Irish Web Awards

We’ve listened to your feedback and you’ve said you want to nominate more than just your own website. So now you can.  Web Awards nomination form.

Category Sponsorship Details.

Way back when as the Web Awards were being planned I had an email back and forth with Adam Beecher. In the email conversation he convinced me to keep category costs down as much as possible. Almost to the same level as Blog Award Category costs. His reasoning was that enough events get the big name sponsors and there isn’t any awards show out there where mom and pop stores and SMEs can avail of being a core part of an awards show with their small advertising/marketing budget. The category prices could have been four figures and sponsored by large brands but instead I hope to see smaller brands have their names there.

So thanks to Adam I realised that Awards shows like the Blog Awards and now the Web Awards are not just about those nominated but those people focused companies and individuals putting in their money to make these great events work. So while these sponsors are called “sponsors”, really they’re like angel investors. Investing modest sums into a vehicle and wishing it the very best. The return hopefully is that they get appreciated by everyone else taking part in it.

Thank you Adam.

Quite happy with the coverage so far. Irish Times covered the launch of the Awards on Friday and there was a small mention in the Sunday Business Post today too. Then online there’s been massive coverage from at least 15 blogs and websites and probably more we’ve not spotted.

Photo owned by txberiu (cc)

People are also asking about ways of contributing a small amount of money towards running the show outside of headline and category sponsorship. Right now there are no other routes to do this and it might stay that way. Instead we’d appreciate you spreading the word via blog, Facebook, Bebo and good ole reliable email. The more people that know about the Awards and submit their work, the more diverse the submissions will be and the better the Awards will be.

You can now nominate your website. Right now only the creators/builders/owners of websites can nominate their own creations. (Depending on feedback we may open it to everyone) If you are a fan of a site then encourage the owner to take pride in their work and nominate themselves. They have 12 days to do so.

Some people are nominating their blogs which is fair enough but please do realise that a blog is at a disadvantage if you look at the scorecard. Fantastic content might win the day though…

Given the Irish Web Awards are talking about transparency and the like, I thought I’d share some of the cost of running an awards event. These are costs encountered so far and more costs will creep in the closer we get to the event and the fancier we make it.

Advertising – Not a bloody chance.

They’re most of the costs and that’s not including decorations. So that’s about €20k.

Photo owned by tuppus (cc)

That’s the massively el cheapo version of running an Awards show. Can you imagine the costs of a bigger room, more people and having a sit-down dinner? Throw in providing rooms for ALL your judges and staff. The costs visciously add up.

If we can keep costs down it means we can pass all those savings on to those entering, sponsoring and attending. Thus free nominations and 30 quid to put your bum on a seat.

I seem to have cocked up the communications on this one already. There is a charge on the door to get into the Awards on October 11th. A ticket for the event is €30. Apologies for the misconception it was free.

The tickets are that price for three reasons:
(i) People attach more value to something that charges them, even if it’s small
(ii) It prevents messers or others from block booking 100 tickets etc.
(iii) Headliner and Category sponsorship don’t cover all costs. It had been considered to raise category costs higher (they currently stand at €450) but this is the max we think an SME can and should pay and we want SMEs to be sponsors.

So sorry to Ken, Michele and everyone else that thought tickets were free. Nominations are free. Your website will be judged without you putting your hand in your pocket. A ticket for the night is also a magnitude less than other award functions but that’s no excuse. We think that 16 year old we keep mentioning should be able to afford 30 quid, sure they’d spend that on fags in a week. If they don’t turn up that’s cool. We’ll post the award to them.

I think those prices are reasonable. About 8-10 times cheaper for a sponsor and 8-10 times cheaper for those that do wish to attend.

Welcome to the Blog of the Irish Web Awards. We’ll try and update the blog as often as we can and let you know what’s happening with the Awards.