Platform
The contest operating system that pays for itself three times over.
Best of Magazine combines a polished public contest, a publisher operations console, a multi-year merchant directory, a printed Best Of magazine, and three distinct revenue moments — all on one platform.
Built to monetize
Three sales motions, three revenue moments, one annual contest.
Every Best Of contest contains three distinct sales seasons. Most publishers only sell into one of them. Best of Magazine is built so your team monetizes all three — and so the platform creates new ad inventory that doesn’t compete with your existing display business.
“Help me get nominated.”
Local businesses run campaigns asking customers to nominate them. The ad isn’t selling a product — it’s asking a community to act on the merchant’s behalf.
- Display ads in print and digital editions
- Social media boosts
- Email newsletter sponsorships
- Sponsored social posts
- Category sponsorships
“Our Best Of nominations open March 1. Local businesses that run a nominate-us campaign typically see 3–5x the nominations of competitors.”
“Help me win.”
Finalists now compete head-to-head and want their customers voting. This is the single highest-engagement window in the calendar.
- Larger finalist display ads
- Targeted email blasts to voters
- Featured category placement
- Social campaign packages
- Sponsored ballot reminders
“You’re a finalist in three categories. Voters are deciding right now. A two-week digital and print package puts your name in front of every voter we have.”
“Show off the win.”
Winners want to celebrate. They want banners, stickers, magazine ads, and badges that turn the win into a year-long marketing asset.
- Full-page and half-page magazine ads
- Yard signs, clings, banners, stickers
- Winner badges and web assets
- Social celebration packages
- Year-long profile placements
“Congratulations — you won Best Burger. Here’s a package that turns this win into a year-long marketing asset.”
Three sales motions, two months apart, all selling against the same campaign — without competing with your existing display advertising.
Run the contest
Manage every contest, every category, every winner — from one console.
Editors, ad teams, and operations staff manage the entire contest from one publisher console. Campaign dates drive everything — set them once and the public site advances through nominations, voting, tallying, and winners on its own.
Campaign managementCategories and companiesVote review queueWinner publishing controls
Campaign management
- One campaign per year, per market
- Set nomination, voting, and publish dates once
- Phases auto-advance
- Configurable caps and thresholds
- Live phase status
Content and merchants
- 280-category starter library
- Bulk merchant import
- Drag-to-reorder categories
- Merge duplicate companies
- Disqualify or recategorize without losing history
Vote review and winners
- Live vote dashboard
- Flagged-activity panel
- Invalidate votes with audit trail
- Tie-breaking and overrides
- Embeddable winner badges
Public contest
A public contest experience designed for thumbs.
Ninety percent of contest traffic comes from mobile, often arriving from a single social share. Every public surface is built mobile-first — fast, frictionless, and self-explanatory.
Phase-aware everything
The site automatically shows the right experience for the current phase. No manual page swaps.
Voter capture done right
Name and email captured on first action, remembered via cookie on return. Smart anti-fraud signals operate in the background.
Built for sharing
Every category page, winner page, and company profile is built with social sharing assumed.
New revenue moment
The Winners’ Storefront — your richest sales window of the year.
The week winners are announced is the highest-engagement, highest-emotion window of the contest. The Winners’ Storefront makes celebration purchases easy while the press release is fresh.
Best Burger 2026
Winner
Full page
Embed
Personalized for every winner
Each winner sees their category and year on every product. Your team doesn’t customize one-by-one; the platform does it.
Order, fulfill, ship
Orders are tagged to winning companies for fulfillment tracking. Print partners receive ready-to-print files.
Built-in upsell flow
Bundles, package pricing, and complete winner kit offerings turn one win into a multi-product purchase.
Magazine
Ad spreads
Sponsor pages
Print product
Every contest ends with a printed magazine your audience keeps for a year.
Best Of campaigns are remembered because they have a physical artifact: a beautifully designed, professionally printed magazine featuring every winner and full of ad inventory your team sells against.
Designed template, ready to flow
Reusable layouts for category sections, winner profiles, sponsor spreads, and full-page ads.
Ad inventory built in
Half pages, full pages, premium spreads, inside-front-cover, back cover — every standard ad position is built into the template.
Print-ready, printer-friendly
Output as press-ready PDF in your local printer’s preferred specs. Stitched or perfect-bound.
Physical signal
Yard signs in every neighborhood. Window clings on every winner.
Best Of contests get bigger when they’re visible. Awareness kits give nominees, finalists, and winners physical proof of their place in the contest.
One catalog, three phases
Same product line covers nomination, voting, and winning phases. Reorder for each phase or sell pre-bundled packages.
Order, fulfill, deliver
Publishers order on behalf of contestants through their console. Bulk discounts, package deals, and white-label fulfillment available.
Built to last
Every nomination, vote, and winner becomes part of your local data asset.
Best of Magazine isn’t a one-off campaign tool. It’s a multi-year directory of every business in your market that’s been nominated, every category that’s been voted on, every winner that’s been crowned.
One annual campaign per market. Archive past campaigns; their winners and history stay accessible forever.
A 280-item starter library covering food, drink, retail, services, lifestyle, and community.
Every nominated business becomes part of your year-round merchant directory and award history.
Captured per-site, per-campaign. Email-deduplicated. Cookie-remembered. Yours alone.
How it lives in your market
Choose how the contest meets your audience.
Some publishers want their contest at a dedicated domain. Others want it inside their existing publication site so voters never leave their brand.
Standalone, fully branded
A dedicated contest site at your custom domain or a BestOfMagazine.com subdomain. Fully branded with your colors, fonts, sponsor strip, and photography.
Best for: publishers building a standalone Best Of brand.
Embedded inline (post-launch)
The contest renders inside your existing publication site via lightweight embed. Your header, your footer, your audience — but the contest engine is fully managed.
Best for: established publishers with existing audiences they don’t want to redirect.
See the platform run an actual contest.
A 30-minute walkthrough shows the publisher console, the public contest experience, the magazine template, and the awareness kits — plus how all three sales motions stack up to a recurring annual revenue program.