The Ultimate Guide To Winning Vocal Challenges

Vocal Media has come under a lot of fire in recent months. Well, maybe longer than that. Even I was ready to throw in the towel. Then I didn’t. Call it ego, call it whatever you want, but my last challenge win made me kinda love them a bit again.

It was the Hometown Heroes Challenge. I’d written 3 pieces. I thought one had a decent hope of being recognised. I was wrong. I won with the one I almost deleted because I thought it was so stupid:

The online writing community seems to have a love/hate relationship with Vocal. People either absolutely love it and those enthusiasts are pretty easy to spot. Or they loathe it with a passionate hate usually reserved for only one’s worst enemy. I’m straddling the middle. There have been times I loved it. There have been times I hated it, felt ripped off and vowed to leave the platform forever.

I don’t make any money there from reads. In fact, I’ve won 3 challenges, was a runner up in another, placed in the Fiction Awards and the Ukraine challenge and I’ve made a whopping $21.29 from reads since my first story was published in February 2021.

But, I make okay coin from winning stuff. I don’t know all the ins and outs of winning, but I do think I have some pointers to offer to those who are either on the platform and wish to continue entering challenges or might be thinking about it.

1. Storytelling Not Writing: First and foremost if you read the challenge narratives, they’re not saying anything about writing contests. They’re cleverly crafting the challenges as “storytelling.” Writing and storytelling are two different things.

I’ve never won a challenge with what I thought was my best piece of writing. And in looking back at my own work as well as that of others, I think that’s where some of us get tripped up.

We’re all writers. We’re all at one skill level or another. But nobody’s impressed with all the fancy shit. When you’re telling a story, there’s no need to say, “The azure sky was lined with swaths of crimson, burnt sienna, violet, pink, orange and yellow as the sun began to set over the ocean as my lover and I walked hand in hand, barefoot on the still warm, brownish-white, pebble fine sand, pausing only to gaze into each others’ love-filled baby-blue eyes.”

Ain’t nobody looking for Shakespeare or Hemingway. Nobody tells a story like that. “Jamie and I walked along the beach barefoot, stopping periodically to gaze into each others’ eyes. The sun was setting and was lit up in shades of pink, purple and orange. The sand was still warm under our feet.” See the difference?

Tell the story. Make the reader feel the story. Keep it simple. As one of my former law professors used to say, “You use far too many words to say far too little.”

Yes, use proper grammar. Yes, structure your sentences and paragraphs properly. But TELL me the story. Tell it to me like I’m sitting with you.

2. Don’t Pander: I know there are writers that will tell you to research the judges, especially when guest judges are brought in. Maybe that’s good advice, but not for me.

I’ve seen far too many writers twist themselves in knots trying to please judges they’ve researched on Google. If the judge happens to be gay, all of a sudden, they write gay characters. If the judge is from a certain geographical area, suddenly, that area shows up in their challenge pieces. You get the idea.

Come on! Do you not think these people, accomplished in their own right, don’t see that? If I see it, they see it.

Also, it's not necessary to write a blub at the beginning of your story explaining that it's for the "Such and Such Challenge." That's obvious because you entered it in said challenge.

I'm not sure why people do this. Maybe to draw attention to the piece. Maybe it's just a habit or an idiosyncrasy in their writing.

It could be just me, but that type of thing reminds me of trying to do a 7th-grade book report and tossing in a bunch of extra words just to hit the word count. It's a distraction from what might well be an excellent story.

3. Follow The Instructions: This one is dicey. We all remember the ruckus last year when Vocal chose winners that clearly did not follow the guidelines. I’m assuming they learned their lesson. I hope they did. Because I was pissed as hell too!

As a former lawyer, I guess I’m a stickler for rules. I’m not going to be that person who wins and can be accused of breaking them. I win fair and square or not at all.

4. Top Story Doesn’t Equal Win: I’ve had 3 top stories. One got second place in a challenge. My first place winners were never top stories.

5. Reads Don't Equal Win: I’ve already said my reads are crap. My first win had 9 reads. NINE. My most recent had 4 before I won. It seriously isn’t a popularity contest.

6. Make Us Feel!: If you can tell a story and get them in the feels, you have a shot. Make the reader feel something, anything. Make them cry, laugh, get angry, whatever, but leave an impression.

7. Pictures: Maybe it’s just me, but any story I’ve won with has had a handful of pictures, not just a cover. I think it’s part of the “make them feel” thing.

8. Keep Trying: Storytelling, as they call it, is a subjective thing. You can’t really predict what any one or two people are going to resonate with.

Just write. Let it flow. Don’t get too caught up in judges or style. Read others’ work, but try not to compare yourself to them. Sure, learn something if you can, that’s always good. A writer needs to read. But when it comes to challenges, just tell your story.

That’s really all I did.

You can find my other winning stories here:

****************

Originally published on Medium.com, edited to provide updates