Awards are one of the few marketing investments where the cost is visible and the return is almost never measured. Companies enter dozens of programmes a year on the basis of an email from an organiser, and are then puzzled by the results.
Question one: who judges, and are they named
Credible programmes publish their judging panel, and the names are people whose opinion means something in the sector. Programmes that will not say who judges, or whose panel is drawn largely from the organiser’s own staff, are selling something other than recognition.
Question two: what is the relationship between entry and outcome
If every entrant receives a trophy, a table at the dinner or a “finalist” badge, the award is a purchase. A useful signal is the ratio of categories to entrants: a programme with a hundred and forty categories is optimising for volume.
Question three: would anyone you care about be impressed
This is the question that eliminates the most. A win only has value if it means something to a customer, an investor or a prospective employee. Recognition inside a programme none of them has heard of changes nothing except the footer of a presentation.
Then do the boring part properly
Once the shortlist of genuinely worthwhile programmes is set, submissions live or die on evidence. Judges score against published criteria, and most entries lose points not for weak work but for failing to supply the measurement the criteria ask for.
That measurement has to be planned at the start of the campaign. Reverse-engineering it in the week before a deadline is visible to anyone reading carefully.
Ganesh Sharma
