A Shorty Awards How To

The third annual Shorty Awards are under way and as has happened in the first two years of the awards there is some confusion about how you nominate someone (or support an existing nomination). More on that in a moment …

The Shorty Awards honor the best people and organizations on Twitter and social media and are presented in early March by the Real-Time Academy of Short Form Arts & Sciences – made up of such luminaries as Alyssa Milano, actress and philanthropist (@Alyssa_Milano), David Pogue (@Pogue), New York Times columnist and author of The World According to Twitter and Alberto Ibargüen (@ibarguen), President and CEO of the Knight Foundation (@knightfdn), one of the awards’ sponsors.

Nominations are now being taken in dozens of official categories may be made through Twitter or the official Shorty Awards website. There are also thousands of crowd-sourced categories. For the first time this year, the Shorty Awards will also honor the industry's best agencies and social media professionals

And, although the awards site insists you can nominate someone simply by tweeting out a nomination, it seems some or many of these do not get caught by the awards site. Therefore to be sure you successfully nominate your favorites on Twitter and in social media, you should follow these steps:

1.Go to the official Shorty Awards website and locate the turquoise “Shorty Voting” bar mid-page.

2.Enter your nominee’s Twitter name and pick the appropriate category.

3. Complete the sentence “I nominate @TwitterUser for a Shorty Award in #category because....”

4. Click the “Tweet Your Vote” button (where you will be asked go through a Twitter authorization page).

If you don’t follow the protocol for the tweet your vote will not be recorded.

And you need to do this soon because in February, the nominees will be narrowed down to six finalists in each category. Winners will then be determined by a round of public voting and by the members of the Real-Time Academy.

So, what are you waiting for? Get nominating and contribute tom this great social media event.