The passionate online community known as gambling Twitter has long been a fierce battlefield filled with bettors, bookmakers, scammers and trolls.
For years, bettors and bookmakers have relentlessly pot-shotted each other, eagerly awaiting the next tweet from a small college beat writer or a descriptive emoji posted by a WNBA player. Meanwhile, scammers who promise inside information and guaranteed locks lurk behind random anonymous accounts, ready to take advantage of the gullible, and trolls attack those who don’t meet their standards. I am ready to
People absolutely love it. And now, with the rapid spread of legal betting, gambling Twitter is on the rise.
According to Twitter, #GamblingTwitter, not #ramsnation or #whodey, was the top hashtag in tweets about the Super Bowl by the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals in February.
Mike Dupree, Twitter’s director of media and entertainment, told ESPN: “I don’t think you can trademark it, but it certainly has its own identity and community, and it’s nice to see that.”
Twitter has released internal data for the first time, commenting on the prevalence of sports betting content on social media platforms. The data, collected by Twitter Insiders Studies, indicates that he has bet on sports in the last 12 months, lives in a state where sports betting is legal, and uses at least one social media platform. Based on a sampling of individuals over the age of 18 who are
The study found that 7 out of 10 bettors surveyed use Twitter, with conversations on social media platforms driving bettors to bet more often and to bet bigger. I was. Additionally, according to data provided to ESPN by Twitter:
• 62% of Twitter bettors bet weekly, betting 15% more each year compared to bettors on other social media platforms.
• 72% of bettors check Twitter to follow live betting status after a live bet has taken place.
• 51% of Twitter bettors have been betting for less than two years.
“We’re already seeing more people tweeting about sports betting this year than we did in 2021 as a whole, and the NFL season hasn’t started yet,” Dupree said.
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How bookmakers use Twitter
Ed Salmons, a veteran Las Vegas bookmaker of nearly 30 years, was introduced to Twitter by a colleague around 2009 and realized the value of the tool after discovering TweetDeck, a platform that allows you to create multiple curated feeds on the same screen. Did. Maybe for bookmakers. Seven years later, the Salmons used his Twitter to put his sportsbook in an advantageous position on his Thanksgiving night with the Indianapolis Colts and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
On Monday, November 21, 2016, as the Salmons and Las Vegas Superbook teams set the opening line for Week 12 of the NFL season, a tweet from a Colts beat writer about Indianapolis quarterback Andrew Luck was spotted on Twitter. rice field.
Despite having bad luck against the Tennessee Titans the day before, he finished the game. Beat the Colts The tweet from his writer was anything but simple, but Salmons said he read between the lines and walked away believing that Luck was unlikely to face the Steelers on Thursday.
With most sportsbooks sitting at -3 for the Steelers, the Salmons have moved the superbook line to -7. Some competing sportsbooks responded by taking the game off the board, while others held steady at the Pittsburgh -3. Started and thought we got a bargain on the price difference.
“In those situations, when you see it and you know it, it’s good that the book essentially tries to get ahead of it,” Salmon said. “So we got the big bucks with the Colts, but then the news broke.”
With luck ruled out, Pittsburgh finished around eight point favorites. The Steelers beat the Colts with his 28-7 win.
These days, Salmons constantly monitors his TweetDeck, looking for influential news. He often enters the quarterback’s name into the search function to get an idea of his injury status, and also looks for live weather forecasts. At the same time, he also knows he needs to be careful not to be fooled by Twitter tricksters, who get their kicks from creating profiles that mimic mainstream reporters and tricking people with fake news. .
“I think at some point, everyone was duped by a fake account,” Salmons said. “For me, you have to be able to know that you’re wrong in one shot, and then confirm that what you’re seeing is actually true. I think you did a good job.”
Bettors should also be aware of Twitter scammers. For example, accounts claiming to have inside information about “fixed games” regularly post on betting-related threads demanding money in exchange for the details.
