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Tag: pitch

  • 3 Real-World Examples of Freelance Writing Pitches That Sold

    3 Real-World Examples of Freelance Writing Pitches That Sold

    What does it take to land an article in one of your favorite publications?

    Luck and personal connections may help, but here at The Write Life we believe that doing the work — and doing it over and over again – helps you achieve expert level.

    But crafting the perfect pitch can be tricky, even for experienced writers.

    Here, we’ll dive into three real examples from writers with various industry experience. While each takes a different approach in their pitching style, all three got hired to write the story they pitched. And each has lessons you can take back to your own pitches.

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    Example 1: Expert sources seal the deal

    The article: America’s Obsession With Social Media Is Undermining The Democratic Process by Lisa Rabasca Roepe, appearing on Quartz

    The pitch:

    Hi [redacted for privacy],

    I saw your post in [private Facebook group] a while back asking for pitches for the Ideas Section of Quartz.

    Here’s a pitch for you to consider.

    Voters are creating an election echo chamber 

    Voters today are embracing presidential candidates who appeal to their specific passions and ideals much like they only trust news sources that align with their ideological views.

    Our ability to self-select our newsfeed via Facebook, Twitter and even whether our main source of news is MSNBC or Fox News is creating an echo chamber for voters. As a result, the only news voters get about their candidate is favorable and the news about the candidates they don’t like is always negative. 

    This piece would focus on how voters are no longer receiving balanced (and, in some cases, accurate) news about election candidates. This is not because the media is biased but because voters have an unprecedented ability to self-select the news they receive.

    This article that would include interviews with:

    • Tom Rosenstiel, executive director of API and former director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism at the Pew Research Center in Washington, D.C.
    • Carroll Doherty, director of political research at Pew Research Center

    My articles have appeared in Fast Company, Men’s Journal and Daily Worth. 

    Please let me know if I can provide you any additional information or clips, or if you have any feedback for me.

    Thanks.

    Why the pitch worked

    Rabasca Roepe was ready with backup info when her potential editor had questions. After being asked how she would prove that voters were self-selecting their news, she crafted “a response full of facts and figures, demonstrating my knowledge on the topic,” she explained.

    She was able to think fast and back up her argument to give the editor confidence in her ability to write a convincing piece.   

    Here’s what she wrote back:

    There is a fair bit of data available through Pew Research Center about consumers self-selecting their news channels and who and what they follow on social media. Plus, for many people Facebook and Twitter has become their main source of news.

    For instance, a study conducted by Pew Research Center in association with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, finds that clear majorities of Twitter (63%) and Facebook users (63%) now say each platform serves as a source for news about events and issues outside the realm of friends and family.

    Pew has also done research on which news channels a majority of liberals and conservatives trust. No surprise here. Most liberals favor MSNBC, The New York Times and NPR, while most conservatives trust Fox News.

    I can tell you that I’m guilty of this myself. I never watch Fox News. My three favorite news sources are, in fact, The New York Times, MSNBC and NPR.

    Some added background about me: I’m the former managing editor of Presstime magazine, the monthly magazine of the Newspaper Association of America. I worked at NAA for about 10 years and I also worked at the American Press Institute for two year, right around the time that news websites first started to allow readers to “customize” their new feeds.

    I think the key to this article will be interviewing experts at Pew and API about the growing trend of consumers self-selecting their news.

    Lisa

    The experience

    An hour after sending her response, Rabasca Roepe’s pitch was assigned.

    “This editor was great to work with and we ended up working on several stories after this initial piece,” Rabasca Roepe says. “She even bumped up my rate.”

    Example 2: Personal essay personality

    The article: I Work in PR But I Hate Statement Necklaces by Lauren Sieben, appearing on Racked

    The pitch

    Hi there,

    [Name redacted] pointed me in this direction for a pitch about the collection of statement necklaces I’ve amassed but that I admittedly don’t like all that much.

