Short Story Writing Contests

As an author or writer of short stories, you are always looking for ways to get your writings noticed by the reading public and may be thinking about entering writing contests to help market and promote your writing talents. Short story writing contests are one of the most ideal ways to add more credence to your work, especially if you become a winner or runner-up. It offers you a chance to win grand cash prizes and have your writings read by possibly thousands of readers. You may also get a chance to have your work published in a magazine or journal. Some contests also offer a book deal as a grand prize.

There are thousands of writing contests on and off the Internet that are always looking for unpublished and sometimes published content. The question that often comes up is: should you pay an entry fee to participate in a writing contest. The answer is no!

Any genuine service promoting any type of contest should never ask for a fee to submit your work. Just because the contest is offering cash awards, does not mean that you should help sponsor that contest. That job should be left to the people who are carrying out the competition, not you the writer. Either they should have the cash awards already on hand or have sponsors to pay for their promoting and marketing of the contest. Most of the time, these contests are charging an entry fee to raise the money needed to give away cash awards. You are a writer not a backer for their contests.

Suppose, the first prize is $1000.00; the second prize is $500.00, and the third prize is $250.00; a total of $1750.00 should already be available or in an escrow account. Many times you will see submission rules requesting a fee for each entry submitted. The rules may say: there is a $10.00 fee for each story you submit. Let us suppose you enter four stories; that is a total of $40.00 you have allocated to that contest. Now let us say the cash price is $100.00, and one of your pieces is selected as the winner. In reality, you have won $60.00 not $100.00. Where does that extra $40.00 go?

If a contest is relying on entry fees to raise give-away money, what happens if the company does not reach its goal? The answer is: you will most likely not get your entry fee back, and this is money gone down the drain. You work hard to be a writer, and nothing can be more disappointing than to throw your hard earn money after a contest that probably will never read your material(s) or better yet, will never choose your story as the winner.

Always participate in writing challenges that do not charge an entrance or a reading fee. The companies promoting these contests already have the money on hand. Rather than pay an entry fee, why not use that money and start your own contest. If you are willing to fork over $10.00 or whatever the fee is, offer that amount in your own short story contest. Not every contest has to offer large sums of money to get contestants.