Episode 105: Are Book Awards Worth It?
The publishing industry is flooded with book awards. But are they worth your time?
We'll dive into the world of book awards, discuss our personal strategies and help you decide how to proceed with your own projects.
Episode Resources
Blogs with links to book award programs:
32 Book Awards You Should Know About (Trad & Self-Pub!)
BookBrowse - Major Book Awards
Reedsy: Best Novel Writing Contests in 2024
Alliance of Independent Authors:
Beyond the Gold Seal: Leveraging Book Awards for Indie Author Marketing
Other Resources Mentioned
Charlotte Dune’s Lagoon - on Substack (referenced during our intro where we talk about newsletter frequency)
Writer Support Group (that Lainey and Charlotte co-host)
Books Mentioned
Hadley Leggett’s new novel, referenced as an example of a great book that won a pre-publication award (the WFWA Rising Star in 2021) - and is published now!
Hadley’s novel - All They Ask is Everything
Full Disclosure: We are part of the Amazon affiliate program, which means Lainey earns a tiny commission (maybe enough for a coffeeif you buy something after clicking through from a link on this website.
Episode Sponsor:
Lilian Sue, author of The Powerful Publicity Prescription, and owner of In Retrospect Writing Services.
The Powerful Publicity Prescription, Lilian’s debut nonfiction PR book focuses on:
Uncovering the intriguing history of PR and demystifying some of the most popular PR myths
How to identify and overcome fear, anxiety, imposter syndrome and more limiting beliefs to build a strong PR mindset
How to unlock the superpower behind your story with confidence
Crafting irresistible story pitches and developing powerful relationships to get your books in front of the right audiences with step-by-step guidance.
As a PR coach and publicist, Lilian empowers authors and creative entrepreneurs to gain the confidence to unlock the superpowers behind their stories, to push past limiting beliefs and learn the tools, resources and knowledge to launch successful PR campaigns to increase sales and achieve their goals of becoming experts. Through 1:1 coaching, she gives authors the personalized support, guidance, clarity and tailored resources they need to harness PR to get their books in front of the right readers.
Learn about The Powerful Publicity Prescription
How Lilian can help authors: Lilian’s services
Connect with her on Instagram
Episode Resources
Webinar: Pros and Cons of Hiring a Publicist - Lilian Sue and Lainey Cameron answer your questions about the pros and cons of hiring a publicist
12 Weeks to Book Launch Success - Lainey’s program to help authors successfully launch their book
Note: next sections are mostly created by AI for your convenience - so please forgive any typos or inaccuracies!
Summary
Lainey Cameron and Paulette Stout discuss the value of book awards in the publishing industry. They note that there are hundreds of awards, many of which require entry fees and may not offer significant awareness value.
Lainey and Paulette share their personal experiences with awards, highlighting the benefits such as social validation, platform building, and potential sales boosts. They also caution about the costs, including entry fees and shipping, and the lack of transparency in the judging process.
Tips for applying include checking the application window, ensuring category fit, and being aware of potential rights issues. They emphasize the importance of using awards strategically and not overinvesting in them.
They emphasize the importance of strategic application and not taking rejections personally.
Newsletter Frequency and Author Updates
Paulette shares a tip about reviewing newsletter data to determine the best frequency for sending out newsletters.
Lainey mentions a future episode topic on newsletters, inspired by her experience at the Women's Fiction Writer's conference.
Types of Book Awards
Lainey and Paulette discuss different types of Book Awards, including literary, genre-specific, and unpublished novel awards.
They provide examples of specific awards, such as the Women's Fiction Writers Star Award and the Rising Star Award for unpublished novels.
Paulette shares an example of a book, "All They Ask Is Everything," that won the Rising Star Award and helped its author get an agent.
They highlight the importance of looking at the specific criteria and benefits of each award.
Lainey and Paulette's Approach to Book Awards
Paulette explains her strategy of applying for Book Awards as part of her marketing strategy to gain legitimacy and social validation.
She shares her success with winning 17 awards across three novels, including the National Indie Excellence Award.
Lainey discusses her approach, emphasizing the importance of social proof and using awards to build credibility.
They both agree that Book Awards are a marketing tool and should be used strategically.
Benefits of Book Awards
Lainey and Paulette discuss the benefits of Book Awards, including social validation, platform building, and morale boost.
They mention specific benefits like presence at book fairs, free classes, and award ceremonies.
Paulette shares her experience with the Book Excellence Award, noting their aggressive marketing tactics.
They emphasize the importance of using awards to promote oneself and one's book.
Disadvantages of Book Awards
Lainey and Paulette discuss the disadvantages of Book Awards, including the cost, tracking and coordination, and potential lack of transparency.
They mention the high cost of entry fees, shipping physical books, and the potential for high-pressure sales tactics.
Paulette shares her experience with digital seals and the high cost of obtaining them.
They warn authors about the potential for losing rights to their books if they are not careful with the terms and conditions of the awards.
Tips for Applying to Book Awards
Lainey and Paulette provide tips for applying to Book Awards, including checking the application window, quality of past winners, and category fit.
They advise authors to prioritize awards based on cost, category fit, and the need for physical copies.
Paulette suggests making a list of potential awards and prioritizing them based on these factors.
They emphasize the importance of not taking the process too seriously and letting go of the outcome.
Conclusion and Resources
Lainey and Paulette wrap up the discussion, encouraging authors to check their website for more resources on Book Awards.
They mention their sponsor, Lillian Sue, and her book, "The Powerful Publicity Prescription," which provides valuable insights on PR.
They thank their listeners for joining and invite them to check out the episode page for additional information.
The episode ends with a reminder to apply for Book Awards thoughtfully and strategically.
Transcript
Lainey Cameron 0:01
Hi, this is Lainey Cameron.
Paulette Stout 0:04
This is Paulette Stout.
Lainey Cameron 0:07
And we are here for the Best of Book Marketing Podcast. And if you were watching us live, you might notice that we are about four minutes late starting. And I put it down to What date is it today? Paulette?
Paulette Stout 0:20
It is Friday the 13th.
Lainey Cameron 0:23
We are recording this on Friday the 13th, and nothing has gone wrong, except for the fact that I left my podcast mic at home. I'm at the co working center. Then I discovered that my earbuds are missing. My earbuds in the case. What else? Paulette? It's just been a weird day, right?
Paulette Stout 0:38
At least you have a case, like my earbuds, like, must be hiding somewhere. I have no idea. You know, my forehead is, like, ridiculously shiny, like, it's just been a day. Y'all, it's just been a day.
