Industry Awards: 8 Reasons Why You Should Enter Industry Awards
Unsure about whether to enter your company into industry awards? Don’t be. Go for it because – whether you shine in product design, manufacturing, customer service, sustainability, training or employee development – there’s an award category with your name on it. And here are 8 good reasons why it makes perfect business sense to enter one or more industry awards.
1 Builds credibility
Industry awards offer you a chance to show off your work to potential clients and customers. Moreover, you don’t even have to win an award to promote your brand. Simply being nominated or short-listed can help to build trust and credibility and differentiate your business, products and services from your competitors’ offerings.
2 Greater lead generation and conversion
Businesses that regularly enter and win awards report a rise in sales and income versus those that don’t. According to some surveys, award-winning companies experienced a 37% rise in sales compared to their non-award-winning counterparts.
3 Gives you opportunity to network
Getting together with peers, clients, consultants and contractors gives you the chance to celebrate what’s great about your sector and your company. Winning or being nominated for an industry award will not only impress your current customers they are likely to want to share their positivity about your products and services. Specifically, it’s good PR for them to promote the fact that they’re working with an award-winning company.
Also, let’s not forget attending an industry awards ceremony is a great night out, with good company, entertainment and food.
4 It’s a chance to reward your team
Entering your company into industry awards gives you a chance to celebrate your teams’ impressive achievements, and reward individuals for their hard work, something that’s sure to boost morale and motivation.
Indeed, many awards have categories for personal and team achievements. For example, Elektra has ‘Design Team of the Year’ and ‘Rising Star of the Year’ categories.
5 Provides you with free marketing
Awards are an often-overlooked tool in the marketing toolbox. You can get a huge potential return on investment with just a little upfront investment in your time and energy. Many awards are free to enter, so being nominated for – and better still winning – an award gives you free publicity.
In the days following the award you could find yourself in the trade or local press, and you’ll also have plenty of eye-catching material to share on social media.
You can include your award -winning logos on your website too, and on marketing materials, for months and years to come. Winners of the Queen’s Awards for Enterprise for example, are entitled to use their winning logo for five years.
6 A chance to reflect
Simply taking the time to complete the application process provides you with benefits. It gives you a chance to examine your business objectively and compare yourself to competitors. By thinking about what it is that makes you stand out from the crowd, you’ll gain inspiration about how you could improve in certain areas.
7 Levels the playing field
By entering industry awards you can compete with larger companies on the same stage and go head-to-head with enterprise-level companies in the UK, Europe or even internationally. If your customer service or training and development programmes are better than theirs, why not shout this loud and clear?
SMEs should never fear going up against large corporations where awards are concerned.
8 Helps to attract new talent
Winning awards adds credibility to your company and puts you in high esteem when it comes to attracting new recruits and retaining existing employees. You may find you’re starting to receive more speculative applications. Who doesn’t want to work for an award-winning company?
Sold?
Entering awards should be a strategic part of your business promotional activities. You’ve nothing to lose (as mentioned, it’s mainly an investment of your time) but stand to win much; including new and repeat business. And the kudos of winning is just amazing.
