Entering business awards – everything you need to know

Entering business awards is good for business. You don’t even need to win the award; a nomination and shortlist is still good enough to have a positive impact on your brand. When a company gets nominated for an award, it’s like a lovely medal of honour. Sure, it’s a silver medal – and winning is gold – but it still makes your business look great. There’s more credibility to your brand, which will reflect well on how people look at you. If it comes to a straight shootout between choosing your business and a rival, consumers are likely to pick yours because you have the ward shortlist/victory.

With all this in mind, how do you enter business awards? Well, it all revolves around your submission, and here’s everything you need to know:

Find awards that are relevant

The first step in writing business award submissions is to find awards that are genuinely relevant to your business.

Find the awards that you think your business genuinely stands a chance of winning. If you only started in the last twelve months, look for awards that celebrate new businesses or small businesses. You’ll never win business awards if you keep entering ones that have absolutely no relevance to your enterprise.

Research the award

Research the awards you’re interested in, learning more about who the previous winners are, for instance. This helps you learn a thing or two about what the judges are looking for in submissions. Some awards will place a firm focus on ethics or sustainability, rather than actual business performance. Others will be all about revenue and figures, showcasing the best-performing companies or organisations.

Your research will give you insight into some of the key questions a judge will ask themselves when reading the awards entries. As a result, you can write your business award entry with the intention to answer all of these questions.

Write your entries with honesty

Now, understanding what a judge wants from a submission is one thing, but that doesn’t mean you have to bend the truth. Too many entries are poor and fail because the companies blur the truth to write something they think will appeal to judges.

This doesn’t work!

Awards judges aren’t stupid; they can see through lies very easily. The only way you should enter business awards is with honesty. Write about your backstory, focusing on all the main points that might make you unique. At no point should you taint your story with things that didn’t happen. Be honest at all times to maintain your integrity and have a better chance of being shortlisted.

Give yourself plenty of time

Don’t make the mistake of entering business awards a few days before the award submissions deadline. This puts you on the back foot and means you have to rush your entry.

Instead, give yourself plenty of time to submit your entry. This includes leaving time for you to proofread everything and write multiple drafts. Or ask professional proofreaders to proof your entry for you.

Most business awards entries have to be submitted online via a portal. Be sure you check your business award entries in Word or Google Docs before you upload them. It helps you feel 100% confident that your entry is written correctly and gets the right message across.

Ask professional business award writers to help

Finally, if you really want to enter business awards and walk away with wins, you need to sound professional. How can you do this? By hiring professional award writers! The team at Award Writers can help you create the best submissions for the best results. Get in touch with us today to see how we can be of assistance.