The Winning Edge is a horse racing tipster service that is being offered through Bet Social. Selections come courtesy of tipster Marcus Williams who has shown some quite impressive consistency with his bets.
Introduction to The Winning Edge
Here’s an interesting question for you. If you’re betting, and you’re not really making money, but you’re not losing it either, is that a good thing or a bad thing? Ultimately, that will probably depend on how you look at things, but I know most serious bettors would be quite pleased with not losing money. The thing is, that is all well and good when you’re betting on your own. The one thing that you don’t want to see is losses. But what about if you’re paying a tipster and you hit the same plateaus?
This is a very poignant question when looking at today’s review subject. Honestly, this is quite a curious service, and it is one that I don’t really know what to make of at a glance. On the one hand, Bet Social show that (depending on a few factors) The Winning Edge is a service that is very capable of producing a consistent and long term profit. That is unequivocally a good thing. But what about when you start to factor in the cost of Marcus Williams’ selections too? Does the service look quite as positive?
I know I’m asking a lot of questions, this is honestly a bit of a thinker. I can’t recall a service in recent times that I have looked at that I have felt quite so conflicted about as The Winning Edge. Everything that is a positive, is a solid positive. But there are so many elements that counterbalance this, and Marcus Williams and Bet Social ultimately end up putting out… just one of the most confusing services I think I’ve ever seen. And this context is very important to understand, because this is going to be a bit of an odd read.
What Does The Winning Edge Offer?
I’m not entirely certain how you start to quantify the offering of The Winning Edge. Normally, there is a clear structure to a service. You can look at what a tipster is doing and say, they’re providing this, and there is a pattern. Or even there isn’t a pattern. Marcus Williams however seems to be an agent of chaos with little that seems cohesive. But here’s the thing, in some ways, that might not be bad.
First things first, I want to address something that really stands out to me. Bet Social say in the sales material for The Winning Edge that Marcus Williams is “Tipping mainly Value Each Way bets”. For over a year, I would say that was the case. But there has been a curious switch over the last few months. Since October, there have been exactly two each way bets advised. All of the rest have been win bets. Which comes back to that point. What is the offering exactly?
Honestly, it seems to me that for the time being at least, Marcus Williams is focusing on win bets. And to be fair to him, that does seem to be working (as I will explore a little later). One thing that hasn’t changed however is that element of value. The average odds to BOG sit at 15.04. It’s quite significant. Something that you should note however is that The Winning Edge rarely sits at that.
The fact is that there is a very significant range here. In the last week, there have been selections advised as low as 3.50 all the way up to 21.00. That is what is pretty typical of the experience with The Winning Edge. Which, to give some credit to Marcus Williams, if you believe the sales material is in line with the approach taken.
Now, let’s talk some more about that lack of a pattern. You’re mostly placing win bets at this point. But some days (and by some, I mean a fair few really) there simply aren’t any bets. Other times, there might be a single horse. The next day, Marcus Williams recommends 4 selections through The Winning Edge. Again, the only consistency to this is the lack of consistency.
Logistically, it probably won’t come as much of a surprise to learn that The Winning Edge is pretty much exactly what you’d expect. Selections are sent out directly via email. You get plenty of time to get bets on, and that is something that you will generally want to do as soon as you get the chance, because the disparity in performance here is very significant. Especially when you get towards SP.
I feel like I say this a lot, but I would genuinely recommend taking advantage of an odds comparison site if you are able. I appreciate that it adds extra steps to following a service, but with something like The Winning Edge it feels very necessary. And if I’m really honest, the extra time taken isn’t really that significant given that this isn’t an overly high volume service (a little under 900 bets in almost 18 months).
Now, let’s talk numbers. Historically, The Winning Edge has been based around 2 points per bet, that is to say, 1 point each way. As the service has seemingly evolved and changed, this is just level stakes of 1 point per bet. In terms of your betting bank, I think it is probably wise to have a reasonable sized one, because the drawdown potential is pretty substantial. Even recently, Bet Social’ proofing shows a 22 point losing streak.
Which brings me to the strike rate. The average sits at 24.69%. A pretty respectable number when you look at the odds etc. But a lot of the heavy lifting here has been done when The Winning Edge was almost exclusively each way bets. Things began to transition in August of this year, and as of the day of writing this, the figure drops quite a lot to 18.88%. Still not terrible, but Marcus Williams clearly isn’t hitting the same numbers.
How Does The Winning Edge Work?
As I’ve already mentioned, a key part of The Winning Edge is the idea of obtaining value. But Bet Social actually put it quite succinctly. They say that “PACE + FORM + VALUE + CONTACTS = THE WINNING EDGE!!”. That is of course a simplification of a formula and a canny bit of marketing, but what it allows is for you to quickly and easily see what exactly all of this is built on.
