By: Kit Grady,
on 4/21/2011
My illustration is out for Elijah Wants to be a Cowboy story by David Roper, in the Stories for Children Magazine in the April Issue.
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By: Jannie Ho,
on 4/19/2011
By: Diana Burrell,
on 4/18/2011
A couple weeks ago, one of my students — a talented writer with a couple national clips to her name — told me she’d taken a class where the writing instructor said beginning freelancers should write 15 articles for regional parenting magazines before pitching national parenting magazines.
I was flabbergasted when this dog of “writing advice” plopped itself on my desktop, practically begging for a rejoinder. I floundered at coming up with a thoughtful response. “That may be the silliest piece of freelance writing advice I’ve ever heard” is the best I could come up with. (BTW, my student hadn’t taken this gem to heart; she simply wanted to know what I thought.)
Let’s break the advice down. First, the premise: when you decide to become a freelance writer, there are dues to pay and you have to pay them by toiling in the Minor Leagues. There’s simply no sure path to the Majors. One of my first students had zero clips, but scored an assignment at Parenting by presenting a clever idea in a well-written pitch. You don’t need a mass of clips to do that, just some smarts with a side of confidence. I had another student who had a few regional magazine clips score a front-page travel section story in The New York Times. Not only was he an excellent writer with terrific ideas, he may be one of the most persistent writers I know. I’m pretty sure if it took calling Arthur Sulzberger Jr. at home to get the green light on that assignment, he’d have done it, no hand-wringing involved. And I know of other writers whose first clips appeared in Self, Glamour, Parents, and The Village Voice.
If you’re a strong writer with great story ideas and you’re persistent and motivated, there’s no reason on earth why you should head for the Minors just because, well, that’s where new freelancers start. Will landing work with the Majors be easy? No. But it’s not easy for anyone, even if you’re a seasoned pro with hundreds of credits. Yes, it’s possible you’ll run into an editor (or two) who won’t give you an assignment because they think you don’t have the clips/chops. If that’s the worst rejection you experience in this career, consider yourself blessed. There are plenty of other editors who will take a chance on you, so don’t let this fear get in your way. If you’re a solid writer with good stories to tell, any lessons you’d learn toiling for magazines that pay .15 per word can be learned writing for magazines that pay $1.50 per word. So if you think you’ve got that perfect story for Men’s Health or Saveur, swing for it!
Next: You need to write 15 articles for [small markets] before pitching the nationals. Says who? Oprah? The Dalai Lama? God? And why 15? Is there something magical about the number 15? Does it have special powers? Will the skies part and the angels come on down from nigh
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By: Jean Matthew Hall,
on 4/16/2011
I subscribe to the hard copy magazine Writer's Digest. I highly recommend it regardless of your genre, style, or target market. Their website sends me too many emails for my purposes, but the magazine itself is terrific. One of my favorite features is their yearly "101 Best Websites for Writers." I don't want to steal their thunder NOR get myself in trouble for quoting too much of the article or
By: John,
on 4/13/2011
New database of Victorian magazines:
This is a new database being built by people at Ryerson University in Toronto. They are digitizing The Yellow Book and other Victorian magazines, with links to related scholarly resources. Yellow Book is where Aubrey Beardsley really made his work known. Keep checking back over the coming months and years for more.
Timbuktu is the first iPad based magazine specifically designed for children. The magazine combines imagination and technology to engage youngsters in news and stories centered around interesting topics. With a bold and brave graphic style and clear and focused interaction design, Timbuktu is on the cutting edge of educating kids in a fun and informative way.
Art Director Olimpia Zagnoli, whose work we’ve featured previously on the site, chats with us today about her latest project, giving us insight to her new role as well as some juicy tidbits about the magazine.
Where did the name Timbuktu come from?
Timbuktu is the title of a book by Paul Auster. Timbuktu is a place everyone has heard of but only a few know exactly where to find it. Timbuktu is a name that usually indicates something remote and unknown, unreachable by definition.
Instead it’s a place that really exists! It’s in the desert of Mali and now it’s also on the iPad!
