With more and more top-quality submissions pouring in each year, how can you make yours stand out? At the ACE Awards HQ, we’ve put our heads together to help guide you. For all you hopefuls out there, here’s a round-up of our top tips for the best chance of writing a winning submission (and adding that trophy to your award cabinet!)
- Select your category
There are seven categories this year so you’ll need to focus your efforts wisely. If you’ve defined what winning the award will mean to your business, you’ll probably have an idea of which categories are right for you. In other words, what do you want to be recognized for?
- If you’re doing something with new technologies consider our Innovation category
- B2B organizations should definitely be entering the B2B category
- Is your program tightly aligned with corporate goals and helping to deliver against them? Business Impact is the one for you
- Digital Success is for organizations embracing web, mobile and app-based channels to collect data
- A safe bet in most cases is the Voice of the Customer category (unless you’re running an employee program – in which case it’s Employee Experience for you)
- Know an unsung hero? Nominate them for the Professional of the Year category. Entrants can also submit themselves.
Once you’ve narrowed this down, focus on the elements of your program that most suit the category so you can really show off your best bits! Remember: you can enter the same initiative into multiple categories – but it must be relevant to all of them. It’s worth tweaking the content to highlight the most appropriate information.
- Tell a story
The judges want to hear a complete story with a beginning, middle, and end. And don’t forget your plotline – a tale of what has improved. This means sharing your program’s good and bad chapters, as you work towards your goals.
- Is it quantifiable? Prove it!
You could tell a story to give Charles Dickens a run for his money, but without evidence, you may struggle to make it as a contender. The judges like numbers, especially financial metrics and revenue increases. Think about how you can use quantitative and qualitative measures to prove your claims for the ultimate validation.
- Supporting testimonials
There’s usually a whole bunch of stakeholders involved along the journey. We want them to tell us how your work is impacting the rest of the business. Which other teams are you sharing your insights with? How does this support them as they think of new ways to do things? This will help show the value you are delivering to the entire business. Customer testimonials are also a great indicator of engagement. So if you have a few friendly clients, ask if they’re willing to talk about their experience too.
Now you’re prepped to enter, what are you waiting for? Head over to the ACE Awards webpage to get started. Ready, set, go!