If your a poet that wants to join contests to win prizes this is the article for you. This article will tell you some simple things that could make the difference in you winning or losing a poet contest.

Today poetry contests are all over the internet and in poetry journals. If you are looking for a contest to join it shouldn't be too hard for you to find a contest that suits you.

If you are wanting to compete just for fun there are many contest out there for you. However, if you are looking to get paid for winning, there are contests that you are able to join that you can enter for free and get prizes that aren't as good or other contests that charge you about $10 and you can win prizes that may be good.

If I were you though, and you were spending $10 to enter a contest and there could be anywhere from a hundred to a thousand people in the contest, I wouldn't waste the money. The odds of you winning are very slim, unless you are an extremely good poet writer.

My advice to you is to look for a contest that has a good entry fee that suits you and a reasonable award if you win. Don't be discouraged if you don't find a contest like the one you want right away, you may have to look through several.

Once you have found a contest you like it is time to get your poet ready to win. The first thing I would suggest is to see who is sponsoring the contest. If the contest is sponsored by a literary journal or a university publication it would be wise for you to read a couple of the poems that the editor likes. You should pay close attention to little details. You should notice what the theme of the poems are and what the style is in the poems.

Once you have looked through a couple of contests from publications that are similar in your style and tone you should check out the guidelines for the contest.

This next suggestion may seem silly but it works. Besides natural talent, the one thing you can do to win poetry contests is to follow the guidelines. Many poets think that if they write unique poems they will stick out with the judges, this is not true though. Judges and editors often do not like people who stray from the guidelines because the guidelines are in place to help them judge the poems easily.

If you want to stand out you can do that through your writing. Don't disobey the guidelines or the judges will find that to be negative and could ultimately not chose your poem, even if it is the best poem. So read the guidelines and follow them all, from the size of the paper to the type of font they want.

My final suggestion is for you to, of course, double check your spelling and make sure there are no mistakes.

Have fun competing and I hope my suggestions help you to win poetry contests!