    A few years ago, statement necklaces became a professional crutch for me. When I made the switch from journalism to PR, I felt like the shlubby and out-of-place little sister who walked in on a party of much cooler, older, prettier high school girls. I moved from my job at a local newspaper in Iowa to a PR job in a bigger city, and overnight I became hyper-aware of my dress pants that were too uptight and my Target basics that were too, well, basic. Every woman working at an agency in town seemed to own the same variation of that chunky J. Crew statement necklace, so I went out and bought one of my own (a much cheaper version at Charming Charlie’s, but it was the gateway necklace). Years later, I’m still working in PR, but I’ve settled into my own style and I don’t feel the need to cling to costume jewelry to fit in. And now I’ve got all these damn statement necklaces that aren’t my style at all.

    I’d love to explore this topic as an essay for Racked. About me: I’m a Milwaukee-based writer and a reader of Racked. For a look at some of my past work, you can find my most recent essays for The Billfold and for A Practical Wedding. My complete portfolio is here.

    Thank you so much for your time and consideration. I hope to hear back from you and hopefully we can collaborate soon on this piece.

    Best,
    Lauren

    Why the pitch worked

    Sieben focuses her pitch on how one type of jewelry has impacted her personal style, rather than trying to fit her entire jewelry box into her essay.

    She admitted to The Write Life that her pitches can be too wordy, but in this case the finished essay delivers exactly what she proposed —  something editors always appreciate.

    The experience

    Sieben was asked to add a small section to her essay, but “It went up pretty much as I had submitted it,” she says. “The only downside is that piece went up months ago and I’m still waiting on payment because of some payroll glitch.”

    Sieben returned to the editor who picked up her first piece and has another in the works.Example 3: Adaptability and a new angle

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    The article: A Wine Drinker’s Guide to Climate Change Winners and Losers by Jamie Cattanach, appearing on Vinepair

    The pitch

    Hi [redacted for privacy],

    Pleased to meet you! I saw your call in [private Facebook group], and I’ve got a story I think might be a fit for VinePair.

    I’d like to write a piece explaining how climate change could completely wreck winemaking as we know it, and even render certain varietals and blends impossible to create should temperatures rise too far. I would briefly explain how varietal characteristics depend on terroir — which, in turn, is defined in part by climate — before imagining how certain varietals’ expressions might change should temperatures reliably increase by even just a few degrees.

    Long story short: if we don’t take action, our children might not be drinking the same elegant, cool-weather pinots or slatey Chablis we enjoy today.

    I spent more than a year on-staff at The Penny Hoarder as their head food writer, and I’ve also worked with the Purple Carrot subscription box, Ms. Magazine, BUST, Roads & Kingdoms, RVshare, Santander Bank, Barclaycard and others. I have a piece forthcoming on SELF magazine’s website, as well. Here are a few relevant clips, and you can also take a peek at my website and full digital portfolio.

    Thanks for your consideration; I’m looking forward to hearing what you think!

    Thanks again,

    Jamie Cattanach

    Why the pitch worked

    Without getting too deep in the weeds about the science of this piece or her potential sources, Cattanach sets the scene for a piece that has wide interest even for a niche publication.

    The experience

    Cattanach’s initial contact at Vinepair left the site between the assignment date and due date, which caused some confusion. She had to adjust her angle in the midst of researching her piece, as a similar article was published on Vinepair about a week before Cattanach’s.

    “I had to change my angle from ‘What will happen to terrior?’ to ‘Where will the new fancy wine regions be and also, by the way, some wine growers are totally thinking about switching to pot, isn’t that funny?’

    Despite the challenges, she was paid promptly and was proud to get her first clip in a wine-focused publication.

    The common thread: Networking

    All three of our pitching examples included mention of a personal reference or Facebook group for writers. That doesn’t mean that these three writers have endless connections in the industry. It just means that they’re paying attention and taking advantage of opportunities as they appear.

