Rejections hurt, but as a freelancer they’re impossible to avoid. However, there are plenty of things you can do to give your pitches a better hit rate. You know you’re not supposed to start your letters with “Dear Editor,” should follow proper formatting protocol, and always send your pitches to the correct person, right? You’ve […]
Why Sending Pitches Is Important And How Not To Give Up
Every time I’ve had a row of bad months, they’ve followed a busy period in which I’ve neglected my marketing. Let’s talk about why pitching matters and how to not give up, even when things get rough, in this excerpt from 30 Days, 30 Queries. Why Not Giving Up Matters 1. Pitching is a numbers […]
The Nuts And Bolts Of Turning A Story Idea Into A Pitch
How to turn a topic of interest into a story idea that sells. To this day, the hardest part of querying for me is still the slicing and dicing required to make a generic story idea specific, interesting, and meaningful. When there’s news or a straightforward trend, the pitch all but writes itself, but what […]
The 6 Essential Traits Of Query Letters That Work
Expert advice from an award-winning freelance journalist on how to write pitches that sell. I’ve always been a big fan of watching how other people do things in order to learn. Which is why I highly recommend that if you want to understand how to write saleable pitches, read as many as you can. (Here […]
What Gets Your Queries Assigned? A Top Editor Tells All
I had the opportunity to sit down and chat with a senior editor at TIME magazine. Here’s what he told me. Early in my career, I had the opportunity to sit down and chat with a senior editor at TIME magazine. He’s written hundreds of articles and features, is profiled frequently, and has lived and reported from […]