Lainey Cameron 0:51
And this is a ridiculous, you know, this is a very professional operation, I swear. No, we're just, you know what? We're authors, trying to help other authors. And sometimes we get it 100% right, and sometimes we don't. So we are here, but we have a great episode prepared for you. We are going to talk all about Book Awards. And as you know, the publishing industry is flooded with Book Awards. If you go Google, you know Book Awards, there are just hundreds of them out there. In fact, I give a list to my class where I think it's got 100 plus awards on it that you could potentially apply for or be submitted for, but the big question is, these cost money. A lot of them. Are they worth your time? Are they worth your money? So this whole episode, we're going to dive into the world of Book Awards, discuss our personal strategies, Paulette and myself, and help you decide kind of what are the pros the cons? Is it worth it to do Book Awards. That's our goal for the episode. Anything to add Paulette?
Paulette Stout 1:44
No. Big Fat covers beyond our daily tragedies today, yes, yes, for sure. So...
Lainey Cameron 1:53
Jump in. Let's do a personal update.
Paulette Stout 1:56
Personal update, yes. So personal updates, I am deep, deep into edits in my next novel. What we give away? I just, I'm like, 98% there on the cover, and it is phenomenal. So thank you to my amazing cover designer, Reena violet. So that's out in February, but it's going to the editor in a couple weeks, and I just sent it off to another sensitivity reader expert who has experience in, you know, commercial kitchens and restaurant kitchens and things, because my, my main character's a chef, so want to get those details right. Don't want any eye rolls, either. Reader, eye rolls. Um, so that's going on. I'm starting to think, you know, do some book club research, some influencer outreach and all that kind of stuff, um. And I just wanted to, outside of that, wanted to give one little quick tip of things, because I, you know, obviously I get lots of awesome newsletters too. I think we all do. We sign up, we support each other, and I see a lot of people sending out weekly newsletters. So I just wanted to you know, if that I would encourage people look at your data, see if it's responding, if your people are engaging, and if it feels good, stay with that frequency. If not, you might want to dial it back, because I know there's very few newsletters I want to get every week, so you might be making some extra work for yourself. So that was just like a little bit of a thought. Bit of a thought I had as I've been seeing, you know, my newsletters come in, um, weekly, all of a sudden seems to be very popular.
Lainey Cameron 3:29
And what a great, uh, topic for a future episode. I think we're gonna have to do one on newsletters, because I was at the Women's Fiction Writer's conference last week, and I was telling people, you know, your newsletter is your best marketing tactic. Of all the things that you could do your newsletter is the one, but yeah, weekly, I kind of, I get really annoyed if people send things, you know, even more frequent than weekly. But it also depends on the type of content to me, like, if it's more of a like, I'll give you an example, Charlotte June, who co hosts the writer support group with me. She does Charlotte June's lagoon, and she's writing things that are very topical. So for example, she just did one all about the debate, and she released it the day after the debate. It's hysterical. I'll put the link in the show notes, because it's really funny. And it was like, the four things that she thinks we should ask for, and one is, like, the eradication of all mosquitoes. I was like, Yeah, I'm done with that plan. Like, what should the politicians really be working on? Is very tongue in cheek, but she sometimes does more than once a week, but they're incredibly topical, and they're more like essays, and they're on subs Yeah, they're on sub stack. And I think a sub stack, which is more like a blog format, can support more frequently than once a week, or even once a week, but most author newsletters don't need to come once a week. They can come once every two weeks, once a month. I completely agree, right?
Paulette Stout 4:40
And I think that it just, it's all about the data. Look at what, what you're seeing. If you're saying that not a lot of people are opening or clicking or not as many as you'd like, you can reassess, is this working for me? And it's all about what works for you. So I don't ever tune into the show. We will not ever tell you the way. There isn't 1z way for anything. But in terms of. Letter frequency, you know, just kind of do it for a while, and then, if that's what's working. So Lainey, our updates too.
Lainey Cameron 5:06
Yeah, and Gail priest has joined us live on the YouTube channel, and Gail agrees. She doesn't want to receive newsletters every single week either, right? We're all together on this one. So yeah, I can. Okay, so my update, personal updates, so last you saw me, I was in Copenhagen. I had some guitars on the wall behind me. I was in this really cool apartment at Copenhagen, and I continued my trip through Scandinavia. It was wonderful. All of August, we kind of trained across multiple locations, Stockholm and then Bergen. It was wonderful. And I got to keep writing as I went, which was really nice. I was really happy with that. Got like another 10,000 words through of the revisions of the version I'm working on. And then last week, I got to go really fun to the wfw a retreat in Albuquerque, and I was teaching, I taught a book marketing, book Book Marketing Boot Camp for three hours, and we dug down on kind of how to find your target reader. And then we dug down on like seven different ways to talk about your book that are not living with plot, which was really fun. And so I really enjoyed that I had a really funny moment. I'm just going to tell you a funny story here when you get a little too into your author life, where I got towards the airport on the day that I was flying to Albuquerque, and I looked at my boarding pass and it had my pen name, not my legal name, on the boarding pass. And they went, oh, shoot, I'm not going to be allowed on the plane. And so I had to go to the people at Southwest and beg them to fix the name on the ticket, and they couldn't quite get it right. So my boarding pass kind of said Lainey Cameron on the top, and my legal name underneath. Lenny Cameron is my pen name, but authors with a pen name, make sure that when you're booking plane tickets, your auto fail on your browser is turned off. Because I didn't notice until I was on my way to the airport, and that was a little bit of a meltdown moment. And it wasn't even Friday, the 13th that day, so just telling a funny story of like things to avoid, and I did make the decision. I'll wrap up my personal update here by saying I made the decision that I'm not going to run my 12 weeks to book launch success class, probably until the new year. I was debating last year, last last month. But the reality is, my life is a little too crazy. I'm packing my mom. I'm moving her down to San Miguel. I'd like to prioritize keeping my own writing going so I can hopefully finish this draft before the end of the year. So I've decided to prioritize that. I'm doing a little one on one consulting, just a very, very tiny amount. So if that's if you need help for the end of the year, I can still help you, but I'm not going to be running the 12 weeks program until probably early and 25 Same as always, get on the wait list if you might be interested. I'll let you know as soon as I open it back up. So with that, go ahead.
Paulette Stout 7:38
I just want to point because, like, lady was horrified, and she posted to social media, what's wrong with my boarding pass? And I saw it at my heart drop for you. I was like, Oh no. But look, a lot of people knew, like they looked at it. They're like, Oh my god, wrong name. So I'm so glad I kept waiting to see the return trip. If you got it looks like you got home.
Lainey Cameron 8:01
Yeah, but I was worried I gave it like a full extra two hours at the airport, in case it was a bit of a meltdown. And the people at Southwest were lovely, but I felt like such an idiot trying to explain why I had the complet wrong name on my boarding pass.
Paulette Stout 8:12
I guess you have to carry a book around with you right here. Really, really, I have an author, I swear.
Lainey Cameron 8:17
Yeah. Do you think it would work with TSA? Here's my book. That's why my boarding pass is wrong. Yeah. So there you go, lessons and errors to avoid. So it was pretty classic.
