4th).

This leads to three possible payouts instead of the standard bet, which gave two:

This third scenario throws a real spanner in the works when it comes to calculating the Kelly stake. Showing where this comes from and going into detail goes beyond the scope of this article.&nbsp;

It is very much the same concept though:&nbsp;finding the stake value that maximises the expected bankroll growth rate.&nbsp;

You don't actually need to know any of this to apply it to your betting. Outplayed's software instantly does all of these calculations for you and lets you know this stake amount when doing your each-way value betting.

The Kelly criterion formula is a great advanced concept for value bettors. It gives the stake that optimises your long-term expected bankroll growth. And after all, that's the main thing you're after!

When using Kelly stakes for betting purposes, the optimal stake can often be quite large, so using 50% or 25% of this amount can be an ideal balance of risk and growth.

It's nice to know where the numbers come from, but you don't need to do all the painstaking maths yourself. Outplayed will do this for you on our value betting software, so you'll always be using sensible stakes for your bankroll amount.

Ollie

Kelly Criterion Betting System: Optimising Bet Stake Sizes

If you’re looking to start a new side hustle, then there are three main questions you need to ask.

How much start-up money do I need?

One of the biggest advantages of Matched Betting is that it can take as much or as little time as you want.

Most importantly, though, you can fit it around your other commitments and it doesn’t require a lot of time to be profitable.

Here, we’ll take you through Matched Betting timings, look at some of the most common bets, explore how much time a bet takes, and give you an insight into a day in the life of a <a href="https://outplayed.com/what-is-matched-betting">Matched Bettor</a>.

There are no set times for Matched Betting.

You can do it early in the morning, late in the evening, over lunchtime, during the day, on weekdays and/or weekends.

Matched Betting opportunities happen all day, every day, so it is highly flexible with timings.

There are, of course, some specific offers that have time restrictions or are linked to specific games or tournaments, but generally you can pick and choose what offers you do and when.

Naturally there are times when it pays to do more matched betting than others.

Big football weekends, major horse racing meets, golf or tennis majors and big sports tournaments all come with increased Matched Betting opportunities. There is obviously no pressure to do more at these times, but it can be highly profitable to do so.

Many Matched Betting offers take only a few minutes to complete.

More complicated sports offers can take up to fifteen minutes, while some <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/matched-betting-casino-offers-explained-in-a-nutshell">casino offers</a> take longer. However, the more you do, the quicker you get.

It's then up to you to decide how many offers you want to do and what type of offers you want to do to fit around your own schedule.

You will also develop a preference for certain offers over others. You may decide to spend your time on bets that take a bit longer to do but bring the most profit.

Alternatively, you may prefer to do lots of simpler matched bets that are quicker and bring in lots of small wins. The choice is yours.

Companies such as <a href="https://outplayed.com/">Outplayed</a> make Matched Betting as time efficient as possible by providing you with all of the tools and guides you need.

There is no need to scroll through all the bookmakers looking for offers. A daily list is provided for you. There is no need to scour the internet for the best odds. Outplayed provide <a href="https://outplayed.com/products/oddsmatcher">odds matchers</a>, bet finders and match catchers with handy search and filter tools so you can find bets quickly and easily.

There's also no need to spend ages trying to work out what offers are the most profitable, as all the work is done for you. Plus, there are designated calculators for all types of bets to make it as simple and efficient as possible. All you have to do is follow the guides and make use of the tools provided.

There are several types of matched bets you can choose from. Some are completely <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/is-matched-betting-risk-free">risk-free</a> and give a guaranteed profit. Meanwhile, some matched bets involve a limited risk giving a low qualifying loss if unsuccessful, but potentially good profits if successful.

Below we’ll take a look at a couple of common offers - one risk-free and one limited risk matched bet. We'll look through the process and show how long it takes to complete them.

In these examples, it's assumed that you already have an account with the bookmaker, the exchange and Outplayed.

An example of a basic sports ‘Bet and Get’ offer can be ‘Bet £10 and receive a £10 Free Bet’.

