Top Choice Awards

What Top Choice Awards does

Revenue mechanics combine a freemium directory model with subscription-based promotional services for winners, complemented by professional services revenue from the Social Questions video series. The go-to-market motion is community-led: consumers nominate and vote during the November-December annual cycle, businesses campaign for votes, and winners are upsold into the TCA Promotion System after results are announced. Marketing and distribution run through the TopChoiceAwards.com and iTrustLocal.com websites, organic social channels on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube (45,000+ combined followers), and email campaigns to the 300,000+ Top Choice Community database. The company is privately held as Top Choice Awards Inc., a subsidiary of Top Choice Media Group Inc., headquartered in Vaughan, Ontario, Canada, with 11-50 employees and no disclosed external funding or institutional investors.

Name

Top Choice Awards

Legal name

Top Choice Awards Inc.

Website

https://topchoiceawards.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2005

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Top Choice Awards operates an annual consumer-voted award survey and curated business directory for local SMBs across 30+ North American cities, monetizing through subscription-based promotional toolkits, managed social campaigns, and video content delivered to a 300,000+ contact database.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Local Business Awards and Marketing Services

SIC

Services-Advertising Agencies (7311), Services-Direct Mail Advertising Services (7331)

akta.pro primary industry

Survey/Panel-Based Lead Capture & Co-Registration Services (BPAFAKAN)

akta.pro secondary industries

Sweepstakes, Contests & Giveaway Administration (BPAFAMAD), Conference & Trade Show Registration Platforms (THAHAFAB)

Keywords

• Consumer-voted awards
• Local business marketing
• Business directory services
• Marketing research surveys
• Promotional campaign services

Headquarters

HQ city

Vaughan

HQ country

Canada

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D, Operations, Others

Revenue model

1. Business Directory Listing (iTrustLocal): Qualified businesses are listed on iTrustLocal.com directory free of charge. Only iTrust Qualified businesses can become nominees in the Top Choice Awards Survey.
2. TCA Promotion System (Premium Winners Services): Paid promotional services available to winners who wish to enhance their winning status. Includes logo license, premium listing, award trophy, decals, pop-up tent cards, desk banner, social media tools, email blast campaigns, and 3-month social media ad campaigns.
3. Social Questions Video Series: Winner interviews premiered on Facebook Watch and shared across social channels, with episodes emailed to the Top Choice Community database of over 300,000 contacts.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

Top Choice Awards runs an annual consumer-voted award survey across 30+ cities in North America and England, enabling local consumers to nominate and vote for their favorite businesses. Winners gain year-round promotion through the iTrustLocal directory and may purchase the TCA Promotion System — a toolkit of marketing services including logo licensing, premium directory listings, email campaigns, managed social media ads, video features, and physical award materials.

Product overview

Top Choice Awards is a social award platform operated by Top Choice Media Group that recognizes local businesses through an annual public voting survey conducted in partnership with iTrustLocal. The core offering consists of the Top Choice Awards Survey (allowing consumers to vote for favorite local businesses across 30+ North American cities) and the iTrustLocal Directory (a vetted business listing platform). Winners receive promotional benefits through the TCA Promotion System, which includes both digital tools (logo license, social media campaigns, email blasts, Social Questions video interviews) and physical materials (trophy, decals, tent cards, banners). The Social Questions series is a video interview program featuring winners discussing industry topics distributed across social channels.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• iTrustLocal: Local business directory featuring only iTrust Qualified businesses in each city.
• Social Questions

