Our songwriting competitions are open for up to three months at a time. That’s 90 full days. Or 2160 hours during which anyone, anywhere, can submit his songs to us in a matter of seconds.
Yet, we receive the vast majority of our submissions during the final hour. And just minutes after, we’re flooded with emails from individuals who missed the deadline and would like us to make an exception… which we don’t.
If we were to extend a deadline at the very last minute, send a bonus email blast announcing it, and make an ‘exception’ for anyone that asks for it, we would receive more submissions.
I happen to know of a few songwriting competitions that routinely extend their deadlines at the very last minute.
And I have to ask, why do they impose deadlines if they themselves don’t stick to them?