How to Succeed at Cybersecurity Award Season: 5 Top Tips

Corporate awards are a controversial topic. While they are something which many companies strive for, many insiders in the comms and marketing world understand the reality: You must pay to play. If your company buys table space on award night, it exponentially increases your chances of success at many cybersecurity industry awards.   However, this generalization doesn’t apply to all cybersecurity awards. Some – Such as the SC Awards US and Europe, are highly reputable, and success at these awards can make the difference between a good year for a company, and a great one. Eskenzi PR understands how to succeed at the awards that matter: In 2024 alone, we had 14 individual entries shortlisted across our roster of clients, with two outright winners. Below are our 5 top tips for award success.   Understand the award   As we’ve already alluded to, some awards are better than others. If your PR agency presents an award to you, make sure that they present all the associated facts: Is this a Tier 1 award? Have any of our competitors entered this award in the past? Is it likely to involve a pay-to-play component? IF you understand all these things well, you can make an informed decision as to whether this is the award for you and your company   Read the entry requirements   While this may sound obvious, you’d be surprised from speaking to the people responsible for putting on these awards how often key things are missed! Make sure you take your time to review the asks associated with every part of the award entry, including the non-mandatory submission options: these are good ways to make your entry stand out.   Think creatively about the category you want to enter   There will be some categories which seem obvious, based on your own vertical within cybersecurity – A security awareness provider will be very likely to enter the ‘Best Security Awareness Provider’ category for example. But these categories are likely to be the most competitive, as everyone will think along similar lines. If there are other categories about your business function, such as ‘best customer service’ or ‘best marketing team’, or individual awards for newcomers or leaders, these may be less competitive and provide you with a greater chance of success   Start as early as possible   Another that may seem obvious, but these entries are likely things which will take a few rounds of edits, and input from different parts of the business: Some will require growth information, annual revenue figures, and specifics about go-to-market strategy. These may not be immediately available to your PR agency, or your marketing teams. Check the deadline for entries, and give yourself a month to get all the relevant pieces together   Include customer case studies   Finally – and undoubtedly most importantly – make sure you have customer case studies ready to go for award season! Most awards are purely marketing “chest-beating” material: Judges will notice awards which have third-party validation. These do not need to be added at the end as case studies too; they can be weaved in throughout your entry.   This guide is a part of our ongoing ‘How to Guide’ series. To read more, please click here.