Products and services

• Top Choice Awards Annual Survey Annual consumer-voted award program recognizing favorite local businesses across over 30 cities in North America and England, run in partnership with iTrustLocal and promoted to the Top Choice Community of 300,000+ contacts.
• iTrustLocal Business Directory Free online directory of iTrust Qualified local businesses that lists nominees and promotes award winners year-round; only qualified businesses can appear in the Top Choice Awards Survey.
• TCA Promotion System Annual promotional toolkit for winners combining logo licensing, premium iTrustLocal profiles, physical award merchandise, email blast campaigns, and 3-month managed social media advertising campaigns.
• Social Questions Video Series Video interview series featuring Top Choice Award winners discussing industry topics and FAQs, premiered on Facebook Watch and distributed across social channels to over 45,000 followers and 300,000+ email contacts.
• iTrust Qualification Process Pre-survey qualification process that vets local businesses on reputation, service quality, and customer satisfaction before they may enter the Top Choice Awards voting.
• Premium iTrustLocal.com Winner Listing Enhanced winner profile on iTrustLocal.com including logo, description, tagline, photos, video, deals, discounts, events, hours of operation, Google map, and customer reviews.
• Managed 3-Month Social Media Ad Campaign Three-month Instagram and Facebook advertising campaign designed by Top Choice Media's social media team to reach target audiences in the winner's city, with full analytics tracking.
• Email Blast Campaign Custom-designed email campaign sent to voters in a winner's city, with analytics on delivery, opens, clicks, and conversions.

Quantifiable outcome

• Survey margin of error is 3%

Named customers1 record

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature2 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• iTrustLocalcoreTechnology or IntegrationiTrustLocal is the technology platform powering the Top Choice Awards survey process. It conducts the annual consumer survey, manages the qualification process for business nominees, and hosts the local business directory where iTrust Qualified businesses are listed. The survey is conducted by iTrustLocal and winners are announced on iTrustLocal.com and TopChoiceAwards.com.

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves1 record

Expansion highlights4 records

Direct peers

• Angi (Angie's List):
• Better Business Bureau: BBB provides accredited-business trust recognition and dispute resolution for local SMBs, directly overlapping Top Choice Awards' value proposition of consumer-validated credibility. Both charge for accreditation/promotion and serve as a trust badge consumers reference when choosing a local business.
• Trustpilot: Trustpilot operates a consumer-review platform where businesses earn trust signals from verified reviews, mirroring Top Choice Awards' community-voted model. Both sell paid promotional tiers to SMBs that want to convert positive consumer sentiment into a marketing asset.
• ConsumerAffairs: ConsumerAffairs collects verified consumer reviews and brand-research content for shoppers researching local services. It parallels Top Choice Awards' survey-driven approach to validating local businesses and shares the same consumer-discovery use case.

Emerging players

• G2: G2 is a B2B peer-review platform that monetizes buyer-vetted trust signals through paid profiles and promotional placements. While G2 focuses on software rather than local services, the operating model (community reviews + paid SMB promotion) closely mirrors Top Choice Awards' TCA Promotion System.
• Birdeye: Birdeye is a reputation-management and customer-experience platform for multi-location and local SMBs, offering review generation, listings, and social tools. It overlaps with Top Choice Awards' TCA Promotion System (reviews, social, listings) and competes for the same SMB marketing-services wallet.
• Alignable: Alignable is a small-business referral and recommendation network where owners endorse one another, structurally similar to Top Choice Awards' consumer-voted trust program. Both monetize the resulting community credibility for local SMBs.

Broad incumbents

• Nextdoor: Nextdoor is a hyperlocal consumer network where neighbors recommend local service providers, directly overlapping the 'community-voted local recognition' mechanic Top Choice Awards depends on. It also sells SMB advertising products competing for the same local-marketing budget.
• HomeAdvisor: HomeAdvisor is a home-services lead-generation and reviews platform for local contractors, directly overlapping Top Choice Awards' home-services verticals (roofing, plumbing, landscaping). Both compete for SMB marketing spend in the local-services category.
• Yelp: Yelp is the dominant consumer-review platform for local businesses, the same SMB customer base (dentists, salons, restaurants, lawyers) that Top Choice Awards serves. While Yelp is broader and free, both compete to be the trust signal SMBs and consumers rely on when choosing local service providers.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/user/topchoiceawards
• Facebookfacebook.com/topchoiceawards
• Instagraminstagram.com/topchoiceawards
• Xx.com/topchoiceawards

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Top Choice Awards