On It’s Nice That, you mentioned discussing being the Art Director of Timbuktu with Editor-in-Chief Elena Favilli and Creative Director Francesca Cavallo over tea and cake, which sounds fantastic. What are some of your favorite aspects of your role thus far?
I have to say I love this role. I’ve always worked on the other side before, so this was a new thing for me. Elena and Francesca gave me total free rein, so I was able to play with a few ideas I had in mind and take them further together with Graphic Designer Francesco Ceccarelli at Bunker Studio. I like to put things together nicely, so this was a good exercise for me. Having the opportunity to work with designers and illustrators from all over the world was a real honour and a very energizing experience.
What artists can we expect to see in the first issue?
For this issue we called artists from San Francisco, New Delhi, Milan, Lisbon, Berlin and Barcelona. They belong to different fields of art as theater, fine art, photography, illustration or motion graphics but they all created something especially addressed to kids. You will find Planeta Tangerina, Massimo Caccia, Jan Von Holleben, and many more.
What can kids look forward to in this as well as future issues of Timbuktu?
They can expect a digital magazine with visually stunning content and intuitive interaction design. They can expect a place where they can cultivate their curiosity and strengths. Plus, they can expect to get in contact with everyday news told in a
By: Eric Orchard,
on 3/30/2011
By: Linda Formichelli,
on 3/24/2011
I answer your burning freelancing questions on the blog. If you have a question, e-mail it to me at [email protected]. Have a lot of questions? Consider signing up for a phone mentoring session.
Kim asks: My question has to do with the state of the magazine market now compared with a few years ago. I heard there are fewer magazines: are they hiring fewer freelancers? And with everyone and their grandmothers attempting/pretending to be writers due to lack of jobs with the economy, how do we deal with everyone paying freelancers less now because these people are flooding the market?
Let me address your concerns one at a time.
The Bad News: Magazines are folding.
The Good News: There are plenty more where those came from.
When writers bemoan the state of the magazine industry, they seem to be considering mostly newsstand magazines. But there are literally hundreds, even thousands, of paying markets that are not on the newsstands: Trade magazines, custom publications, alumni magazines, association magazines, and more. I make my living writing mostly for custom pubs and trades these days, for reasons I explained in this post.
Throughout my career, I’ve lost many clients due to magazines going belly-up. But every time I’ve lost a client, I’ve been able to find another one to replace it.
Finally, as Jennifer Lawler talks about in this guest post, we writers always do better if we diversify. I’m sure there aren’t many writers out there who make 100% of their income from magazine writing and are able to pay their bills that way. Most of my income comes from magazines (and websites), but I top off my bank account with copywriting, writing books, teaching e-courses, and even doing copyediting for one client. If you don’t rely solely on magazines for your income, the state of the magazine industry won’t impact you as much.
The Bad News: Many markets pay ridiculous rates like $4 per article.
The Good News: That doesn’t affect professional writers.
As I said in this post, “Markets that pay $1, $2, and more per word are not going to start offering $4 per article ‘just because they can,’ because they can see from these content mills the kind of quality that payrate buys. It’s like saying that McDonald’s grill-jockeys are depressing the rates for master chefs.” There are plenty of markets out there that pay decent rates, but many writers are too lazy or too inexperienced to find them and work to break into them. And some writers just prefer the easy way out of writing $4 articles that they can find as easily as clicking on Craigslist. For the rest of us, there are lots of good markets to go around.
The Bad News: Thanks to the Internet, everyone and their brother finds it easy to deluge markets with pitches.
The Good News: When editors find a professional, skilled writer, they usually stick with her.
It’s more difficult to break in these days than it was when I started 14 years ago, and I believe it’s because the Internet makes it so easy for any wannabe writer to fire off dozens of crappy pitches — which makes it harder for professional, skilled writers to stand out.
But truly great pitches do stand out, and once you do get in the door and wow an editor with yo
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This series of links were included as part of an article I wrote for WQ Magazine,”Markets – from woe to go and getting a foot in overseas! ” [March issue 2011] . Sadly, the actual links had to be removed due to space restrictions so I have placed most of them here.