But what’s good is that we get even more information on how Marcus Williams finds selections. Specifically he talks about using his own handicap figures, Race Pace figures, ground conditions and “top information”. I appreciate that ultimately you’re taking their word on some of this, but I am quite inclined to believe that this is the case to some degree or another.
The blunt fact of the matter is that no tipster is every going to tell you exactly how they find their bets. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be a tipster service to operate. People would just do it themselves. But I think that there is enough from Bet Social and Marcus Williams here that you can make an informed decision about The Winning Edge. The only real criticism that I have (and it is a bit of a doozie) is the lack of explanation on the change in approach. This is widely unaddressed.
Adding to all of this is some incredibly comprehensive proofing. Whilst it would have been nice to understand why the change in approach, at least this proofing lets you see that it has happened. Bet Social update it daily and I think it does a very good job of providing an understanding if The Winning Edge is a service that will work for you.
What is the Initial Investment?
If there is one thing that I will say about The Winning Edge, it is that it does lean towards the pricier side. I often view the “average” price of a tipster service at around £30 – £50 per month. Bet Social and Marcus Williams are asking £44 per month for this. As such, it isn’t prohibitive at all, but it also isn’t the kind of thing that you’d necessarily have a punt on for fun.
If you want better value, there is a quarterly subscription to The Winning Edge which is £45 for your first 3 months. After this has elapsed, the cost goes up to £90 per quarter. The best value by a considerable margin though is signing up for 6 months. This will cost you a one time payment of just £93.
What is the Rate of Return?
Ok, let’s talk profit potential. First things first, all of the numbers that I’m talking about at the moment are BOG. That is very important to keep in mind. The overall profit here is 485 points at the time of writing. Over 16 months that is a very respectable monthly average of 30.31 points. The ROI is equally decent looking at almost 37%.
The thing is, these results are prone to stagnation in the short term. March closed on 395.5 points, May closed at 392.6 points. June closed at 374 points, July closed at just 380 points. And there are numerous examples of that happening. Ultimately, The Winning Edge keeps moving in the right direction. That is what you want to see, but it isn’t a constant or necessarily consistent.
As a final note, I want to talk about how The Winning Edge has performed if you’re not betting BOG. To BSP, Marcus Williams has managed to squeeze out a very small profit of 65.79 points. Over 16 months, that isn’t great. It also saw 9 losing months in this period. To industry start price, these fall even more. There is actually an 83.53 point loss. Furthermore, there have been just 5 profitable months out of 16.
Conclusion for The Winning Edge
I really don’t believe that The Winning Edge is a bad product. Ultimately the results speak for themselves. But there is a lot to be said for the fact that there may be points where you are going to sit around watching your betting bank slowly dwindle. When Marcus Williams isn’t ultimately making a profit, you’re still paying out £44 per month. Using £10 stakes, that would mean that several profitable months would actually be losses for you personally.
There is also a huge amount to be said for the fact that this is only really profitable to BOG. For a lot of people that will be a problem, and reasonably so. The fact is that simply the passage of a day creates a gap of 568 points for the worse. I’m being a little bit dramatic here, but if you’re following The Winning Edge, every minute is money out of your pocket.
That doesn’t mean that you’re looking at a bad service though. Far from it actually. I think that Bet Social are onto something with Marcus Williams. This isn’t something that has been proofed for a few months and put out off the back of a good run, The Winning Edge has been consistently solid for nearly a year and a half. I know that this seems a bit contrary to the drubbing I gave this before, but it is a fact.
Profits sustained over that period of time, with just 4 losing months (two of which were pretty negligible) isn’t easy to achieve. But that is exactly what Marcus Williams has done with The Winning Edge, but does it ultimately mean that it’s any good? Is this something that I would recommend? This isn’t the sort of question that really has an easy answer, because there is ultimately some nuance here.
In theory, The Winning Edge is a very good looking option. It ticks all of the boxes that I’d expect a service of this nature to tick. By this I mean those long term profits, honestly, pretty reasonable day to day results. Sure, there is a lot to be said for the fact that Marcus Williams sometimes stumbles, but the long term trend is upwards, and that is a win in my book. I’m a little less certain about the value for money, but I can even overlook that.
The real problem that I have with The Winning Edge is the fact that the results change so drastically. Consistency in results is all well and good, but if you can’t get them consistently, that simply isn’t an ideal situation. The fact is that for some people, this will be a reasonable and very viable option. But honestly, if you have any doubt about getting bets placed as soon as they land, or you have restrictions on an account, this is a definite no go.