This requires the following Matched Betting activity to guarantee profit:

1. 	Find the Qualifying Bet - Go to the <a href="https://outplayed.com/products/oddsmatcher">Outplayed Oddsmatcher tool</a> and either select the exact offer from the drop-down menu or select the relevant bookmaker and chosen exchange, and then choose a bet from the list provided (2-3 mins)

2. 	Make the <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/qualifying-bet-guide">Qualifying Place Bet</a> – go to the bookie site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the bet (1 - 2 min)

3. 	Make the Qualifying Lay Bet - go to the exchange site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the lay bet (1 - 2 min)

The Free Bet will either be granted immediately or once the qualifying bet has settled. When it does:

4. Find the Free Bet - Go to the Outplayed Oddsmatcher tool and either select the exact free bet offer from the drop-down menu or select the relevant bookmaker and chosen exchange and select SnR. Then choose a bet from the list provided (2 - 3 mins)

5. 	Make the Free Place Bet – go to the bookie site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the bet (1 - 2 min)

6. 	Make the Lay Bet - go to the exchange site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the lay bet (1 - 2 min)

A simple Bet and Get offer on average will take between 6 – 12 minutes depending on how much experience you have as a Matched Bettor.

This can be even more efficient by using the direct links on the Oddsmatcher tool. The bookie link will take you straight to the relevant market and if you link your exchange account you can place your lay bet with just one click.

In the example offer above, it should return around £8 in profit which works out at around £1 a minute.

This bet gives money back or a free bet if your chosen horse finishes in a specific position in a race. In some cases it can be 2nd place only, some offer 2nd and 3rd place while some offer 2nd, 3rd or 4th place.

With some bookmakers the offer is applicable on a specific race or set of races, while at others it is any race with a minimum number of runners. This process is as follows:

1. Find the Bet – open up the Outplayed Match Catcher tool and use the filters to find the relevant bookmaker, exchange and appropriate race or track. Then just look for an eligible bet with the lowest qualifying loss. (4 mins)

2. Make the Place bet - go to the bookie site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the bet (1 – 2 min)

3. Make the Lay Bet - go to the exchange site, ensure the odds are the same as the Oddsmatcher and place the lay bet (1 - 2 min)

Horse racing refunds should take 5 – 10 minutes depending on your Matched Betting experience. It may take a little longer if you have to source the odds yourself directly with the sites, but this should only add another minute or two.

If your horse doesn’t place where you want it to, then you'll lose the minimal qualifying loss. However, if your horse places as required, you will also receive a refund or free bet in order to lock in profit.

On a £10 horse refund, you would hope to have no more than a 70p qualifying loss but can make up to £8 profit and there are plenty of them to do every week.

Every day bookmakers offer a variety of bonus offers and promotions for customers. While this gives us lots of opportunities to make profits, it also means we can be selective when choosing the most profitable and time efficient ones to do.

Luckily, if you join Outplayed, they do this job for you, so you don’t have to.

Offers are divided into three main types – Sign-Up Offers, Reload Offers and Ongoing Offers.

Sign-Up Offers are usually the easiest to do and can return great profits. In the case of simple Bet and Gets as discussed above, they can be done quickly. However, in the case of casino sign-up offers, they sometimes require some time if they involve large wagering requirements.

Reload Offers are promotions given to existing customers and can include things like Horse Racing Refunds and Extra Places. Because of the useful tools available on Outplayed, these can often be done extremely easily and quickly especially as you become more used to them.

Ongoing Offers are bonuses that are given either daily or weekly like free daily games or bet clubs. These tend to be the bread and butter of a matched bettor and become part of a daily routine, which can be completed in a matter of minutes.

When registered with a company such as Outplayed, they provide you with not only a list of daily bonus offers, but also an expected value for each. This means that if you’re pushed for time you can immediately prioritise the most valuable bonuses and only do the others if you have time.

You can sort offers by profit and filter types of offers to find the best available offers at any time.

It is a really handy way of making Matched Betting as time efficient and effective as possible. It also means that you can make £10 - £20 a day just by doing a small number of offers.

Every Matched Bettor has their own routine, both in terms of what offers they do and when they do them.

The amount of time each person allocates to Matched Betting differs greatly from around 30 minutes to three hours a day, while some prefer to only do Matched Betting on weekends.

It's therefore impossible to give you a standard example of what most Matched Bettors do.

However, as I’ve been doing Matched Betting for around three years, I thought it might be useful to share my daily routine to give you an idea of timings.

My usual day would involve around 30 – 60 minutes of Matched Betting activity in the morning, followed by 15 minutes in the evening. Depending on other commitments or available offers I may add additional time as and when I feel like it is worthwhile.