    As a colleague reminded Cattanach: Your story idea definitely won’t get picked up if you never pitch it anywhere.

    You learn by taking the chance, and doing so with confidence. Good luck, writers!

    Note: We’ve removed some of these contributor’s clips that they shared in their pitches, but the text of their pitches otherwise remains as emailed.

  • 4 Ways to Cope When Your Freelance-Writing Pitch Goes Unanswered

    4 Ways to Cope When Your Freelance-Writing Pitch Goes Unanswered

    Starting out in the freelance writing world, I was full of enthusiasm. I was eager to get my business going; I was pitching all over the place. Cold pitches, job boards, you name it.

    As much as I hoped to be an overnight success, deep down I knew it would take some time to really “make it.”

    Yet, the first days and weeks after sending a batch of pitches were spent obsessively checking my inbox. Now I’m not talking about the rational check-twice-a-day kind checking; I mean the refreshing-the-inbox-every-five-minutes kind.

    I was excited; I just wanted to land gigs and get writing!

    Then it happened.

    I hit refresh one more time, and there it was, “RE: Blog Post Writer” sitting in my inbox just waiting to be opened. I sat breathlessly excited and opened the email.

    “Thank you for your submission. We are not taking on new writers at this time.”

    You’d think I was crushed, but far from it! I practically jumped for joy. Obviously, I would have been MORE excited to see a job offer, but in my eyes, this rejection was a win.

    Fast forward to today. I’ve gotten my fair share of rejection e-mails. But I’m grateful for each and every one of them. To me, rejections mean someone took the time to read my ideas, thought it over and however disappointing to me, just didn’t believe it was a good fit.

    Best you can hope for in this worst-case scenario, the rejection comes with a little feedback that you can use to hone your next pitch. Rejection can sting at times; I’ll give you that. Your dream job, your most brilliant idea, all quickly shot down with a polite e-mail. But there’s a lot to be learned from those rejection emails.

    What’s really hard? The dreaded non-response.

    That’s where my self-doubt really takes off. A “yes” is a job. A “no” is “try again next time.” What do you make of radio silence? You worked hard on that pitch, and you hear crickets in return. What then?

    1. Make sure you did your research

    Does the potential clients’ submission page mention a timeframe? Sometimes companies will state their timeframe for responses to submissions such as “If you don’t hear from us in 5 weeks, feel free to send your ideas elsewhere”.

    Other times it’s written somewhere along the lines of “We typically get back to writers within two weeks.” Some potential clients will respond within a week, but it’s not at all uncommon for them to take much longer.

    Before you stress out about the lack of response, make sure your expectations are in line with theirs.

    2. Follow up

    Once you’ve scoured the publications’ website or posting for information regarding their timeframe, it’s time to follow up. A general guide of when to send a follow-up email is somewhere between ten to fourteen business days.

    A good follow up will be personal and informative. Cite the date you sent the pitch so they can easily find it in their inbox or voicemail. Remind them why you’re such a good fit for this position (without repeating your original pitch).

    According to writer Chad Dresden, it’s considered appropriate to follow up three times. After that, it’s up to you to simply leave it out there and hope for the best or continue to reach out.

    I’m by no means advocating for harassing editors here. I can’t imagine a “wear-them-down” strategy has worked in anyone’s favor. You’re more than likely going to hurt your chances of a future pitch being accepted by excessively flooding their inbox.

    More often than not, by following up two to three times, you’ll get a response, be it positive or negative.

    3. Recognize a dead end

    Sometimes following up is not an option.

    Many writing opportunities (especially companies looking to hire B2C-Business to Consumer- writers) are fielded through agencies that use pre-generated forms, leaving you without a contact person with whom to follow up.

    Armed with your well-researched knowledge on the company’s’ timeframe for response, you may have to leave this pitch up to fate.  