Lainey Cameron 8:29
Okay, so let's get into Book Awards, because we've got so much good, meaty stuff to go through here, and we do, I think we're thinking we might start with like, types of Book Awards, because there are, like I said, there are hundreds of different Book Awards, but there's kind of fundamentally some different types out there. I mean, we could talk about some of those different types to give people an idea, because everybody has different concepts, and if you've not been through this, you may not even know what we mean by these different Book Awards. So do you want to lead off with this piece?
Paulette Stout 8:57
Sure, absolutely. So let me just go through a few of the different categories. So obviously, there's literary Book Awards which, and these tend to have fewer categories, you know, fiction, nonfiction, you know, poetry or something. And they just, they're a little they're more technically, more prestigious. You probably have heard of them. You know, Pulitzer national book or, you know, things like that, that. And most of these are only eligible for traditionally published authors with a poster, you can apply as a self published author, and y'all I did so when I win, you know, you can say you knew me when, right? So that's kind of what the next one are like, kind of deeper awards that have multiple categories within, you know, different genres, and you know that a lot of them are, you know, they're, they're money, they're businesses, they're, they do help authors, but they also in are in business of awards and making money in that way.
And it doesn't mean that just because they make money from it, that this necessarily bad. It won't. We'll go through that later on. Um, there's also genre specific award. So you, you know, the Hugo, you have the killer. You know, there's different genres for nonfiction and fiction and horror and children's and things. So, you know, some Book Awards really narrow down the types of of literature that they are, um, reviewing. So those are two. Do you want to pop in with some more of the categories Lainey?
Lainey Cameron 10:18
Sure, so then you've got, so in addition to the genre specific so for example, under genre specific WFWA , women's fiction writers has one called the Star Award for published women's fiction authors, and it has a debut category and another category, a general category, and like, you have to be women's fiction, and they have to deem your book to be women's fiction. And often those member those membership organizations have an advantage to being a member, or some of them are even only open to members, is one of the things that you see. So in that case, I think, I think that example, it's like, it's open first to members and later, but a lot of them, like, there's some membership criteria around them. Geography specific. I've seen a number of people win the royal pamphlet tree Awards, which is in Florida. There's also some state specific ones. There's some literary ones that are specific to geographies that you have to live in that geography, and so that's something that's worth looking at. Like the Georgia author of the Year awards is specific to the state of Georgia, not the country. But yeah, and if you live outside the US, there are many country specific ones, right? There's a whole separate set in the UK that you may have to live in the UK in order to qualify for. So it's really worth looking at those, because some of those have some nice ability to get you out to their membership locally, if they have, like, a conference or something. And then unpublished novels is another one that's pretty cool. So we don't always think of this, but just because you haven't finished writing your book doesn't mean that you couldn't put it in for an award. Or just because it isn't published yet doesn't mean you couldn't put it in for an award. So for example, another one from women's fiction writers is an award called the rising star, which is for books that are not yet published. I actually was a finalist in the rising star myself, and I just saw a book. It can be a great way to get an agent doing an unpublished award, right? If you're not, if you're in that kind of almost their stage. So for example, with the WF wa one, I think they used to record the first 35 pages, it might be slightly less Exactly hold that book up.
Paulette Stout 12:13
So I was sorry. Couldn't help myself.
Lainey Cameron 12:17
So Paulette is holding up a book. Hold it up called, All They Ask is Everything by Hadley Leggett. And Hadley won the Rising Star when this was an unpublished book, and that's a great example of, I believe,inning the Rising Star helped her in her search for an agent. She then got an agent. She then got published by Lake Union. And that book just came out, and Paulette and I both read it, and it's absolutely fabulous. It's all about motherhood. Fabulous. It's all about motherhood, three different people trying to do the right thing for two little girls who are up in the in the adoption, kind of foster care system or the foster care system. It's a beautiful example of pitting characters against each other while showing the good in every every character. Really fabulous book and such a great fun read. So they go show me, show me one more time. Collette singing.
Paulette Stout 13:02
All they ask is everything, yeah, and it was really, um, it's like a, it's a great coverage, turquoise and yellow writing. It's got a picture of a glass of milk that is shattered and spilling. So it's a, it's a great metaphor for, you know, motherhood of all different kinds, and people who even don't have children, who still care about children. So it's a really beautiful story, and you know, all the attention it's getting is well deserved. So definitely check that out if you are in the market for a new book.
Lainey Cameron 13:28
So there you go, great example of an unpublished award, how your career and now the book is published. And then last things we had is kind of audio awards. There are kind of FORMAT SPECIFIC awards for audiobooks, like the Audis, Audis, Audis, however, you say are probably the best example of that, A, u, d, I, E, S, Audi Audi Audis, I guess that one anyway. So those are some examples of the types of categories, and we're going to talk about the pros and cons as we go into this. But first, let us share a little bit of what Paulette and I did, and then we'll kind of dig into, like, why you might want to apply. So Paulette, do you want to go first and talking about kind of how you approached awards?
Paulette Stout 14:06
Yeah, sure. I mean, I think that, as a self published author, you're always looking for legitimacy. You're trying to make sure people know that your books are quality. And I look to awards as a kind of a strategic layer to my marketing strategy. I use awards intentionally. I apply for a lot of awards. And I wanted, you know, the social validation, and you know, you win them, and then you're an award winning author, and that can, you know, you know, spiral more. So I intentionally apply for a lot. So so far across my three novels, I've won 17 awards, summer wins and summer finals, and all of those are for writing primarily in women's fiction category. I have won a few romance multiple cultural romance category. Reason one cover design category. So those are them. And I think my national indie Excellence Award win for women's fiction, I think I'm pretty proud of that one, when thinking of which ones are proud that one means a lot to me. And I think that in that one, definitely, when I posted that on social media, got a lot of you know, you go girls and stuff, because I know we're all we're all vying for the same category. So that one meant a lot. How about you?
Lainey Cameron 15:27
Was that last year? Was that 23 that was this year, 2424 so I was just looking at my list, because I also won it in the women's fiction category, the exact same award, the National indie excellence in 21 so two years before
Paulette Stout 15:38
That? Yes. So three years. So because you won 21-24
Lainey Cameron 15:43
Yeah, sorry, I can't count.
Paulette Stout 15:46
It is Friday, the 13th.