My Matched Betting routine is as follows:

8.30am - Log into Outplayed and browse both the Sports and Casino Reload Offers to see what’s available and decide my plan of action.

8.35am - If there are any good Price Boost offers I will do them immediately as the odds can worsen on these as the day goes on and it is an easy way to lock in quick guaranteed profit.

8.40am – Log into some of my key accounts (Coral, Ladbrokes, Betfred, Paddy Power, BetVictor etc) and place any available Bet and Get offers, Horse Racing Refunds, play the Daily Games and do ongoing offers such as Ladbrokes Only Spins and Horses and Betfred Mystery Spins.

9.10am – Check out the Lucky 15 Finder Tool and Extra Place Master Tool and place a handful of bets with a valuable positive expected value.

9.20am – Refer back to the reload lists and do the most valuable offers depending on what time I have available.

9.30am – By 9.30am I usually finish Matched Betting for the morning and often for the day. Occasionally if I have time, I will check the Lucky 15 Finder and Extra Place Master sporadically.

Evening – at some point in the evening I will spend 15 minutes checking the results of my bets and totting up my profits for the day.

If there are any good casino offers on, I will normally do them while relaxing on an evening. Also, sometimes there are in-play bets available for live evening matches so I will do them as well.

On average I do between 10 – 20 bets a day which works out at around 3 – 5 minutes per bet, plus I do some daily spins and offers.

Some days I don’t do Matched Betting at all if I don’t have the time, I just fit it around my other commitments.

The simplest way to find out how long Matched Betting takes is to try it yourself. Outplayed offers a <a href="https://outplayed.com/user/register#1">free trial</a> to all new customers to introduce you to the principles of Matched Betting and see if it’s something you enjoy.

The trial gives you access to over 40 signup offers with step-by-step guides to get started. It takes you through creating a bookmaker account and an exchange account, claiming the bonus offers, how to find appropriate betting markets, and then placing and laying the bets.

Detailed step-by-step instructions are given throughout the process to ensure that all customers who take part in the trial make a guaranteed profit providing they follow the instructions correctly.

If you’re anything like me, then the trial will take you a while.

When I did it, I was completely new to Matched Betting and I read and reread everything about ten times to make sure I was doing it correctly.

I also wanted to understand what I was doing and why I was doing it at every stage of the process.

So, while you cannot take the trial as a good example of how long Matched Betting takes, it does give you an insight into the process.

Once you have completed your free trial, you get quicker with each offer.

Soon enough what may have taken you 25 minutes the first time only takes you 5 minutes to complete once you have more experience.

How Long Does Matched Betting Take?

It’s rough out there. With the cost of living crisis sending people’s expenditure sky-high, everybody seems to be looking for a way to boost their income in the hope of keeping up.

Side hustles - a source of additional income alongside your main job or role - are growing enormously in popularity. Over 40% of Brits have a side hustle of some sort, and that number is even higher in younger generations - 65% of Millennials have a side hustle, and as many as 68% of Generation Z.

Source: <a href="https://www.finder.com/uk/business-banking/side-hustle-statistics">Finder’s Side Hustle National Survey</a>

If you’ve pondered starting your own side hustle, you’ve probably also thought about the kinds of extra work that might suit you. If you’re looking for inspiration, our list of the best <a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/side-hustle-ideas">side hustle ideas</a> out there is a great place to start. For anybody who likes words, though, copywriting may already have crossed your mind.

But is it really worth your time? If you’ve got as far as searching for information online, you’ve probably come across a whole host of smiling people on YouTube or TikTok promising that you can make six figures within just a few months, and you’d be right to be sceptical.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth pursuing at all. Copywriting isn’t a magical get-rich-quick scheme, but if you’ve got a way with words and are willing to commit yourself to a good amount of hard work, it can become a lucrative side hustle, or even your main source of income.

In this article, we’ll take you through all you need to know about copywriting as a side hustle, how to get started as a copywriter, and how much you can realistically expect to make.

Copywriting refers to any kind of writing used to promote or market a product or service. Most copywriting nowadays involves materials used on websites or in email communications, but physical leaflets, posters and billboards are still needed, and it’s copywriters who create the text for them.

‘Copy’ has been used in technical fields to refer to writing for centuries - specifically, writing that would be reproduced in print, i.e. copied. The term ‘copywriter’ followed later, in the early 1900s, to mean the person who wrote the text of advertisements.