This list of resources, sources and publishing opportunities on the internet and elsewhere is far from exhaustive. Please do contact me if you have or know of a resource that can be included!
Review Blogs and sites
Book Review blogs
Debra Sloan – The Picnic Basket http://www.thepicnic-basket.com/
Carol Denbow – A Book Inside http://abookinside.blogspot.com/ Magdalena Ball – Compulsive Reader http://www.compulsivereader.com/html/
Susan Whitfield http://susanwhitfield.blogspot.com/
Jo Linsdell – Writers and Authors http://writersandauthors.blogspot.com
Betty Dravis & co-bloggers - Dames of Dialogue http://damesofdialogue.wordpress.com/
New Zealand Writer – http://new-zealand-writer.blogspot.com
Sarah Chavez-Detka http://minorreads.blogspot.com/
Kerry Neary http://kerryneary.blogspot.com/
Free Press Relese DIY site - http://www.prlog.org/submit-free-press-release.html
Sites
All genres:
Goodreads – http://www.goodreads.com/
Children’s Literature:
Terry Doherty Reading Tub http://www.thereadingtub.com/
Reading Tub Blog http://readingtub.wordpress.com/
Magazines that publish short stories and poetry
[I have submitted a list of online journals most on Facebook, some with links - http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150093435850908 and growing.] New additions
Leaf Garden Press http://leafgardenpress.blogspot.com/
http://leafgardenpress.blogspot.com/2009/01/submissions-open.html
Rose and Thorn http://www.roseandthornjournal.com/Home_Page.html
Good Reading – http://www.goodr
By: Linda Formichelli,
on 1/28/2011
When I teach my 8-week Write for Magazines e-course, I get a lot of students who turn in great ideas about parenting teenagers, and some who want to write about grandparenting. Their ideas are unique. Fresh. Interesting.
The problem? There are no good markets for these ideas.
For example, there are very few magazines that target parents of teens. Most parenting magazines focus on moms of babies through toddlers. Parenting: The School Years skews a bit older. Family Circle — a notoriously difficult market — does target moms of tweens and teens. But do you want to spend all your time on a pitch that has one potential market — and one that’s hard to break into at that?
The same goes for grandparenting articles. The only magazine I know of that aims at that age group is AARP. Well, there is a magazine called GRAND, but the last I heard they charged writers $10 to review queries.
(Of course, I’m not the ultimate expert on the magazine market, so maybe there are other publications out there that are for grandparents or moms of teens, that accept queries and pay well. But I don’t know of any.)
My strategy when I want to pitch an article is to come up with ideas first and then find markets for them, instead of finding a market and then brainstorming ideas for it. (Both ways are valid and it’s a matter of personal preference.) Without a particular market in mind, you’re likely to come up with some ideas that seem great but that have no selling potential.
And that’s fine. If you’re brainstorming correctly (as Diana Burrell suggests in her Become an Idea Machine e-course), you’re coming up with tons of off-the-wall ideas anyway. Some of the duds are obvious, but some of them — not so much.
The trick to weeding out the ideas that have no markets is to become a voracious reader of magazines and really learn what’s out there. You need to read magazines that are not on the newsstands, magazines that are outside of your usual areas of expertise. You need to read magazines until your eyeballs hurt, and then read some more!
That takes time. Until you’re at the point where you have a good feeling for what’s out there, you can research markets before writing up your query. Have an idea you love? Check out the newsstands, look in Writers Market, Google your topic plus “magazine,” and go through the Yahoo directory of magazines. Post a general description of your topic on a writer’s forum you frequent and ask the other participants for markets. (Keeping it general lessens your risk of idea theft.)
Finally, if you find there are no markets for your idea, you can tweak it for an audience where there are a lot of markets. I like to tell my students that the ideas you come up with when you brainstorm are just seeds of ideas anyway — rarely does a perfect idea pop fully-formed into your brain.
