I've been mulling it over my head for a couple of weeks now and these are the tips I would give writers if they want a chance at being one of the winners in any of the FanFicFriday contests. This is based off of various things I've seen in both well written stories and not so well written stories.

 Time ~

 Take the time to write a good story instead of slapping a story together in a matter of a couple of hours. By this I mean coming up with the idea you want to use and finishing said story within a couple of hours. There is a high chance that your story isn't going to be well written and will have a rushed, rough draft feel to said story. You the writer are also less likely to convey what you want to convey if the job is rushed.

 Try using an idea you already have in your head if it works or go and take the time to come up with a good idea before writing your story. Then spend the time to write the story. It takes time to write a good story, particularly one that has everything it needs. I saw a lot of stories that were shorter then they could have been. By this I mean they glossed over the details of the story and some of the important details.

 Grammar and Technique ~

 Use proper grammar and writing technique to the best of your ability. If you don't see a particular writing technique in a published book or writers breaking that particular grammar rule then don't do it yourself. Truth of the matter is this isn't just a tip to be successful at the contest. All writers owe it to their readers to use proper grammar and writing technique.

 Why?

 One of the reasons for proper grammar and writing technique has to do with the ease of reading stories. If you don't use proper writing technique and grammar then it can be hard for the reader to read your story. This is particularly true for readers with some kind of learning disability or readers whose first language is not English. Using bad grammar can also cause some people to have headaches or eye aches.

 Some of the things I saw? I saw dialog written in bold font instead of regular. I saw stories that the entire story was one big block paragraph. I saw one story that added glyphs into headings that instead of making it look better made it hard to read. Some stories were written entirely in italics. There were also issues with end punctuation and proper capitalization. Some stories over used yelling in caps as well.

 Summary ~

I'm honestly not sure if Fanfic is going to judge stories based on summary content or not. I do know that they're not going to judge stories based on cover art though. I kind of hope they aren't going to judge the stories on summary content because some of my favorites will honestly be eliminated from the running. This said... having a good summary helps to draw the reader in.

 First... actually have one. There were quite a few stories that didn't have any summary at all and I hadn't a clue what the story was about. Other stories only used a single quote. I know this is a popular trend, but the truth is the quote needs to be very good to draw the reader in. If it isn't... it will need more substance.

 What ever you do DON'T post a sample of your story into the summary unless it is very, very small. This is typically bad writing on the writer's part as the sample posted doesn't tell the reader what kind of story it is. Or these samples give away the stories ending. If a sample is used it needs to be something that will catch the readers attention, but not ruin the surprise. On top of this don't post samples that promise the readers one thing but give them something else in the story.

 Fandom Labels

 One of the top instructions I saw people not following for this latest contest was not using proper grammar and writing technique. The other one I saw was people not properly labeling their stories... aka... “indicate the fandom you are writing about in brackets”. I don't see either one of these stipulations going away and if you don't follow them you're story is very likely going to be disqualified. I say this having read some really good stories that had one or both of these problems.

 I wish my advice were simply be sure to label the fandom as stipulated, but it isn't. I unfortunately have to advise about not using acronyms that only people inside the fandom will recognize. 1D and 5sos works because both bands are actually identifiable by their acronyms by the general public, but not everyone is going to know some of the more obscure acronyms. I had to look up some to figure out what fandom the writer was writing for.

 I also unfortunately have to make it clear that certain things don't count as fandoms because I saw people labeling their stories that way instead of with the actual fandom their story was from. For example... one of the not-fandom labels I saw being used was characters. Other writers used their pairing labels. I think some writers used their OCs name as a fandom label, but I'm not entirely sure. I just know I couldn't figure out what fandom these stories were for.

P.S. Don't label your actual fanfic stories non-fiction as the second category. That actually isn't possible as fanfic is still fiction and thus the opposite of non-fiction.

 Follow Instructions

 No... seriously. Follow the instructions for the contest if you want to win. While the instructions this time around didn't include not submitting the one-shots in a one-shot collection as the judges won't be able to tell which one-shot is being submitted I came across at least one story that actually wasn't a one-shot. It was a chapter based story. This contest was specifically for oneshots.

 Target Audience

 Normally when a fanfic writer writes a fanfic their target audience is a select niche within their fandom. For a multi-fandom contest though you're not writing for a select group anymore. Some things that may be popular in your niche aren't going to go over well outside of said niche group. Yes... you're going to get gushing praise for your niche group, but you're not necessarily going to get far if the idea isn't favored outside of your niche group.

 One of the things to be cautious with are self-inserts and wish fulfillment. There is nothing wrong with some self insertion and wish fulfillment mind you... that's going to happen in all right. I actually broke from one of my norms of not reading for fandoms I don't know well and for some of these stories I was able to easily tell that the OC (original character) was in fact a self insert and there for wish fulfilment purposes. That is not a good thing.

 Another thing I can think up off the top of my head is recycling material from the fandom you're writing for. While the judges may not notice it if they are not familiar with the fandom those who are familiar will. People don't read stories for a retelling of the original story... aka, stories that are recognizable as the original story but with very few and/or minor changes. Retelling in itself isn't bad and that is where we get AUs from, but actually recycling material is not being original at all.

 There are likely others, to many to list. My best piece of advice is to be aware of what goes on outside of your niche group and keep in mind that you're not simply writing for your niche group anymore. Keep in mind that this is not a popularity contest. The judges favorites may not match with the popular favorites. Actually... the judges may like some of the more popular favorites but choose to favor a lesser known work with any given contest.

 Don't Despair and Don't Ego Trip

 Just because your story isn't picked doesn't mean you're not a good writer. If the judges get more then twenty good entries then they're going to have to pick and choose. In fact... if there are a lot of stories turned in... enough to justify having twenty winners... and only five of the stories are very good entries and the others only good entries or average entriesthey may still pick twenty winners.* The stories are going to represent the best submitted for that contest.

 *I don't know if they'll actually do this unless all the entries aren't well written or not. I do know though that in the past the actual professional publishing industry actually had some bad years when it came to what was put out so some of the major awards out there had to select books that did not stand up to books selected in previous years or even later years. They weren't “bad” books... they just didn't compare to other winners.