“We will continue to put tools in place to ensure a safe experience for sports bettors on our platform if there are bad actors on Twitter,” Dupree said. Before doing so, sports bettors should take a second look at their account to see if it is a reliable source.Is it verified? We have some work to do as bettors to make sure.”
Tip: Someone who claims to have info on a given game and sells it for $50 on Twitter may not be a legitimate and reliable source.
How bettors use Twitter
Data released by Twitter shows that bettors of all levels are using the platform to help with their handicaps. Some people are eager to find out what’s new. Others simply track the picks of popular betting personalities and discuss the action as the game unfolds. Even sophisticated betting syndicates rely heavily on Twitter.
Right Angle Sports (RAS) is one of the most influential betting syndicates in the American market. It consists of 10 of his disabled people in different parts of the country. As part of our handicap routines, we closely monitor social media news and when RAS bets, lines change instantly and often dramatically in sportsbooks around the world. Some of the bets that move these lines could be caused, more than anything else, by the emojis the player posted on her Twitter.
“One of the strangest skills we’ve acquired as a team in recent years is deciphering emojis,” RAS’ Edward Golden, who prefers only Edward, told ESPN. “I don’t know how many times a month one of our team members posts player tweets, but it’s just an emoji. Maybe one of those flushed face emojis. Brain exploding It could be an emoji, it could be a blue heart, but whatever it is, the emoji has a different meaning for each player. Did she get hurt?” Then someone on our team said, “No, she always does. She’ll say, ‘She’s just complaining about the flight being delayed.’ ”
Needless to say, there is more to bet on RAS than emoji translation. RAS handicappers quickly find and rate news items that are influential, but according to Edward, recent information appears to regularly hit the betting market before being posted on Twitter. But social media still remains a valuable tool for RAS.
“All of our current team members, we all found them online through social media,” says Edward. “In the old days, you could find undiscovered talent on betting forums or chat in his room. Nowadays, it’s all on his Twitter.
“There are so many obscure or undercapitalized originators putting out great work that no one knows who they are, despite the obvious potential.” We’re looking for people.Anytime.We’ve been lucky to hire some serious talent who use Twitter.They make us better while growing into an integral part of our team. I have seen the
The growth of Twitter in sports betting
According to Dupree, sports betting is one of the fastest growing areas on Twitter, growing 300% over the past four years, rivaling rising categories such as cryptocurrencies and NFTs. increase.
“[Sports betting] It may not have the full history and scale as it is a more recent phenomenon, but we have seen the sports betting conversation very much mirror the hyper-growth of the last few years.
The explosive popularity of sports betting on Twitter coincides with the widespread expansion of legal sportsbooks in the United States. In 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that all states can choose to allow sports betting. Since that decision, 31 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have set up legal gambling markets. According to the American Gaming Association, more than $147 billion has been wagered on legal sportsbooks in the United States over the past four years, generating nearly $10.6 billion in taxable revenue.
Sportsbooks are using Twitter’s clout to make markings, showcasing improbable parlays and promoting special deals for bettors such as odds boosts to gain large followings. The sportsbook also takes advantage of partnerships with professional sports leagues such as Major League Baseball and the NBA to post highlights with betting spins. FanDuel’s sportsbook account @FDSportsbook has over 214,000 followers. DraftKings’ @DKSportsbook has over 158,000 followers.
DraftKings Chief Marketing Officer Stephanie Sherman said:
According to Twitter’s survey, the most popular type of bet was on the spread, followed by parlays and moneyline bets. Bettors surveyed said that odds boosting (sportsbooks offer enhanced odds on certain bets) and the fear of missing out on the bet everyone is talking about are factors that influence their betting decisions. said to be a motivating factor.
“Twitter is called the world’s largest sports bar, and we want to share the excitement with our fellow fans,” said Dupree. “Well, you can think of Twitter as becoming the world’s largest sportsbook. It’s not about placing bets, it’s a place where people talk about the action and follow bets.”