Lainey Cameron 15:49
So, yeah, very similar for me. So I've only got the one book in the world. In the world, it's called the exit strategy. It came out in 2020 and I think I applied for like, 16 or 17 awards as the book came out, thinking that I was new at this, okay, thinking that I might win two and it would be really nice to say that the book won two awards, and the thing won 15 Awards, which just blew my mind. I don't I can't even explain it. Obviously, it's not a garbage book, but I was really proud of that book. It did win. Go on to win 15 awards. One was last year. It was a Legacy Award, which means an award that you can go apply for many years after the book is out. And that particular one was the Hawthorne prize, Prize for Fiction, and it made it to the finalists in that and I was pretty proud of that, actually, because it wasn't specific to women's fiction. It was like all fiction, and they were, they were accepting books from five years back, I think so it was like all books from up to five years ago could have been qualified for that. And so I was pretty proud of that one to make the final. That one, to make the finalists in that one. But also I tend to like the ones out of the ones I've won. I really like the ones with cool names. And we're going to talk more about like, what are the bolts, what are the values of these awards?
Lainey Cameron 16:53
But for me, why I did this is, as you heard earlier, Lainey Cameron is my pen name, and I needed to build credibility, or I wanted to build credibility that I am a quality author at the beginning of my career, and I felt like if I could do that with my first book, I wouldn't have to repeat it necessarily, on all the other books at the same level and extent. But that was my goal, was credibility as a quality author. And so I knew that, like these awards, it was mostly me who was going to be talking about them and sharing them. It wasn't like they have a lot of awareness value. We're going to talk about that. And so I like the ones that have really cool names, because if I'm going to share something, I'd like to share something that looks good and sounds good. And so, for example, among the ones that I've won the independent author network Book of the Year, outstanding women's fiction. I love it, because you can say it's I write outstanding women's fiction, right? That's the name of the award. Is outstanding women's fiction.
Lainey Cameron 17:41
So I think I like that one in particular. One in particular. And I like in 2021, the American fiction awards, because that also sounds very credible. You know, it's broad American fiction pretty, pretty broad. So that one I think I like and tend to kind of lead with as well. And also, yeah, I was really proud of the national indie excellence. I was really proud of the Eric Hoffer Book Award, even though I was only a finalist, because, again, that was all fiction, which is so broad and so many people apply for that one. So to me, personally, to make the finalists in that one, because I knew it was a really big category of people in it, just as a personal like Eagle boost was valuable to me to say, okay, yeah, that has some value,
Paulette Stout 18:17
No, and it's great. And I don't have ladies want to hang up, to hold up, because I read ebooks a lot, but it really was a phenomenal read. It was just quality, quality work. Lainey writes amazing books. So
Lainey Cameron 18:31
Beth is lovely, Lainey, you are the award queen. I'll take it. I'll take it. So let's go. Let's keep going.
Paulette Stout 18:40
So why apply? Why apply? So, um, like you said, it's, you know, for me, it was part of my strategy, and also for the platform building piece of it, um, and it was, for me, it was one of those things when, especially when you're kind of newer to a writer, and you haven't established, you know, you are the platform, and people don't know who you are. There are so many books out there right now, and you people don't know which to choose, so I think that it is a way to kind of set your book apart from others that they might be considering and when they're making their purchasing decision, if one has won a whole bunch of awards and people seem to like it, and another one, you know, you're not sure you know, that can kind of potentially tilt the sale in your favor. Another piece of me, and is that, you know, I write like slow ride a Lainey laughs at me. But you know, I do about a book a year. And for me, there's a lot of space in between the releases, and you kind of need stuff to talk about. So for me, I like to stagger the award cycles of the different ones I apply for, not the look I win every one, although I win a lot, is like so you have something to talk about. When the awards news comes out, you need a nice little drab of information to kind of keep you front and center, to talk to your newsletter list, to remind readers of your books, if you have a backlist, kind of just is, this is a nice little social media. Be a touch point for me for that. How about you? Lainey, yeah,
Lainey Cameron 20:04
I mean, I kind of covered it that for me, it was social proof. So I talked to my marketing class about the idea that, think about when someone goes to your Amazon page, and yes, they're going to see your book description, but what else is going to provide social proof and really communicate the experience of writing the book? And you can do that with author endorsements. Obviously reviews do that, but Book Awards are another way to do that, right to show that it's going to be a quality experience or the type of book, or to validate that it's a great read in women's fiction or a particular category. So that's another good way to do it. I think it really belongs right there on your Amazon page. I changed the first few lines of my book description that it leads with the awards that the book has won, and that's a pretty common thing to do before it goes into the plot in the book description. And so I kind of use it that way on my Amazon page as a way to give social proof, to help people feel confident if they buy that book, that it's going to be a good read and going to be a fit for them. So that's a good way to do it. And yeah, these legacy awards, so awards that allow multiple years back are also a nice way, if you can win one of those, to keep the news going, like you say on the book, right? I was able to share that use news this year in 24 for a book that came out in 2020 so, yeah, right.
Paulette Stout 21:09
And then I think so if you're interested in kind of seeing some different approaches to how we leverage awards on our Amazon pages then, or on our websites, like pop over, you know, look for the exit strategy on Amazon. You can look for what eyes can't see my latest book. And I use, I use the award wins in my a, my A plus content, and those are the images that appear on your landing page of your individual books. And I recently, we did them to kind of highlight the awards and the graphics and the testimonials and in new ways. So if you're looking for some ideas, you know you can check out my page and peek and see how I kind of use the graphic to leverage the award wins. I
Lainey Cameron 21:51
love that. I love that, and it's a good example of like, I don't have control of my A plus content right now because I'm with a small publisher, but when I get my rights back, which will be soon, next year. Actually, my contract is five years, and I can request my rights back. So when I get my rights back, that's an example of something I should do is really leverage those awards and create some A plus content.
Paulette Stout 22:10
Good idea. Yes, yes, for sure.
Lainey Cameron 22:13
Okay, benefits. Why would you do Book Awards? So we talked about why we did it, right? Was really the credibility, the social proof, the social validation, I think you know the cheat. The challenge with that is you have to use it right? One of the things I want people to understand in general about awards is, except for that first category of like the book, or the Women's Prize for Fiction, the you know, the what else is in that, the Pulitzer, except for that, except for that first category in the National Book Award, except for those is like five of them, most awards have no awareness value. And I say that very generally, covering almost every award except for the ones that I just named. I mean, maybe some of the really literary ones kind of have some niche awareness value in their community, but in general, most of these awards. So whether you're talking about, if I just look at some of the ones that I won the ippy independent publisher Book Awards, or Chanticleer or reader's favorite or top shelf Book Awards, or American fiction words, or IA independent author network, or the Hawthorne Prize for Fiction, or the Eric Hoffer none of those have any awareness value. Nobody is going to see it unless you share it. And I just want to kind of reinforce that point, because I think people think awareness is a reason to do Book Awards, and in general, I tell my class like these don't really have awareness value by themselves, but, but what do you think
Paulette Stout 23:29
Black 100 100% I mean, I think that, and they're fun to kind of, you know, little you can boast about it within the author's circles, like you wanted awards, and you can support each other, but, you know, it's totally for the same so I'm looking at some of my titles here. You know, independent press, independent author network, writing awards, doing the book festival in these today. You know, book excellence, like all these things exactly like, you know, you wouldn't be looking for these, and most people don't know what they are, so I think it's really they are a marketing tool. You know, they're obviously, they're a validation point, like we said. But you know, you can't just kind of get the award and sit back and thumb, you know, from your fingers, and expect your book sales to spike like they won't use it. Yes? Mana falling from heaven.
