Winning business awards can reap rich rewards when it comes to bolstering brand awareness and the reputation of your business.

When we work with clients on their communications plans, we put some templates and workflows in place to optimise when these milestone events occur. It takes a lot of effort to apply for those noteworthy awards. Our advice is to make the most of them if you get shortlisted or, indeed, win one.

Top 8 tips to make the most of awards:

1. Be selective about which ones you apply for

Check which awards will reap the most rewards for you and will catch the eye of your prospective customer audience. We would suggest doing a little research based on your industry and your target audiences. (What would catch their eye, or what is taken seriously in your market).

2. Verify the authenticity of the awards organisers

You will have noticed that there are many business awards out there. Our advice is to check which awards organisers are genuine and pretty well recognised.

Many digital agencies, online magazines and others have created awards in order to help serve their agenda of brand awareness for them – so just check what the backing is to the awards. We would suggest looking awards that are serving the business community (like banks, accreditation organisations, professional associations) or your target customers.

Find out if you can talk to a previous entrant or winner to gauge what their experience was of how the awards worked or were organised.

3. Tidy up your online collateral

Take the time to look at all your online collateral before you enter the awards: look at it as if you were an outsider. Check your online presence matches what you say you do in your award application and there is enough credibility there to help the award organisers make a decision.

This way you ensure the best view of you as possible when applying.

4. Choose multiple categories

If you are able to, and if its applicable – look to try and apply for multiple categories in the awards process. This will help to increase your chances of being accepted into the awards, or even reaching a short list of businesses.

5. What are the benefits for entrants and/or winners?

A lot of work goes into applying for awards – so it’s important to check what the benefits are for entering the awards. We would suggest asking the organisers a few questions like:

• What PR efforts follow the winning of the award?
• What media is used to promote the awards beforehand and once the award winners are announced?
• Is there an awards evening – who pays for attending this?
• What are the prizes for the winners? (Other than: “we will promote your business”)

By getting the answers to these questions – they should give you an idea of whether or not you should take the time to enter.

6. Confirm all necessary dates

The worst thing that could happen is if you miss any important dates – so make sure you know when the following happens:

• last day (and time) for the award submission
• when the short-list comes out (so you can promote whether you are on it or not)
• when the winners are announced
• when the award ceremony takes place (if applicable)

7. Have a press release drafted

In the event that you do win, it would be a good idea to already have a press release drafted and ready to go to a planned list of media outlets.

Be sure to research that media list and include local and national journalists, and any other media which would find your win noteworthy.

8. Prepare client stories

Look at the categories which you have applied for and reflect on any client stories you could attach to those categories. There may be an editorial aspect you could use within a press release as well. Journalists love it if you can give them more than they need, or more story angles they can work with.

If you haven’t put a documented PR, media and communications plan together to help you achieve your objectives, talk to us – we’d love to see how we could help. Find out more about our PR and Media Planning service or our diagnostic strategy session.