How do incorporate a trailing stop profitably in my trading?

This is something I want to do and sometimes I succeed but most of the time i'm not confident enough to do it. I generally trade support and resistance, and my general rules are that I like to go for a 1:2 Risk/Reward trade setup, but I feel like having a trailing stop can maximize profits. The only thing with this though is knowing when to activate the trailing stop. I have drawn a diagram below to describe what I mean.



At the start of the trade you would have met your target of 20 pips with a risk of 10 pips, but due to activating the trailing stop I only got 10 pip profit from the trade. Would this seem like a reasonable thing to do?

reasonable many programer do this to ea with filosophy "better a little than got a nothing"

I prefer moving SL to break even, giving the trade room to grow. Typically I will do this when the profit is deep enough to warrant an adjustment. The trades I take are normally 30 pips risked for 100+ gained. Normally I move SL to BE after 30 to 50 pips.

That seems reasonable. Most of my trades do seem to be an equal risk to reward most of the time so that would probably be best.

You guys who are considering trailing stops or breakeven stops owe it to yourself to spend some time in this thread:
Expectancy Management

Spoiler:



you may end up rethinking trailing stops / breakeven stops in light of the evidence.