Whatever you do, don’t fall in love with an idea and write up a pitch right away without finding at least a few potential good markets for it. [lf]
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By: Anastasia Goodstein,
on 1/25/2011
On the cover of Teen Vogue this month we have Lucy Hale, rising star of ABC Family hit drama "Pretty Little Liars" (see YAB member Caro's review here). The Memphis-born actress, who broke on to the teen TV scene in the CW's brilliant-but-canceled... Read the rest of this post
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By: Matthew Cheney,
on 1/24/2011
By: Diana Burrell,
on 1/10/2011
Like many freelancers, you probably made a goal to sell more stories in 2011, and one key element to meeting this goal is having stories to tell. And like many freelancers right about now, you’re probably scratching your head wondering how the heck to find these stories. Maybe everything you’re coming up with feels tired and old … done to death. Boring and uninteresting. Or worst of all, you’re coming up with nothing. Zip. Zilch. And if you keep going at this rate, that’s exactly what you’ll have in your checking account come March or April.
Last year I gave a talk to freelancers called “Five Tips to Finding Story Ideas That Sell” and it seemed to strike a chord with them. Here are the tips in a nutshell. If you’d like to work one-on-one with me to learn how to generate story ideas effortlessly — ideas that actually sell to editors – sign up for my Become an Idea Machine workshop that starts on January 17, 2011 (that’s next week!) Some of my students have gone on to sell stories they developed in my class to places like the New York Times, Discover, Yankee, Parenting, The New Scientist, and more.
1. Memorize the phrase “That would make a great story.” Whenever I’m talking to my friends, mother, kid’s pediatrician, or a person buying bread ahead of me in line, chances are good I’m weighing the conversation in my mind and wondering if there’s some kind of story I could sell to an editor. It’s sick, I know! If my friend is poring her heart out to me about her cheating under-employed husband who just cleaned out her checking account, of course I’m there to comfort her and give her advice as a friend, but the writer in me is thinking, “Wow, I can’t believe my smart, well-educated friend ended up with such a loser. This is the third time this week I’ve heard about smart women ending up with dud husbands. I wonder if a women’s magazine would be interested in a piece about smart women marrying down. Is this a trend?” I’ll be frank: much of the time, the ideas I come up with this way I don’t use, because they’d violate a confidence or just aren’t that interesting to me. The real takeaway here is that I’ve trained myself to be present as a writer (not just a friend/mother/stranger in the supermarket/etc.) during the day — it’s a skill you can develop, too.
2. Focus on what what will be hot a year from now. Right now, there are a lot of freelancers pitching stories about frugality and simple living. But I think forward-thinking writers have moved post-recession and and pitching stories that are a step-ahead of the crowd. No, I’m not suggesting pieces on how to buy a share on a corporate jet or how to live large like Richard Branson — those days are gone. For example, we’ve been reading stories about “staycations” and cheap domestic travel, but I think international travel is coming back; if you write about travel, now might be the time to start looking for stories over the border. As a food writer, I would have been laughed at for pitching a story on caviar two years ago, but right now, it might be a good topic. I could do a little digging and find out that maybe caviar consumption is up around the world. Are caviar producers feeling optimistic again? Is this some kind of economic indicator we should pay attention to? Right now there are “happiness” and “simplicity” trends in literature; before this we were looking
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By: John,
on 12/11/2010
Jillian Tamaki reminds us there was a time when Maclean’s actually used illustrations on their covers (this cover was by Oscar Cahen). I don’t think I’ve ever seen them use an illustrated cover in my 41 years. (By the way, this is me dropping a gigantic hint to whomever is the Art Director there right now.)
By: Linda Formichelli,
on 11/8/2010
I’ve started noticing a theme that comes up with most of my e-course students and mentoring clients: They tell me they want to break into national magazines (usually women’s magazines) so they can make enough money to quit their jobs and make a living as a full-time freelancer.
Of course, I’m very willing to help them. I’ve written for dozens of newsstand magazines, from Family Circle to Fitness, and I have a pretty good idea of what they’re looking for. However, I don’t know anyone who makes a full-time living writing only for these types of magazines, for one good reason: They’re very difficult to work for. It seems pretty sweet to make $2 per word and up writing for a newsstand magazine, but let me tell you — you work your ass off for that money.