Lainey Cameron 24:23
Exactly.
Paulette Stout 24:25
The skies will open, the beam of light will come down, and, you know, gold will descend on you from but,
Lainey Cameron 24:34
yes, but there are some reasons you would do Book Awards, and they do have some values. And so what is that? Social validation? Right? You can use it to say, this is a quality book. It's an award winner that has a lot of value, right? Readers pay attention to that stuff when you say in your Amazon ad or on your page or on your book description. The other one is, some of them offer some very specific benefits. So let's highlight some of these very specific benefits. So one would. The presence at book fairs. So for example, readers favorite, I believe, has a presence at the Miami book fair, and they take out a booth, and they bring in all the books that were the winners and put them in a booth at the Miami book fair. And readers can come during the Miami Book Fair and see all of the winning books. That's kind of nice. I don't know if it truly shifts sales, but it's a nice upside benefit. There's one of the awards that actually puts you on a billboard in Times Square. It is very temporary, right? But you can go there and take a photo during the day that it's up again, it's not going to make any difference. Nobody is walking by the billboard going, Oh, let me buy that book. But goodness, you can go there. You can take a photo with your book. You can have a friend take a photo of your billboard on Times Square. Readers don't understand that you bought a billboard in Times Square for all of two minutes in one day. They just know that, like, there's a photo of your book in a billboard in Times Square.
Paulette Stout 25:46
I know I thought about that one. I thought about it. I'm like, Oh, I girl, like, I buy at Home professionally for years. And it's like, yeah. And by the way,
Lainey Cameron 25:58
by the way, if you feel very passionately about that. For a few 100 bucks, you can buy yourself a place on a billboard on Times Square. You could actually do that yourself. It is totally possible.
Paulette Stout 26:08
Yes, yes. That's a whole nother. We probably have an episode, because I have thought about doing display advertising anyway. It's another month, another
Lainey Cameron 26:13
episode. Anyway. That particular one that does the billboard is called the book fest awards, for what it's worth, if anyone gets excited by that, some of them offer like free classes. So like, I think book Excellence Award offers, like free book marketing classes, online book marketing classes, or, you know, judge whether you think that stuff's really valuable to you or not.
Paulette Stout 26:36
I almost didn't apply for book excellence, just because the few times I did, and I won ones for something, and it was like, they are a very aggressive marketing organization, so, and I don't see, I think I haven't applied in like, two years, and, like, I still get emails, like, almost like, weekly from them for something. So they're aggressive. And so just know that some of the awards committees are, you know, they kind of handle their business differently,
Lainey Cameron 27:02
right? And some of them have award ceremonies. And this is kind of like it depends on you. For some people, this is like their worst nightmare, and the last thing they want to go to is an award ceremony. You have to spend money to go. For other people, and I put myself in this category. It's pretty damn validating to walk to the front of a room and pick up an award and go like, wow, I've made I've come somewhere from where I started, right? You went from writing a first draft of a book to getting given an award on a stage. So some of them do actually have physical award ceremonies, which I think is pretty cool. I think ippy, the independent publisher, is in that category. Unfortunately, I was covid year, so they didn't do it that year. But I think that one does it and a WF wa does an award ceremony for their Star Awards. A lot of the association, ones like the thriller Writers Association, etc, for
Paulette Stout 27:46
their RWA, I'm sure does for their winners and things too. Yeah,
Lainey Cameron 27:51
yeah, exactly. So that can be a neat benefit, right? Yeah.
Paulette Stout 27:54
But I think one of the big things to remember about Book Awards is like, they're not going to sell books, but they can help you sell you as an offer. So I think that that's if you can feel comfortable with that, then and go in with an open mind. I think that's a good way to think about it.
Lainey Cameron 28:10
Yeah, and Beth commented on on the live stream here that it must be personally thrilling to win an award. And I think so, yes, you know, like, don't underestimate the last item we had on our list of some of the cool benefits is the morale boost, right? Like being able to know that you've come so far and that, you know, a jury actually chose this as one of the most you know, whatever criteria valuable winning books in the genre is pretty neat.
Paulette Stout 28:34
Yeah, it definitely is. And I think, yeah, and I think especially when you're, you know, there's so much doubt and rejection that's involved in creating books that just having any kind of at a girl, at a boy, at a day is is really worthwhile. So yeah, definitely don't underestimate the value of that. For sure, that
Lainey Cameron 28:56
is true, and we wanted to say a couple of words about we're going to put some articles, some links on the website. So you can go to the episode page at best of bookmarketing.com and we're going to put three or four articles that actually list awards that you might want to consider. So there's a whole big, long list of awards that you're able to look at there. I think there's three different articles, four different articles with lists of awards that we're going to put up there for you. So if you're kind of wondering, like, what are some of these words that Lainey and palette are talking about. They're all in some of those lists. There's a good article that we want to talk about a little bit from the alliance of independent authors. And palette and I are both fans of the alliance of independent authors. They do great work. You remember, right palette,
Paulette Stout 29:34
I am, I am, but yeah, they have amazing resources,
Lainey Cameron 29:39
yes, and they have a list, and it's a really good List of awards, but they have a really interesting way that they categorize their rewards. And I just wanted to talk about a couple of the criteria they use, because we agree with most of what they say, but then there's a little bit that we're like, I'm not sure I agree with this completely. So what they have on their guiding principles is they say. So this is that I'm not us for a second. Okay? They say they want an event, award, event to to exist, to recognize talent, not to enrich the organizers. We'll come back to this. Their second criteria is that receiving the award is an achievement. They say the judging process should be transparent and clear, the prizes should be appropriate and commensurate with the entry fees. Entrance are not required to forfeit key rights to their work. We're going to talk more about this one, and there is no profiteering upsell. That's exactly what palette was just talking about with. Like, you know, look excellence.
