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7 Ways to Leverage Awards to Build Thought Leadership

7 Ways to Leverage Awards to Build Thought Leadership

Winning awards is an accomplishment for your business and a valuable tool to improve and build meaningful awareness for your brand. Sometimes it isn’t even winning that can have the most impact; many are so well-respected that nominations or finalists are just as noticeable.

The important thing to remember about awards is that you, your business, and your brand ultimately control how much and how long awards create an impact. Whether your brand is the winner, a finalist, or a nominee, awards help establish credibility, build trust, and enhance reputation.

How do you make the most of awards? Here are seven ways to leverage awards to improve your brand.

Spread the Word: Share Your Award

Once you win an award, share the news through your social media channels, email newsletter, and website. You want to ensure this information is one of the first things your audience sees when visiting your platforms. Getting the news out is the first step toward establishing brand recognition, especially regarding the award. If people visit your page after seeing a list of winners, they must see the same information highlighted almost immediately to avoid confusion and establish your credibility.  

Get Published: Pitch Your Story to the Media

This goes along with sharing the news, but we’re thinking beyond internal efforts now. Create a media kit or press release highlighting the award and the significance of the recognition. Reach out to relevant journalists and publications in your industry, and offer them an exclusive story or interview. Your visibility will improve and position you as an industry thought leader.

 

Learn How to Become the Go-To Expert in Your Industry

 

Show It Off: Use Your Award Logo on Marketing Materials

Winning an award usually comes with a badge or logo that can be used on marketing materials, websites, and social media channels. Display the logo on your website and marketing materials prominently. Consider adding it to company email signatures or as a highlight in business bios for senior leadership and pitch decks. This will help to attract more customers and establish your brand as a leader in your field.

Amplify: Leverage Social Media to Promote Your Award

Social media is the best platform to promote your brand and leverage awards. On your social channels, you are telling the story. Create a dedicated post or a series to celebrate and share it with your followers. Be sure to focus on the people within your business and your customers who helped make earning an award possible. The content created in this space will have a significant impact, as this will be a landing spot for anyone discovering your business because of your connection to the award. Be authentic, tell a story, and highlight your brand as a leader in your industry.

Create Great Content: Develop High-Quality Content to Showcase Your Brand

This goes hand-in-hand with posting on social media. Whether about the award or other planned content, you want to be sure your posts include high-quality content — that you're not simply posting to post. Now is the time to create award-winning content and showcase who your brand is. Leverage the recognition as inspiration to create high-quality, engaging content that will resonate with your audience. This could be a blog post, video, podcast, or infographic highlighting your brand’s expertise and unique value proposition.

If you’re struggling to determine what that content should be, think about what helps establish your brand as a thought leader, what questions are being asked about your industry, and why people need your product or service. Build content that answers those questions.

Collaborate With Winners: Build Relationships With Other Award-Winning Brands

Partnering with other award winners is an effective way to create more awareness for your brand. As you are working to develop content or new offerings, identify other brands that have won similar awards and brainstorm potential partnership opportunities. This will help you expand your network, share best practices, and attract more customers.

Target Your Audience: Use Social Media Ads to Reach Your Ideal Customers

Recognition from awards is great content to use to target your specific audience. A simple and effective way to leverage award content for targeted ads is to share the announcement article and build a targeted campaign. Targeted ads with this content can help expand brand awareness and credibility in front of consumers.

Recognition and awards take time to achieve. So your brand’s name and accomplishments shouldn’t be as fleeting as a brief Facebook announcement. Share the news, tell your brand story, and allow your achievements to have a lasting impact.

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Picture of Mike Szczesny

About Mike Szczesny

Mike Szczesny is the owner and vice president of EDCO Awards & Specialties, a dedicated supplier of employee recognition awards, athletic awards and other branded merchandise. Szczesny takes pride in EDCO's ability to help companies go the extra mile in expressing gratitude and appreciation to their employees. He resides in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

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