With organizing awards, there is hardly an event more exciting than announcing results and winners. It’s the moment your whole program has been building towards, so you have to do it right, or else, you risk ending your awards on a sour note, potentially even impacting the next edition. To make sure that doesn’t happen, we’ve prepared a guide to help you make the most out of this momentous occasion.
Timing is everything
Let’s start with the question of when. While the answer is simple enough — after the evaluation phase of your program — it’s not as straightforward as it seems. Here are a few things to consider regarding the timing of your results and the big reveal:
- Set aside enough time to verify the results — don’t fall into the trap of rushing to announce the results right after the judging concludes but rather, allow for enough time to double and triple-check that you have the right results and winners;
- Don’t keep your entrants waiting too long — that said, do not take too long either, meaning, you need to allow sufficient time to make sure your results are correct, but not too much so that your program loses momentum and anticipation turns into tedium;
- Create a buzz before the actual announcement — you can fill the necessary waiting time by creating a buzz about your results and winners announcement with social media posts, possibly a blog post dedicated to your program’s finalists or one with commentary on trends and insight gleaned from the entries.
Ways to announce results and winners
You have quite a few choices here, so let’s take a look at the most popular ways to announce results and winners:
- Awards ceremony — arguably, the most popular, and most glamorous way to announce winners and hand out physical trophies. Whether you would go with this type of winner announcement depends on your awards program’s concept and budget. While an impressive awards ceremony will ensure you go out with a bang, it is the most time and resource-consuming to organize;
- A special webpage for your results — regardless of whether you hold an awards ceremony, consider a dedicated webpage where you can announce results and showcase winning entries. It is online-friendly, fairly easy to set up (especially if you use an online award program management platform), and would remain available long after your awards ceremony has concluded;
- Email — while much less flashy than an awards ceremony or a website, well-crafted emails to all contestants are the most efficient way to ensure people know where they stand, regardless of whether they have won or not;
- Social media — consider the appropriate social media channels, based on your target audience, where you can announce the winners. You can also encourage them to reshare your posts so that you create extra buzz for your program;
- Blog post — dedicate a blog post to your winners. Depending on the scale of your competition, you can either name the winning entries or provide statistics about entries and winners, with the latter being a good option if you manage a large-scale competition with multiple categories and hundreds or thousands of entries;
- Press release — prepare a press release to send out to your partners, and consider reaching out to any industry-oriented or local media, depending on your awards program and target audience. Keeping your partners and media in the loop will expand the reach of your program and garner extra attention.
Naturally, you can go for just one of those or a combination, depending on the specifics of your program and target audience.
Crafting the right messages
When announcing your results and winners, don’t neglect the copy, as you need to send the right message to reinforce the positive impression of your program. Make sure that your messages to your program entrants have the right information and that you keep an upbeat yet respectful tone of voice.
- Message to winners — include congratulations as appropriate, what category they won in, which place, and what they have won; if you are sending out emails, you can also include information about the next steps in the case of a live ceremony, or if your winners need to order a trophy, claim digital seals, etc.;
- Message to non-winners — do not forget that you also need to inform those who did not win. Be respectful, include any relevant information about why they did not win (e.g., their entry did get enough points or votes), and encourage them to compete in the next edition of your program. You can also direct them to jury feedback about their entries, if available through your awards management software, for example.
If you are struggling with the right copy for your winner announcement, there are some handy AI tools out there that will make your awards program smarter.
Beware the pitfalls
While announcing results and winners is fairly straightforward, there are still things that can go wrong, putting your awards program’s reputation at risk. Let’s take a look at what could go wrong so that you can avoid it:
- Announcing the wrong results or winners — this is pretty much the biggest mistake you can make at this stage of your awards program. That’s why you need an absolutely reliable system to calculate the results, leaving no room for error and doubt;
- Making mistakes in the winners’ names — make sure you have the right spelling of your winners’ names, including any special characters, diacritics, or hyphens, otherwise, you risk leaving a bad impression;
- Failing to inform those who have lost — as noted above, don’t forget to include all your program’s participants in your communication, even those who didn’t make it to the winners’ list;
- Looking unprofessional — make sure that all your output related to results and winners looks professional, meaning, you should avoid things like sloppy emails or a badly-designed webpage for winners.
How Evalato helps you out
Evalato, which manages your whole awards management process from beginning to end, has multiple functionalities for this important stage of your program, including:
- Real-time view of voting progress and results — this will enable you to plan your announcement and pick just the right time to announce the results and winners;
- Tags to mark applications and label winners — this makes it even easier to stay on top of things when sorting results and winners and minimizes the potential for mistakes;
- Reliable results calculation after each round — you can trust Evalato to calculate the results, regardless of which of the software’s 6 voting types you decide to go with so that you can have peace of mind when announcing results and winners;
- Automated email communication that takes care of messages to everyone; Evalato’s emails are completely customizable so that you can craft them to perfection, sending just the right message to all your program’s entrants, winners or otherwise;
- A ready-made public applications page — regardless of your decision about trophies and ceremonies, Evalato has you covered with a professional-looking ready-made webpage where you can proudly showcase results and winners.
At the end of the day
Announcing winners and results will help you finish your awards program with a bang, which is why you need a reliable solution to handle it, along with the rest of your program. Evalato has what it takes to do the job and do it well. If you’re still on the fence about using awards management software for your program, though, you can test Evalato for free or book a demo and get all your questions answered.
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