Paulette Stout 30:35
Yeah, they're a little bit of a bad offender. So,
Lainey Cameron 30:39
so here's the thing. So, so they rank, they have a ranking of all the awards, and they rank very negatively any of the awards that basically are money making endeavors, awards that are exist for the purpose of making money. So they have, they tend to be the ones with, like, 60 plus categories, and you can enter multiple categories, and it's 50 to $200 per category, right? And they kind of say none of those are worth your while, or they put a caution against them. And I'm not quite as negative on those awards as they are, because I think if you're only doing it in order to have something that you can promote and show to readers, it doesn't matter so much whether it was money making versus not money making, right? Because readers don't know the difference. They don't really know other than the Booker Prize, they don't know the difference between, you know, a fancy literary award that had a $200 cash prize and an award that tries to make you sell, buy stuff after the fact, right? They don't know the differences. So I'm not quite as negative as they are on on the idea of awards that make money. And unfortunately, a lot of these awards, almost all of them, the judging process is not transparent and clear, like, I wish it was, but like, I would encourage you to go to any of these award websites, and I would say 99 out of 100 don't tell you exactly what their judging criteria is. It's really hard. All you could really do is look at who won in the past in order to determine whether your book would be kind of like those books. But, but what do you think of this article play? Yeah,
Paulette Stout 32:03
I I was kind of surprised, frankly, when I went through the whole it's a grid, so when you go in there, it's like a big table, and they have, like, the criteria, and they give it like a score of, you know, caution, or, you know, good or recommended, or whatever the categories are. I was surprised how negative they were about a lot of the different book award prizes, and I think that as long as you go into the award process with open eyes and clear goals for yourself and awareness of your budget and what you're why you're applying for the awards, I feel like it's, it's a, you know, it's a transaction. It's something that I am paying for the opportunity to win a prize, and after I get that, we can use it in all kinds of ways to market the books we've each like we've each gotten something of value out of the transaction. So I don't see that, for me as a marketer and a book seller, that that there's a huge negative there, if it is not the same as winning like a prestigious literary prize, but that is not what I write, and that is not what I'm seeking, you know. So for me, I'm going into it with open eyes. And I think as long as you do that, a lot of these awards, you know, are fine to enter,
Lainey Cameron 33:13
yeah, and so I would say this article again. We'll link to it on the Episode notes on the website. It's actually a good article to go consider all of the awards on this page, like, take, take the the caution ones with a bucket of salt. In terms of you understand now why they said it's a caution, because anything that's money making is a caution. But most words actually are money making, right? Like, there's actually relatively few that are non profit awards. And so to me, it's a little bit of snobbery there. Like, only want to do non profits like, I only want to do fancy literary nonprofit awards like, okay, but most of us are writing commercial fiction and don't apply for don't, you know, our stuff doesn't apply to these fancy literary awards.
Paulette Stout 33:48
Yeah, 100 400% and Okay,
Lainey Cameron 33:51
so we are going to go into some of the disadvantages, kind of, some of the big gotchas that you don't want to fall into with these awards. And there's quite a few really big gotchas that we want you to be aware of, because we never want you to walk into something and go, Oh my god, I can't believe I did that. Okay? And we're also going to go into some tips for how to apply to awards and give yourself the best chance with these awards. But first we're going to take a quickie, quick commercial break, not really, but we're going to talk about our sponsor, Lillian Sue, who we are so grateful, sponsors us and has sponsored last three episodes. Are sponsoring the last episode of this episode and the next one. And Lillian Sue is a publicist, but mostly she sponsored us because she wanted to get the word out about and I now have a physical copy of it about her book. It's called the powerful publicity prescription, and it's really designed to help entrepreneurs and authors as entrepreneurs do their own PR, which is pretty cool, and I've had a chance to actually go through it. I've got some post it notes, and one of the things I love in it is how she talks about myths. And one of her myths is all publicity is good publicity. And if you've ever seen someone get caught in a Twitter storm for something they said online. Nine and then it just spirals. I mean, we've seen some examples in the author community where someone says something dumbass, and it spirals, and they maybe even land up losing their publishing contract as a result. Yes, all publicity is not good publicity. She also has PR Myth number two, spending a lot of money equals PR success. I agree with that one completely. People spend a lot of money and they do not get PR success. And so I love how she kind of breaks down some of these myths. She's got, like, 56789, 1010, PR myths. Oh, here's your number 10. PR is about spinning lies to make your brand look good. Love it like and, yeah, I love it. And part of what she's doing, so there's three parts to the package she sent me. There's the book, there's the PR glossary. And this is very cool. If you go to her website, you can get hold of this. It's the it's basically a workbook. And what I really like about this is she takes some of those lies and she breaks them down, and she actually has you kind of think about, like, why do you believe some of this stuff? So she actually goes through, like, if you have anxiety about talking to the media, like, Why do you have anxiety? And how do you deal with anxiety talking to the media, she goes through imposter syndrome. Like, if you have imposter syndrome, how do you it kind of has you work through. Like, why do I have imposter syndrome? How do I deal with that? How do I get over it so I can be better at dealing with media opportunities? It's kind of nice and hands on. So anyway, I wanted to show you that, because she is our wonderful sponsor. And they're great books, they're powerful publicity prescription. And again, we'll put the link on the show notes, but I'm really enjoying the workbook and going through it now I have it, so
Paulette Stout 36:30
yeah, and I think that a lot of people think that, you know, they either have to hire a publicist or they don't get to do PR. And I think that using the resources that Lenya is providing is kind of that nice in between level where you can DYI your PR and choose what you're comfortable with, choose on a timeline, and, you know, manage it yourself. So definitely encourage you to check those out. And
Lainey Cameron 36:50
that's one of the other things I like about what Lillian does, is she does consulting to help authors. So as opposed to saying the only way to work with me is to hire me as a publicist for a massive package, she'll actually do one on one consulting to get you on the pieces you need to help with, and then you can DIY the rest if you want, which I like, because not a lot of publicists are willing to do that. Mostly it's an all or nothing. Either you buy them as an expensive package or you don't work with me, and she's not like that. It's one of the reasons I think she's a nice fit for authors who are kind of just dipping their toe in,
Paulette Stout 37:18
for sure, for sure. Great. So I think we're gonna go into our next topic now, which is the disadvantages of Book Awards. So just for starters, there's no getting around. There's a cost. There's a cost involved, because you need to pay for entry. You know, there's a piece, a cost for the fees. There's a cost for the books, a cost for the postage, if you're mailing paper books. So all of those kind of are wrapped up in the class. So when you're thinking about applying for Book Awards, and they require hard copies of your book, you know you need to be able to factor in not only the fee, but the shipping and the postage as well.