Copywriting often appeals to creative writers, who reason that it ought to be an effortless way to put their existing skills to good use and earn some extra cash. While it’s true that creative writers - or anyone with writing experience - are probably quite well suited to the role, copywriting is a very particular skill, and one that requires a lot of work to get the hang of.

Nonetheless, it’s a skill that’s in high demand, which is why it can be such a profitable side hustle. If you put the time and effort into learning your craft and gaining experience, you’re likely to find that you can make an excellent side income from your hard work.

There’s a surprisingly large number of types of copywriting. Most professional copywriters specialise in just a couple of them, so that their clients know they’re getting exactly the expertise they need.

As a beginner, you’ll probably want to try your hand at most, if not all, of these types of copywriting. This will allow you to discover what you enjoy most and where your talents lie, and therefore the type of copywriting that you should make your niche.

Direct response copywriting is what we might think of as traditional advertising. Your copy aims to produce a ‘direct response’ in the reader to take some action - usually, to buy the product that’s being sold, but you might also be persuading people to sign up to a newsletter, or follow you on social media.

This is a broad category, spanning short, punchy ads with a hard sell to long-form ‘advertorials’ - adverts in the form of articles - and it’s particularly in-demand.

Writing persuasively without being off-putting is tricky to master but, because it’s a rare skill, competent direct response copywriters rarely struggle to find clients.

Many of the following types of copywriting can be considered a subset of direct response copywriting. So, no matter what kind of copywriting you plan to do, you’ll need a solid understanding of the fundamentals of direct response copywriting regardless.

Marketing copywriting can be considered the quintessential form of copywriting - text designed to promote. It has a lot of overlap with direct response copywriting, but isn’t limited to material intended to produce an immediate action - it may hope simply to build awareness of a product or service.

Marketing copywriting can involve producing copy in a wide variety of forms, both offline and online. For example:

You’ll need to be able to adapt your writing style to the job in hand - depending on the product or service, you might be asked to produce elegant, dreamy prose to create a vibe or atmosphere, or precise, technical information to appeal to an informed customer who knows exactly what they’re looking for.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, which involves writing copy specifically to improve a website’s results on search engines - Google, predominantly. It requires an understanding of how search engines work, and the best tactics to use to boost results for a particular brand or website.

In the past, simply flooding an article with relevant keywords was a common strategy, but as search engines have become more intelligent, you need a more sophisticated approach. Balancing the creation of engaging, readable content with optimization for search engines is a delicate matter, which is why SEO experts are frequently sought after.

This is the art of turning technical, complex concepts into accessible, straightforward copy for the average reader. This might take the form of instruction manuals or articles regarding scientific research, but it can also be more traditional marketing material relating to technical concepts.

IT companies will often employ technical copywriters, for example, to help translate the complex principles of their software into simple language the consumer can understand, while simultaneously highlighting the benefits it has to offer.

Technical copywriters are in high demand, as their skills are both specialised and crucial to a variety of industries, including the tech industry, engineering and healthcare.

Brand copywriting refers to the craft of capturing the essence of a brand in its marketing material. It’s exemplified in the short, pithy taglines you often see that sum up the voice and image of a brand, but encompasses longer form writing as well.

Brand copywriting aims to create an emotional connection between a company and its customers, helping a brand to come across as more human and relatable.

Consistent brand copywriting is crucial - every piece of copy you write for a brand needs to convey the brand’s message and values, all while maintaining the brand’s chosen voice.

A fairly self-explanatory category, email copywriting refers to the text of emails sent out by companies, whether newsletters, marketing communications, or updates for existing subscribers.

Email copywriting is often in the form of direct sales, but it can also be more informative, educational content, so you’ll need to be able to adapt your writing to the company’s requirements.

Email copy will either be B2B (business to business) or B2C (business to consumer), so you’ll need to take into account the audience. B2B writing is usually less emotive and more logical, as you’re encouraging a business customer to make a rational purchase that will serve their needs. It may also use more jargon, if the business customer is in the same industry as the company running the email campaign.

As you might expect, social media copywriting means writing for social media - whether that’s in the form of Facebook ads, Instagram captions, or even the scripts for TikTok videos.

Social media copy is usually snappy and to the point, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t creative. Humour is an important weapon in the arsenal of the social media copywriter, as well as striking imagery and engaging ideas.

The possibility of a particular post going viral is always in the back of the mind of the social media copywriter and, while this won’t happen often, they’ll need to ensure their copy is still effective if it ends up reaching a wider audience than anticipated.