Because ideas have to go through multiple layers of acceptance, it often takes months to hear back on a query — and then, when you do, sometimes the editors need the article turned around very quickly. Then, once you turn in the article, the multiple rounds of revisions start. Finally, once the article is finally accepted, you have to wait to get paid. One newsstand women’s magazine accepted my idea in June, the article wasn’t accepted until November, and I wasn’t paid until the following April.
Now, I’m not saying that it’s not worth it to pitch and write for national magazines. Not at all. They make excellent clips that can help open the door to other magazines. And the per-word rate is a factor: I definitely felt like I had “made it” when I got my first assignment that paid over a dollar a word. Finally, I’ve developed relationships with many wonderful editors at national magazines.
But if your goal is to make enough income to freelance full-time, I’ll tell you what I tell my students: You need to write for other markets as well, and trade magazines are a great, often overlooked market for freelance writers. Trade magazines are publications that are created for the members of a certain industry. For example, Credit Union Times is for execs in the credit union industry, In-Plant Graphics is for people who run on-site print shops, and you can probably guess who reads Sheep! magazine.
Here are some of the benefits of writing for trades:
* They’re easier to break into than national magazines. I’ve written for more than two dozen trades, including Funworld, Multi-Channel Merchant, and Call Center Management Review, and I broke into almost all of them with letters of introduction. While many trades are happy to receive pitches, they also often come up with ideas in-house and assign them to freelancers.
* They’re less competitive than national magazines. So many writers overlook this great market that trade magazine editors tend not to be overwhelmed with pitches like their national magazine counterparts.
* They make great clips. A clip from a trade magazine can help open the doors to other magazines. I used mostly trade clips to break into national magazines.
* They’re fun to write for. The people I interview for trade magazines are usually excited to share information about their industries, and that excitement is contagious. You may think it’s boring to write about, say, how to set up a cleaning schedule for your restaurant (which is a topic I wrote on last year), but I disagree. A true freelance writer can find interesting nuggets in any topic.
* They can pay well per hour. The per-word rates can look stingy compared to national magazine rates &md
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By: Kathy Temean,
on 11/2/2010
AAA Southern Traveler is published bimonthly by the AAA Auto Club of Missouri and is sent to 215,000 AAA households in Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi.
The magazine’s goal is to provide readers with a variety of useful articles on travel, auto safety and their AAA membership. The magazine publishes approximately 5 to 6 freelance travel stories per issue. Departments (Travel Treasures, Driver’s Seat, Card Tricks, In the News and Common Cents) are staff-written.
How to contact:
Send queries rather than finished manuscripts. The best time to query is January through April. Please note that we plan a year in advance. We are not responsible for returning unsolicited manuscripts or photos. Send a SASE to receive a quicker response, however, we try to respond within four weeks of receipt. We will consider a previously published article if it appeared in a non-competing publication. Simultaneous queries are accepted; just let us know.
Assignments:
They work from an editorial calendar and assignments are made at least six months in advance. They purchase first North American serial rights for print and electronic distribution. A copy of the magazine is sent to new contributors with the assignment, which always is made by letter. We use AP Stylebook and prefer third-person style. Obviously, the writer should have visited the places s/he is describing.
Payment:
They pay upon acceptance, not publication. That’s the good news. The bad news is you won’t get rich doing this. A feature goes for $300. If it’s picked up in our sister magazine, AAA Midwest Traveler, it’s another $150. We don’t pay assignment expenses.
Photos:
They purchase photography throughout the year and prefer digital images (please do not send slides unless that’s all you have) saved 300 dpi as a minimum as a CMYK TIFF or JPEG. Pay ranges from $75 for a small image used inside up to $300 for a cover.
Things they do not use:
Humor, satire, fiction, poetry, cartoons, reviews
By: Liz Goulet Dubois,
on 10/28/2010
The ravioli-lovin’ staff at Everyday with Rachael Ray have featured my Spongioli super-absorbent kitchen sponge design in their October 2010 issue!