Lainey Cameron 37:54
Yeah, for me when I was especially because I was in Mexico when I was applying for awards and the concept of trying to ship books like around to us awards. I just didn't do the ones that required physical copies. And you know, it's a lot, because the cost, like you say, can be anywhere from 60 to $200 most of them range in the 100 to 150 from what I've seen. But there's some as low as 30. And kind of the high end ones are 200 most of them were around the 6200
Paulette Stout 38:18
Yeah, I think, I think between like 65 and 95 there's, like, probably a lot of them in that category. But
Lainey Cameron 38:25
then if you're shipping physical copies, my physical copies cost me, what, $16 a book, if I'm getting a big print run from my small publisher, more than if you were indie, and then I got to put the shipping on top. So we're looking at more than $20 per book, times. Some of these require four or five books, so you've doubled the entry cost in buying books, right? Like you had $100 entry cost, but then $100 to buy and ship books too. So for me, I just didn't do those. I chose not to do off awards that required me to ship physical books around. Yeah. So
Paulette Stout 38:53
for the ones I've applied, they usually were one book per category, so it was kind of like you had a little bit of control over how many books, but there's definitely, definitely a cost, and there are lots where you can apply for an ebook, or they don't require print books at all, so you can definitely gravitate towards those Book Awards. So another disadvantage is just, you know, the tracking and the coordination, having to know when the deadlines are, making sure that your books are in the right place at the right time and are available, and you know, you're done, and you're through your if you're the new book, if you've got your proofreading, and everything is done and it's ready to go at that point. You know, some folks you know, have concerns with the legitimacy of the award programs. You know, there's, we talked about the lack of transparency about your are they reading the entire book, or are they reading selections, and who was reading it and how? You know, how many reviewers do you get? You know, there's a lot of times you don't know, for some of the Book Awards. And then, you know, the truth is, like we talked about, you're not going to sell books. You're not going to sell direct books for this at all. I.
Lainey Cameron 39:59
Yeah, we actually forgot to mention one thing and the benefits, which is some of them will actually do a review as part of it. So like Readers Choice, reader's favorite is one of those that they do a review, and the review is kind of what cuts into the reward process. And so some of them, you get a review that you can share with more detailed comments about your book, which is almost like getting a blurb or an endorsement. So that can be a benefit as well.
Paulette Stout 40:21
Yes, I think, yeah, that's, that's a good one. Thanks for mentioning that. So then sometimes, once you apply, you know, you think you're done and you're waiting, but then you start getting emails and they want you to buy, like, add on packages and services and PR and seals and stickers, and, you know, coming to the events and, you know, so there's some of those services, it can be a little high pressure. You never have to say yes to any of them. You know. Just understand, you are not required, right, to purchase any add ons once you've applied. But, you know, it can be enticing. You know, when the emails are coming and things look glossy, yeah, those
Lainey Cameron 40:53
seals. So if you ever, ever seen a book that has like a sticker on the front that's like a gold sticker that says blah blah, award winner, that's what we mean by the seal, and you basically order a roll of those with little silver or gold seals and put them on the front of your physical paperbacks. It makes sense, if you're physically selling, like at a book fair or whatever, yeah, they want to charge you up the wazoo for those little silver seals that go on the front of the book,
Paulette Stout 41:14
right? And some of them charge you for digital seals as well. I run a category, and I shouldn't be saying this out loud. I'm just going to tell you all like they charge for the digital seals. And I'm like, No, so I ridiculous. I don't tell anybody. I clipped the prior years winners off and I went on Canva, and I matched the color, and I put a little year change on it, and I bought now, y'all, I legitimately won the award. I was on the website. I just didn't want to pay 40 bucks for the damn digital deal. So, wait,
Lainey Cameron 41:47
wait, wait, so 40 bucks for an image file. Are you kidding me? Yeah,
Paulette Stout 41:52
yes. I was like, no, no, I will not, you know, like that should come for free, um, and it didn't. So I made my own little thing. And then some of them don't give you anything, you know? So when I won the New England book festival awards, like, there isn't, you don't get anything. So then I had to kind of make a little image out of, like the logo and the whatever. That's kind of what I use in my promotions. But yeah, sometimes, like, you don't get anything, or they charge you for it. And let's see we've got.
Lainey Cameron 42:28
Some of them do have cash awards. I mean, it's very, very rare, but there are a very few number that actually have cash awards. Like, it's rare, but it exists.
Paulette Stout 42:36
Yes, yes, yes. So just rounding up some of the disadvantages, because I know we want to get to the tips, is, you know, the reach of the award, people name recognition, people not knowing about it. You know, in the whole black box under the scene judging arteria, mishmash that we've touched on a few times,
Lainey Cameron 42:53
and a big one that I want to hit on here is, right So, and actually, we have it in the tips for replying, but let's just bring it up here is, be very careful you're not giving in away any rights to your book. And if you are, make sure you do it deliberately and know what you're doing. So some of the unpublished contests are actually run by publishers, and you're giving them the right to publish your book if you enter the contest. I mean, it sounds extreme, but like read the T's and C's for God's sakes. Because there's also some movie ones, some movie and television ones where you were giving them first right to promote your movie, your book, from movie and TV rights. And just be very thoughtful about if you're giving away rights. And it sounds ridiculous, but it's in the in the small print, you think you're just entering a competition. And in the small print, it says that by entering, if you win, you're giving the right for them to shop your book to TV and movie producers. You want to be very careful, because you're actually giving away your rights to the book there. And so be very thoughtful when you enter them that you know what you're doing there. Yeah. And
Paulette Stout 43:49
I actually saw one that I was midway through applying, and then I saw, I believe it was, it was a library, I forget the name of. It was a library award. And I noticed that by applying, if you win, they take the library rights for that book and only get the libraries through them. And I sorry, I get a lot of my income from libraries. So for me, giving that distribution up, and the the the royalties that I would have lost significant royalties for my book if I had entered that contest, because then the distribution was impacted. So definitely look at the fine print on some of those things, because you don't want to, you know, give up rights that are going to you could come back to bite you later. Right? Exactly.
Lainey Cameron 44:40
So let's go into some last section here, tips for applying. So I'll lead us off here. So make sure you get the application window right. So a lot of these have an application window that you have to apply between this period and this period. It's very common for them to have fees that go up over time. So if you get in in the early window, it's one price. And if you get in, you know, three months before it. Closes. It's a different price. Just make sure you're meeting the roles around publication dates, around publication types, around whether they take arcs or not, like some will take advanced review copies, ebooks of advanced review copies, and some won't. And so you don't want to go send your money in, and then you get disqualified, and most of them don't give the money back. In that scenario,
Paulette Stout 45:22
the rules, and I think I applied for one because, you know, my books sometimes are kind of at the end of the year or whatever, but I always get the copyright, like, pretty close. So I had a book where my copyright was in one calendar year, but then it was published, you know, within a month of the next calendar year. So I was able to apply because they went by when the book was copyright. So it sometimes will say the late the language. You'll see what some of these dates is published in, or copyright in, you know. So just look for that distinction, because, depending on your situation, you might or might not apply based on what the criteria is. There Exactly.
Lainey Cameron 45:59
So definitely, pub date is a key thing. And, you know, even, like some of the ones I'm really familiar with, like the women's fiction writers Awards, the published ones, it definitely applies to a certain year. And you need to be in that year that they're specifying. And you don't want to, like, apply, you know, you were January 2, but it had to be December 31 for example, with any of these awards, yeah, for sure, for sure. Um, the let, the next thing we wrote here is check the quality of the past year as winners. And I like this because the way I think about it is like, do you want to be with this group of books? If you put this group of books with your cover in the middle, let's assume it's a similar quality this year as last year. Would you be embarrassed to say that your book is like these other books?