Website copywriting is another one that’s pretty well explained by the name. Website copywriting involves writing the text of a website - all of it, from the landing page to the About Us section to the text accompanying individual links.

A website’s copy needs to be functional and informative, but it also needs to convey the brand’s voice and message, hopefully persuading the casual browser to explore further and find out more about the company.

PR Copywriting, short for Public Relations Copywriting, means the writing of press releases, designed to inform the press and the public about a new product or service.

As press releases are usually directly aimed at the media, rather than at consumers, they often have to work differently to capture their audience, who aren’t expected to want to purchase the item themselves, but to publicise it.

Again, you probably worked it out from the name, but product description copywriting is the writing of product descriptions. For each of the millions of products out there, a product description copywriter had to patiently come up with a compelling description to sell it.

The style you use to describe a product will depend on the brand and the product itself - a luxury homewares company will probably want to use a much more elegant, artistic voice, while a company selling power tools is likely to prefer efficiency and precision - but in all cases you need to describe the product succinctly yet persuasively.

1. First of all, and most importantly, practise. Unless you’re already an experienced copywriter, you’ll need to put in a lot of time to hone your craft before you can start to offer your services professionally.

2. Perhaps take a course. However, it’s important to make sure you’ve checked objective reviews or opinions about that course. There are a lot of amateur copywriters out there offering courses, whose money is made more from selling their course than from actually doing any copywriting - not really a trusted source! Have a look at the resources section below for reputable copywriting courses in the UK.

3. Do your research. Not only should you read all you can about copywriting, especially about the types of copywriting you’d like to pursue, but you should also study existing copy.

See a particularly well-crafted Instagram post while doomscrolling? Save the copy to study later, so you can work out what makes it so good. You’ll start to build up what’s known as a ‘swipe file’ - a folder full of bits of copy you admire and can learn from.

4. Decide on your specialisation. Once you’ve tried your hand at most types of copywriting, it’s wise to decide on a couple you particularly enjoy, or you feel you have a flair for. You can then hone your skills still further, until you’re confident that you’ve got a quality service to offer your clients.

5. Establish regular writing habits. Even before you’ve landed your first client, you need to get into the habit of devoting a chunk of your free time to copywriting. It’s much harder to practise discipline before you have the prospect of getting paid to motivate you, but it’ll pay dividends to have an existing routine when you get to the point of juggling multiple projects with tight deadlines.

6. Build your portfolio. Any prospective client will want to see samples of your best work before hiring you - how else can they be sure you’ll do a good job? The problem, of course, is that before you get your first job, where do you get a sample to put in your portfolio?

The answer is to make up sample projects for yourself. When you’ve worked out the sort of copywriting you’d like to do, you can simply have a go at it, making up projects for either real or fictional companies. Just make clear in your portfolio that this is ‘speculative’ or ‘spec’ work, so as not to imply that you’ve actually been employed by a particular company.

Your portfolio will normally take the form of a dedicated website, but it doesn’t have to be a complicated one. You can put together a basic website yourself, using a service such as <a href="https://www.squarespace.com/websites-start/?channel=pbr&amp;subchannel=go&amp;campaign=pbr-go-uk-en-core_squarespacealone-e&amp;subcampaign=(squarespacealone-en_squarespace_e)&amp;&amp;cid=16750987583&amp;aid=133807090214&amp;tid=kwd-1988643730&amp;mt=e&amp;eid=&amp;loc_p_ms=9045777&amp;loc_i_ms=&amp;nw=g&amp;d=c&amp;adid=602138458540&amp;channel2=pbr&amp;subchannel2=go&amp;gad_source=1&amp;gclid=CjwKCAjw4ri0BhAvEiwA8oo6F1Y2ar_hbmtCevn30EK_4wxovdjetaVeo2TLs0v9vWjNmkP_7H0j4BoCDNcQAvD_BwE&amp;gclsrc=aw.ds">Squarespace</a> or, to make things even easier, use a template offered by a dedicated portfolio company, such as <a href="https://copyfol.io/">Copyfolio</a>.

7. Find your first client. Arguably the hardest part! Many people begin by offering their services cheaply on freelancing sites such as <a href="https://www.upwork.com/">Upwork</a>, or <a href="https://www.fiverr.com/">Fiverr</a>. However, you run the risk of deterring clients who may assume that anyone working at low rates won’t do a good job, and attracting clients who don’t value quality work, only a low price.

