When you run and own a company whose primary business is awards then you’re going to have a natural affinity to the sector, but before you stop reading bear with me as this piece is designed to challenge, reaffirm, or simply provide some key insight into why awards matter in the B2B space in 2026.
It is worth noting the media industry – unlike many other sectors when it comes to awards – take legitimate programmes seriously and understand the value they can bring to a business.
Recent forays into creating programmes for the esports and women’s football sector have only reaffirmed this. Both of these sectors were shocked when we implemented our judging process and discovered there were real jurors going through real information and awarding real winners based on the standard of the work/entries they had submitted, rather than on how many tables, or how much sponsorship they have paid to be part of the programme. The jurors soon realised they were effectively setting the benchmarks for their sector and could decide the winners based on the work with no outside interference, or pressure.
One of the biggest problems is there are a lot of awards programmes that operate in this way – thankfully not too many in the media sector that are just looking for a quick financial win and no real attempt at longevity, no real judging process, which brings into question their legitimacy – across various verticals and it taints the legitimate players in the awards business. One of the most common comments I often have cited back at me when I explain what our business does to people outside of the industry – including friends in different sectors – is the trophies are only handed to those companies who have spent the most on sponsorship, or bought the most seats to the ceremony.
It’s a constant battle and one that always rankles me. Thankfully – despite some snobbery and cynicism, usually from those that never enter, or just like to permanently sneer – on the whole the media industry embraces the role of awards and the impact it can have on their business. Long gone are the days when it was simply about beating your rival agency or client to the trophy – although there is still a lit bit of competition left, thank goodness – but now the role of awards has many important facets for any business who enters.
Before we look at the reasons for entering it’s important to ensure a potential enterer chooses the right awards programme to submit into. In my experience the best ones are those that have a thorough judging process – jurors associated with an entering company are not allowed to adjudicate or talk about their entries – and results are always recorded and transparent if questioned. The other key piece is always choose those programmes where most of the jurors are the clients of that industry, or the people the entrants need to get their business and work in front of. Potential entrants also need to look at the categories and decide whether these provide the right platform to showcase their company’s work, and they’re worth winning. Once you have sorted this then it’s time to take into consideration these other key reasons:
New Business
There is an opportunity to drive new business and showcase effective and creative solutions. You don’t have to win a trophy, or even be shortlisted to take advantage of having your work and business showcased to clients. The entering company can use their submissions as a valuable piece of content, more on that later… In today’s current climate, from holdcos and indies to media owners and adtech companies, they are constantly looking for new business and entering awards is a very cost effective way – much cheaper than a successful paid for social media campaign for example – to reach an engaged audience who look after media budgets and most importantly are looking for new ideas and inspirations for their own campaigns.
Retaining and attracting new talent
Whenever anyone is looking to buy a new product or service, watch a movie or boxset they tend to look at its rating, or the accolades it has won. The same can be said about employees choosing organisations to work for. If the said company has been winning awards there is a certain allure about joining an organisation who is deemed the best in class, or who is delivering fantastic work that is deemed good enough to be showcased to clients. Equally if current employees see their work being recognised by clients and peers it tends to provide another reason for them to stay and be part of the success.
Generating greater productivity and increasing internal company culture
From childhood to adulthood most people enjoy being praised or recognised for the work they are producing, so if a colleague or boss deems work to be worthy of being entered into an awards programme adjudicated by senior clients and peers then the curator feels good and this positive feeling quickly spreads throughout the business and the levels of productivity also increase and helps drive positive company culture.
Setting benchmarks
Any work that is shortlisted from the first round of judging has helped set industry benchmarks for what good and potentially great – for the work that wins – looks like and helps clients and agencies aspire to these levels now and going forwards. What companies don’t want to be seen as setting the benchmarks for the sector?
Driving greater client spend
There is now doubt a winning client is a happy client and more often than not after an award win the client is given a bigger budget and remit for the next iteration of its campaigns, which then flows into the agencies’ P&Ls, which makes great business sense.
Amplifying business around the world
Just entering into a revered awards programme, nevermind being shortlisted, or winning a trophy allows a business to build a narrative around the strategies, insights and results they are delivering for clients. It is a great opportunity to develop content and amplify what the business is doing in the industry and can be used as a great calling card for current and potential new clients.
As media businesses around the look for that competitive edge awards certainly provide an opportunity to gain it in a cost effective manner.