I don’t know about you, but there is something about ravioli that captures the imagination. OK, that might apply to just me.
Anyhow, thanks for another nod, Rachael. You’re cool.
By: John,
on 10/28/2010
Subtraction.com: My iPad Magazine Stand:
Former NYTimes.com designer Khoi Vinh on magazines formatted for iPads and tablets.
In a media world that looks increasingly like the busy downtown heart of a city — with innumerable activities, events and alternative sources of distraction around you — these apps demand that you confine yourself to a remote, suburban cul-de-sac.
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By: Kinderscares,
on 10/12/2010
The cover of Crow Toes Quarterly says: Great Reading for Sleepless Nights. I couldn’t agree with this more. If you haven’t been introduced to CTQ, you’re really missing out on something special. The artistic prowess of this little magazine screams of something so huge, but is contained so beautifully in such a little package. It’s amazing. Just amazing. Every issue is prefaced by an editorial by ‘Your Humble Narrator’, with topics ranging from the CTQ staff’s love of the Fall season, to the ability that a short story has to take you places that you’ve never been before. By far my favorite part of the whole CTQ series, the Narrator adds that little bit of insight into the imagination and creativity that goes into each publication. Never before have I seen such incredible quality in a magazine for children, let alone one dedicated to scary stories and poems. Crow Toes certainly does set the bar at an awe inspiring level. Art-wise, volumes 1 - 14 feature pieces by many different artists, but it’s the seventh issue - the cover depicting a solemn looking little blonde girl - by artist Kristian Adam - entitled DEER HEAD, that really speaks to me. The picture is at both times terrifyingly creepy and endearingly beautiful, giving it the ability to create an uncomfortable yet gorgeous atmosphere. Yeah...I like art. Can you tell?
1 Comments on Crow Toes Quarterly Magazine, last added: 10/12/2010
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By: BookEnds, LLC,
on 10/4/2010
If I am represented by a good agency and am pitching to a top magazine or newspaper, should I mention the fact that I have an agent who deals with NY Times best-selling authors in my bio?
Will it seem strange that I am mentioning that I have an agent but that I, not them, am doing the pitching?
I never worked in the acquisitions department of a magazine, so I can’t say with complete certainty how a magazine editor thinks or works. Maybe one of my readers would know. That being said, I don’t think it could hurt to say your agent is currently shopping your book.
If you are shopping a nonfiction book and you are an expert, I would definitely mention it. It’s something that will give you more credibility as the author of the article and the book.
As for whether it’s strange that your agent is pitching for you: Not strange at all. Few literary agents pitch to magazines.
Jessica
By: Anastasia Goodstein,
on 9/30/2010
This month's issue of Seventeen is, as the cover would indicate, pretty heavily focused on "Fall fashion." Never mind the fact that most schools have been in session for at least a month; it's never too late for back-to-school style guides —... Read the rest of this post
By: Brimful Curiosities,
on 9/28/2010
According to a recent White House Press release, President Obama announced a new goal of recruiting 10,000 Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) teachers over the next two years. Students in the U.S. lag behind in math and science when compared to their peers in other countries and the government wants to see improvements in STEM education. Even at my daughter's school I've noticed they've started to put more of an emphasis on math and science. Each week in kindergarten, my daughter observes and participates in a new science experiments and every week she brings home a math at home worksheet to complete.
This fall I've been trying to focus more on science and math with my kids in our daily lives. While the school will teach the basics, I believe it is important for us, as parents, to encourage the curious minds of children through simple home activities. Starting this past month, we've been trying to participate in Science Sunday every week.
Just recently through Mom Central, I learned of a new science publication for kids ages 6 to 9. KNOW: The Science Magazine for Curious Kids by Mad Science contains short articles and plenty of engaging pictures, experiments, games and activities to help children think scientifically. Right now a free online copy of the Sept/Oct 2010 KNOW Magazine is available for download. A bi-monthly publication, the yearly subscription rate for the U.S. is $28 (Canadian dollars). That price doesn't seem too bad, especially considering the magazine contains very few ads.