If you already have connections to people or businesses, make use of them! Even if you don’t charge for your services, you’ll be able to use the work in your portfolio and build from there. By using your existing relationships to get yourself started, you’ll put yourself in a position to build your network and land paying clients in the future.

Send out cold emails. This may sound like an alarming prospect for a lot of people, but it can work. If you see ineffective copy for a particular brand and think you can do a better job, it’s worth your while seeing if they like your ideas.

It’s unwise to send them useable copy right away - there’s a risk of the company deciding to use it without hiring you. However, you could look up a competitor’s website and put together a professional-looking mockup for that competitor, demonstrating that you understand their market and audience without the risk of your ideas being poached.

You may have seen self-proclaimed copywriting gurus claiming that it’s possible for anyone to make six figures copywriting within their first couple of months, but the reality is that you’re unlikely to make much money when you first get started.

However, as you build your client base and your portfolio, you can expect to start commanding pretty decent rates. Quality copywriters will usually charge £50 - £75 an hour, and if you dedicate yourself to your work for long enough, you’re likely to join them.

Copywriters don’t always work on an hourly charge - sometimes they’ll work on a day rate, and some will charge by the project, to spare their client any concerns about them dragging the work out to fatten their invoice.

As a new copywriter, your rates should generally reflect the fact that you have less experience, but without being so low as to suggest that your work isn’t valuable.

Advantages Of Copywriting As A Side Hustle

Drawbacks Of Copywriting As A Side Hustle

If you’re a freelance copywriter, that means you’re self-employed, and you’ll need to submit a tax return if you make over £1000 in a year from your copywriting.

Stephanie Sorrell

Is Copywriting A Good Side Hustle? A Complete Guide For 2024

Mug Betting basically refers to any form of gambling that has no strategy behind it.

No one wants to feel like a mug, right? Well, that’s not strictly true.

In fact, in Matched Betting appearing like a mug might just be to your advantage.

The label of ‘mug’ is usually associated with negative connotations. Unless you’re talking about what you drink your cuppa out of, of course.

A mug suggests someone who has been taken advantage of. And a mug’s game suggests a foolish or worthless activity which is likely to be unsuccessful.

However, in Matched Betting, appearing like a mug bettor can actually help you in the long run and we’ve got some great tips to help you do this effectively.

Whether it’s a random bet or an emotional bet based on your favourite team, mug bets are really just punts.

They have no strategy behind them, no thought, no mathematics or analysis, they are just a bet that any person can place when they fancy it.

Think of it like choosing the Grand National winner based on the jockey’s colours or picking a greyhound to win based on your lucky number.

Mug Betting is what most normal punters do. They bet on their favourite teams to win, or their favourite players to score as a general rule.

How Can You Use Mug Betting To Your Advantage In Matched Betting?

One of the key challenges in <a href="https://outplayed.com/what-is-matched-betting">doing Matched Betting</a> long-term is to keep your bookie accounts open and eligible for offers.

Bookmakers monitor customer behaviour and if they believe that you’re only taking on value bets or promotional offers, then they will often restrict your accounts.

This is known as ‘<a href="https://outplayed.com/blog/top-tips-to-avoid-being-gubbed">gubbing</a>’ and it can include anything from stopping you receiving bonus offers, applying stake restrictions to your account, or closing the account completely.

It’s therefore in your best interests to stay under the radar as best you can. And Mug Betting – well, more like strategic and purposeful Mug Betting – is a good way to do this.

If you can appear like a mug punter, placing bets when no promotion or bonus is on offer, or when the odds aren’t the best, then you can keep your accounts healthier for longer and therefore prolong your matched betting journey.

Mug Betting isn’t just a case of randomly placing bets and potentially losing money. That’s just gambling and that’s not what Matched Betting is about.

There is a strategic way of using Mug Betting to your advantage and we’ll take a look at some tips below.

The most important thing to remember with mug betting is that it is best done in the first few weeks after opening a betting account.

This is when there is more focus and attention on your betting activity, so it’s a great way to establish yourself early on as a regular bettor in the eyes of the bookie.

Of course, it isn’t a guarantee that you won’t get gubbed in the long-run, but it does start you off on a good footing and helps you blend into the background. The longer the account is running, the easier it is to keep it active.

Outplayed Blog

Matched Betting

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