Paulette Stout 46:40
Yes, don't apply for award if winning will disappoint you. So if you apply for award, you're like, Oh, crap, I won. You know, that's probably what you could skip. I'm sorry, big, little silly. Yes,
Lainey Cameron 46:55
no, but it's true. Like i There were certain awards that I looked at, and I looked at the books that won the previous year, and I was like, Oh, I would not want to be in the company of those books like I wouldn't want mine to be put on a slight on a page next to those books. They just weren't of the quality that I would want to be prepared to my own work, right? Sometimes, I mean, unfortunately, covers matter a lot, so sometimes it's just the cover looks like garbage. We've talked a little bit about covers in the past, and the cover says low quality. And I wouldn't want to be on the same page with books that have that kind of cover. So just do look at the previous years. It does matter. Look at the category. Fit is really important, and sometimes your book fits in a weird, niche category, but it's actually really good because it's easier to win. And so what I mean by that is some of these awards, I think I had one that was in a category around, like, feminist books or something. And like, it was interesting because it was, like, fiction and nonfiction together. It wasn't even novels. It was just a category that you could put any book, fiction or nonfiction in. But it was a perfect fit for my book, which is very feminist. And so sometimes, like, look at the categories,
Paulette Stout 47:57
yeah. And for me, I sometimes won't apply for awards. I don't have a good category fit for me. So if I, you know, if I'm looking for women's fiction, if they don't have a women's fiction category, and a lot of awards programs don't, then I, you know, I may not apply for that. But if I have a book that kind of leans a little romancy, or I write, you know, I have, like my my last book, one for multicultural fiction. So you can apply and look for the categories that you think you have a good chance. Some of them have categories by book length, or, you know, if it's a debut, or if it's your second book, or if it's a series, you know, you know, we talked about audio before, so you can get creative with the categories to kind of push position yourself for success.
Lainey Cameron 48:36
And again, like when you go to share it, you can choose whether or not to lead with the category or just with the name of the award, right? You like, one of the things I see is people think they have to put every single last detail, you know, the blah blah Book Award, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah category. Like, no, like, put it on your website somewhere, and someone can get the details if they want it. But when you're doing, like, an ad or something, you don't have to put, you know, all 25 words of the description in there.
Paulette Stout 48:58
Yeah, some of them are long, so it's definitely a good choice to cut that back, um, and I and again, you know, geographic categories, um, like the New England Book Festival was a specific regional award, like we talked about. But then there are other larger categories that have regional breakouts, like, this is the Northeast one, this is the south, this is the West, you know. So you can decide whether those categories would be a good fit for your book, especially if you your books you know, are very centered on a place you know they might that might be a good fit for you.
Lainey Cameron 49:28
And then we suggested, here, you suggested, actually pull out this idea of making a list of the awards you want to consider, and then prioritizing based on cost category fit your budget. And I think that's a really good idea. And also looking at the previous winners, whether you need paper copies or not, the shipping costs. I mean, you probably don't want to apply to, like, don't do what I did and apply for 17 awards. You know, a cost of up to $100 each. That's a lot of money that I spent on that I will acknowledge. Turned out I didn't need to spend that much money, right? Like, I thought I would win too. So like, like, if you look at my. Then you're like, Lainey, applied for 15 awards. That's what I should do. It wasn't deliberate. It wasn't what I thought would happen.
Paulette Stout 50:06
Yeah, and I think, and then also, as you grow your platform over the years, you can feel like, okay, do I really need to apply for this category every year to this award? So you can kind of tailor back, so I'm definitely applying for fewer awards, you know, in this next book cycle than I have in the past. I'm just picking a few that I feel are a good fit because, you know, at some point it just becomes stupid, you know, that you've, you've won an award. You know, you don't have to keep applying. You can save that money and put it somewhere else within your marketing strategy. So, and part of that is also looking at the different types of awards. You know, it's kind of like when you look at, you know, influencers to approach, you want to approach some with, like, really big following, some mid medium following, small following. So you can do the same approach with your book awards. And look at one, some that are really competitive and prestigious, and some that are, you know, a little more portable, and some, you know, maybe a little bit, you know, more within likelihood that you could, you could place in that kind of an award. And just, you know, apply for a mix. So then you have a range of award wins, if they should work out for you exactly,
Lainey Cameron 51:09
Exactly. I think that makes a lot of sense. And also just have some fun with it at the end of the day. Like, don't take it too personally. This is not like most of us don't even know. It's a black box behind the covers on why one book, one versus another, like, throw it out there and let it go, and if it comes back one day, you'll be so excited. And I had that happen a number of times for me, where people were messaging me, saying congratulations, and I was saying, what for I applied for the award a year ago or nine months ago. I forgotten all about it. I let it go. I just, you know, when I put these things out there, I let them go. I don't even, like, note down the date it's coming in. It'll, I'll find it out. And then eventually someone comes back to me and says, By the way, and I'm like, Oh, I forgot all about it. So, like, don't like, hold on to it really strongly emotionally, because it's not like, the number one predictor of your success or your worth or any of those things. We could say that about a lot of things in Book Marketing. But like, my advice is just like, put it out there, choose thoughtfully, and then just let it go into the universe.
Paulette Stout 52:02
Yes, I mean, I do have a spreadsheet that I keep them in, and I write down the categories and I keep the links, because, like Lainey says, you forget sometimes, you know, and sometimes they don't notify you. Some that just have a date, or they'll announce it and you have to go look for it. So I usually put links to the award programs into this little spreadsheet, so at least I'll remember where do I have to go and, you know, go back and look, and I keep track of the categories I apply. I keep track of the costs, and, you know, sometimes the early bird periods, and, you know, just to try to make it more affordable. And then at some point later, when you remember, you can kind of go back and check exactly like
Lainey Cameron 52:36
I have a spreadsheet too, but I don't like look at it every week, I just put it there. And eventually I'll go back and look, and so I have it all there, but more often than not, someone else is the one who's been telling me what I've won an award, and it's kind of Yes, well, okay,
Paulette Stout 52:52
that was a lot. Hopefully everybody found it helpful. You could go to our website. This episode, we ave a lot of resources. So because there's a lot to know about Book Awards, there's lots of them to apply for, we try to be as transparent as possible about the good and the bad, and let you decide for yourself around some of those things. So definitely go to bestbookmarketing.com and check out those resources.
Lainey Cameron 53:16
And if you have any other resources that we missed, if you have a favorite place that you go for a list of awards and you want us to add, just let us know we'll happily add extra resources to that page, and thanks for taking the time to join us and to listen to us.
Paulette Stout 53:28
Thank you till next time. Take care. You.