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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Same here: I always say to myself, “I don’t get it. I’ve never missed a deadline, I can turn around a rush article with no problem, and the editor seems to love my work. And yet I haven’t heard from her in six months and my e-mails are going into a black hole.”
I’ve been rereading my well-thumbed copy of Work Less, Make More by Jennifer White, and the author brings up the idea of offering not just benefits, but value. Making your deadlines and being a good writer are benefits — benefits that a lot of other writers offer. But what do you do that elevates you above all other writers and makes you indispensable to an editor? What does she really need from you to truly make her job easier? That’s value.
I racked my brain and had trouble thinking of what I could offer to an editor that I don’t already. And then it hit me: Editors need to fill pages, and to fill pages they need ideas. Since I’ve been in the business so long editors come to me, and I rarely have to pitch any more. But what if I offered not just the benefits of fast turnaround, professionalism, and good writing, but also the value of fabulous ideas editors can use to fill their pages, which makes their jobs easier?
So here’s what I plan to do: I’m going to make a list of all the magazines that usually come to me with assignments (generally trade and custom pubs), and I’m going to brainstorm ideas for their pages. I’ll also be on the lookout for tidbits of news they can use, even if they don’t directly result in an assignment for me. I’ll let you know how it goes.
What benefits do you offer an editor, and how can you set yourself apart by adding value? Please post your experiences in the Comments below! [lf]
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The winners have been selected in the first-ever drawing for free spots in my e-course on writing for trade magazines. A total of 63 people entered the drawing; I am so psyched about all the interest in the class. First, I wanted to explain how I did the drawing. Originally, I was going to go [...]
This week I posted Adding Value, about how we writers need to offer not just benefits but also value. The benefits I offer an editor are that I’m fast and a good writer who works well with editors — but those benefits don’t really distinguish me from other good writers. I struggled deciding what value to add, and decided that I would begin generating great ideas for the editors who usually come to me with in-house ideas. Even these editors need ideas to fill their pages, and it’s difficult to come up with them month after month.
So yesterday, I made a list of magazines that usually come to me with work (mostly trades and custom pubs), and sent quick ideas to five of them. By this morning, I had heard back from two of them:
Wow! I don’t usually hear back on pitches so quickly, and with positive messages to boot. The Adding Value experiment is off to a great start.
How will you offer value to your editors next week? [lf]
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