My kids and I really enjoyed browsing the magazine online. The articles are laid out in an artful, eye-pleasing way, with the right balance of text and pictures on each page. This newest issue contains all sorts of interesting pieces on shapes, patterns, origami and more. The see-through frog on page 3 amazed my children and they wanted to know more about it. We used the page on Fibonacci Fun in this issue as the basis for one of our Science Sunday posts a few weeks ago. And, there's even a page featuring book reviews by kids! Hooray! This magazine looks like an excellent supplement for home science studies. I also think that the publication might be a good one for public and school libraries to offer for check-out to their patrons. Magazines like KNOW provide the perfect stimulus for kids and parents to talk about and learn about science together.
"I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Mad Science and received the products necessary to facilitate my review. In addition, I received a gift certificate to thank me for taking the time to participate."
By: Anastasia Goodstein,
on 9/24/2010
Today we bring you our weekly sampler of the cool youth media and marketing gigs. If your company has an open position in the youth media or marketing space, we encourage you to join the Ypulse LinkedIn group, if you haven't yet, and post there for... Read the rest of this post
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By: Adventures in Children's Publishing,
on 8/3/2010
By: Linda Formichelli,
on 8/2/2010
I offer to bust readers’ excuses for not pitching magazines — or, if they’re pitching, for approaching only low/no-pay pubs. (By the way, if you have an excuse you’d like me to bust, you can send it to [email protected].) Have a lot of excuses — or a lot of questions? I’m offering a 10% discount off my phone mentoring through August 20. Here’s what a client I helped last week had to say:
“In one half-hour telephone session, Linda covered a lot of ground—she answered all of my questions, offered specific, detailed advice and gave me some fantastic tips and resources. As a freelancer who has experience but is ready to move to the next level, it was a huge boon to be able to speak with someone so knowledgeable and so willing to share her insights. Exactly what I needed!”
—Fiona Kirk
Here’s Jan’s excuse: My problem with NOT writing is that I’m 52 years old and JUST started writing. I know I have a lot of wisdom from my experience but I also have doubts as in I’m too old to be writing this late in life. Am I too late in starting out? Can I learn enough to still be successful? I’m not 25 and starting, or 35, or even 45.
There’s a Dear Abby (or maybe it was Ann Landers) column that I love and always remember when this excuse comes up. A woman wrote in that she wanted to go to college, but she was 70 years old. “When I graduate, I’ll be 74,” she said. “Should I do it?” Abby (or maybe it was Ann) answered, “And how old will you be in four years if you don’t go to college?”
Her point was that time was going to pass anyway, so you may as well follow your dreams no matter what your age is now and what your age will be when you succeed.
Fear of failure is an insidious thing, and sometimes it crops up wearing different masks, like “I’m too young” and “I’m too old” and “I’ll start when the kids are in school/I feel more confident/I take five thousand writing classes.” See your excuses for what they likely are — a fear of trying and failing.
You can learn the basics of freelance writing at any age. You have access to the same tools and resources as everyone else. And as you said, you have the benefit of wisdom from your life experience.
The even better news is that editors rarely care — or even know — how old you are. Heck, they don’t much care about you at all except for whether you can turn in a great piece! I wrote for Parenting before I even planned to have a kid myself. I now write for magazines aimed at women in their 20s and 30s, even though I’m 41.
The trick is that you need to know how to think like your market, and that’s a skill you’ll need as a magazine writer no matter what age you are. For example, if I were pitching AARP: The Magazine, I’d need to understand the issues that people face in their 50s and beyond. When I wrote for parenting mags, even before I had a kid, I had to get into the minds of moms with young children. And when I wrote for a magazine aimed at college-age, minority employees, I had to think about what they wanted and needed to know about the issues that affect them. (And I’m not college-age, a minority, or an employee.)
This is a skill you can pick up by reading magazines, books, websites, and online forums that target all different markets.
I hope tha
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Congrats!It's a great illo!
Love it, Kit! He looks like a great character.