Your Guide to the 2026 South Shore Home Life and Style Best of South Shore (BOSS) Awards
The South Shore Home Life and Style Best of South Shore (BOSS) Award Nomination Period is Open: Now What?
As you can tell, the SHD Marketing team gets very excited around this time of year when we can start nominating our favorite local businesses for some BOSS love. We know a lot of our clients and friends like to get involved so we created some recommendations and tips to help you maximize this local award opportunity! Check out the information below and let us know if you have any questions.
What is BOSS?
Best of the South Shore (BOSS) is run by the magazine South Shore Home Life & Style. There are *many* groups and categories spanning everything from restaurants to graphic design (ahem…). Winning a category allows you to promote your business as Best of the South Shore, be featured in their Summer Issue, and attend the BOSS Bash in September alongside fellow winners and local businesses.
The BOSS Nomination Period:
The nomination period is Jan 16 – Feb 6 and you can nominate one business in each category per email address so have fun sharing some love with all your local faves.
The SHD Marketing Recommendation to promote your own business nomination:
Identify the category/categories you want to be nominated for.
Send a direct ask to your friends and clients to nominate you and share the specific link where they can vote. Ex. You can nominate SHD Marketing for two categories: Graphic Design and Social Media Management here.
Make sure everyone knows about the Feb. 6th deadline!
Spread the word to your broader audience to increase your nomination by:
Sending a marketing email inviting people to nominate you.
Posting on social media (posts + stories), you can access the official BOSS assets here (more to come) or create your own!
Consider purchasing an ad that will show in your category throughout the nomination and voting periods. Ad info can be found here.
While you are exploring, please consider nominating SHD Marketing for the following categories:
Graphic Design (Services)
Social Media Marketing (Services)
Best Place to Work - Norwell (a new category at the end)
The BOSS Voting Period:
Voting for the BOSS Winner out of the top nominees is from Feb 23 – March 16. Each person with a unique email address can vote once per day during the voting period.
The SHD Marketing Recommendation to determine who will WIN the category
Once voting opens (and you made the ballot)--SPREAD. THE. WORD.
Identify a core group of friends, employees, and clients to ask them to commit to voting for your business every day. Make it fun and send reminders. Maybe even partner with other business owners to have a voting cohort!
Marketing emails, social posts, stories, and website updates are your best friends here to invite and remind your community to vote for you.
Remember, everyone can vote once per day, so consistency is key. Don’t worry about being annoying, stay visible and keep putting yourself in front of your audience to rack up those votes.
Votes Are Tallied and Announced
After voting ends on March 16th, SSHLS tallies the votes and notifies businesses if they won.
If you win, you can consider purchasing an ad that will be in the Summer issue of the magazine.
Results are revealed in June in the BOSS Summer Issue.
Winners can start putting their BOSS Winner Badge on all of their marketing materials!
Check out how SHD Marketing highlighted our big win last year with this super fun splash page!
Have questions or need help managing your BOSS campaign? SHD Marketing can support everything from strategy to full execution, or provide templates you can use yourself.
Reminder on the key BOSS dates to note:
Nominations: January 16 – February 6
Voting: February 23 – March 16
Winners announced: Summer Issue (June 2026)