Are Children’s Book Awards Really Worth It?

WHAT EXACTLY IS A BOOK AWARD?

If you’ve never heard of book awards and contests before, here’s a short summary of what they usually are:

Book awards have a panel of judges select a number of winners out of all submitted works for each of the offered categories. Some of these also award prizes, such as media coverage or monetary prizes. Panels usually create their own criteria on which to judge all books on.

There are hundreds of different book awards out there, each with their own submission guidelines, requirements, and deadlines. And most select their winners once a year. 

WHAT’S THE PURPOSE OF SUCH BOOK AWARDS?

Now, when it comes to the purpose of book awards and contests, that’s where opinions often begin to differ from person to person. But despite what many book award websites claim, here are some things they WON’T do for you, at least in my experience and personal opinion:

1. They most likely will NOT increase your book sales.

2. They will NOT capture the attention of traditional publishing houses.

3. They will NOT make you known throughout the author world.

So, while such a win could potentially give you a temporary spike in sales, that’s usually mostly due to you sharing your win with your friends and family on social media and the like. 

So if it doesn’t increase our book sales, why then should or might we still consider submitting our beautiful work anyways?

ADVANTAGES THAT BOOK AWARDS MAY PROVIDE

Here, the answer really depends on what YOU want to get out of this for yourself and your book. What are your major reasons for entering your book into such an award? Here are some things winning such a contest or being awarded a certain title or status WILL DO for you (and the reasons why I enter certain books of mine):

• Depending on the award you choose to enter, it gives your book a certain level of credibility. 
• Showcasing such a win sets you apart from others.
• Recognition and validation. 

For better or worse, people love social proof. Winning such an award validates your work by an unbiased outside source, letting others know that it isn’t just you who thinks your book has the potential to rock little ones’ world. 

Please note that I wrote certain books above. While I’ve written a great number of children’s books, I enter only a select few into awards and contests. That doesn’t mean I don’t love and believe in my other books. Just like everyone else, however, I have a set budget set aside for things like this that I try to stick to. 

HOW TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT CHILDREN’S BOOK AWARD

In my book How To Self-Publish A Children’s Book, I worked my way through the entire interwebs and put together a list of awards and contests specifically for children’s books. 

While this greatly narrows down your choices, how should you decide what award(s) to choose? 

Because there are quite a few awards out there, here are a number of questions I ask myself before entering any book award:

1. What audience does the award site cater to? Here, it is important to mention that most of these contest and award sites are being visited and frequented only or mostly by other authors. The best and most beneficial ones, however, are being used as a source of pulling relevant and reputable books for OTHER sites. Just like we viewers look to the Oscars and Grammy Awards to see what movies or songs are worth watching or listening to, so too should the award function for our book. The Mom’s Choice Awards audience, for example, isn’t just other authors, but thousands of mom bloggers and sites that are looking to feature the best, newest, and already vetted items in a number of different categories. 

2. Does this award offer a children’s book category? Many of such award and contest sites actually do not offer a children’s book category. If that’s the case, submitting our work here wouldn’t be a good use of our time and resources. 

3. What other books have previously participated and have been given this award? This is a great criteria to pay attention to. Here, we want to look for professional looking work of others, because we are what we associate ourselves with. 

4. Who is this award associated with or sponsored by? Being able to point to a great sponsor that is backing an award is always a fantastic plus and credibility booster. The IRDA Award, for example, is being sponsored by giants such as AMAZON, Ingram Spark, and Kirkus Reviews, and had it’s winners for 2018 announced at the BookCon in New York City, which I was so very lucky to attend as a recipient.

5. How reputable is this book award? Does the award’s title speak to me? Besides its own website, who else mentions this award? Are there other sites that cover it? Is it mentioned on any other credible lists of awards?

As long as you’re clear on your goals, and why you’re entering these awards, you should now have some helpful guidelines that you can base your decisions on when it comes to choosing what awards and contests to enter.

WHERE TO DISPLAY YOUR BEAUTIFUL WIN

Now, what are some great places to display your amazing win? As an award-winning children’s book author you’ll want to make sure to display it proudly! Here are just a few ideas on how to leverage your beautiful win:

1. Add it to your Amazon author profile

2. Weave it into your book description

3. Add it to your ABOUT page on your website, if you have one

4. Include or mention it wherever you share your author bio. This could include your LinkedIn profile, Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, etc. 

You’ve worked so very hard, so be sure to also toot your well-deserving horn on your regular social media platforms by sharing your beautiful news about your win. Your friends and family love and support you, so be sure to share these amazing news with them.

SPECIFICS: MY REASONS FOR HAVING ENTERED THIS PARTICULAR AWARD

Now with all this being said, I wanted to end by sharing my own personal reasons for having entered this particular award. 

1. I love challenging myself and am always trying to better my craft. And Mom’s Choice Awards is a tough nut to crack. I know many authors that have submitted their work to this particular award, but didn’t get this coveted golden seal of excellence. I really wanted to see if I could do it. 

2. Mom’s Choice Awards has a great audience: moms. It’s not just other authors, like most other book awards. If you’ve gone through my Age Range Perfect Masterclass, you know that children’s book authors have to appeal to multiple key-audiences in order to be successful, with moms being one of them. So this particular award seemed like a fantastic fit.  

3. Because it doesn’t get awarded often, it truly sets my book(s) apart from others, which ultimately helps me with my biggest goal that I set for myself with parts of the proceeds of this particular book series: to help build schools and increase educational opportunities for little ones in the developing world. And I believe that with this award, I’ll be able to position my series in such a way that helps me further this cause.

It is my hope that I was able to answer most of your questions when it comes to whether or not entering these awards and contests is worth it. In the end, this is a question only you can answer, based on your personal goals for yourself and your book.

I will spend the rest of the day celebrating this beautiful win with my family. Because celebrating our milestones, my sweet friend, is just as important as (1) working towards them and (2) accomplishing them. Because if we don’t take the time to truly celebrate what we’ve accomplished thus far, we may just miss the beauty of this amazing journey!

xo

~ Eevi