    4. Get tough

    Sometimes you won’t hear back, no matter how many follow-ups you send. Sometimes you’ll get rejected with zero feedback. “Them’s the breaks,” as they say.

    Being a freelancer is tough, and you need to get tough too. Being a writer, you probably know this by now; it’s all about the rewrite and second look.  

    Look over your sent pitches. See where you could improve. Maybe upon a second look, you’ll think of somewhere a particular idea would be a better fit. Keep pitching, but remember to pitch smart. Take the time to make sure you’re writing for the right audience.

    Ultimately, you need to remember that not all opportunities are the right ones for you. You have move on from the non-responses. But you also have to keep pitching and writing.

    Hopefully one day, you’ll come to see those rejections as small victories as well. Your “perfect fit” is out there, but you surely won’t find it by sitting around listening to those damn crickets.

    How do you deal with rejections — or lack thereof?

  • How Successful, Work-From-Home Freelance Writers Really Find Work

    How Successful, Work-From-Home Freelance Writers Really Find Work

    Aspiring writers always ask me, “What’s the easiest way to find writing jobs?”

    They’re hoping I can send them a link to some magical job board or bidding site where big-name copywriting clients and $1/word magazine editors are posting ads seeking writers.

    Well, here’s the thing: There’s an inverse relationship between how easy a gig is to get and how lucrative it is.

    So the question is: Do you want to do it the easy way — or the way that will land you assignments?

    Where the writing gigs aren’t

    Tons of writers flock to job boards and bidding sites, where they fall prey to clients who offer to pay them peanuts.

    (That’s a metaphor, but actually, I think a jar of peanuts would be worth more than the cash these writers would earn from a typical article.)

    Good clients don’t advertise for writers online because they have professional writers coming to them. For example, you’ll probably never see $1 – $2 per word magazines like Redbook, Entrepreneur or Health posting on job sites. (And if you do see it, it will likely be the case that they’re looking for “citizen journalists” — another term for “unpaid writers.”)

    Carol Tice of the Freelance Writers Den likes to say that businesses that advertise for writers are dysfunctional — and not the kind of clients you want to write for if you can help it.

    And she’s right: What else would you call clients who are willing to sift through thousands of applications from low-quality writers who are slavering to score $5 for an 800-word article? You’re not one of those low-quality writers, so these clients are not for you.

    Yes, there are some paid job boards that vet listings to make sure they pay a decent rate. But those free ones most writers flock to? Not so good.

    OK, now I’ve scared the jelly out of you by saying there is no easy way to find writing gigs. But the good news is, if you put forth more effort in seeking out, qualifying and approaching prospective clients, you can land assignments that pay a hundred times what you would make from some content mill that advertises online.

    Work-from-home freelance writers

    A great truth of freelance writing is:

    Shoe leather counts

    Here’s an illustrative example. Let’s pretend we’re interviewing the writer who earns mere pennies and the one who makes a good living writing, and have asked each of these writers, “How do you find gigs?”

    Here’s what the cheapie writer would say:

    “So, I go to sites like Elance and spend a few hours looking through the ads, and I apply to the ones that will pay me at least $5 per article.

    “When I get an assignment, I bang it out super fast so I’m making $10 per hour! I spend a lot of time scrolling through ads, and write to a couple of potential clients every week.”

    And the writer who rakes in loads of moolah would say this:

    “OK, so I search around online and keep my eyes open in the real world for trade magazines I might be able to pitch, since that’s the market I like to write for. I write for the banking and credit union industry, so another thing I do is when I go to a bank or do any banking online, I ask the person working with me what industry trades they read.

    “When I find a good market, I read it online and figure out what kinds of articles they run and whether the articles are written by freelance writers, staffers (which means they don’t use freelancers) or industry experts (who typically aren’t paid).

    “Then, if the magazine looks like a good match, I write a customized Letter of Introduction that outlines a few targeted article ideas and my credentials. I search through LinkedIn or the magazine’s website to sleuth out the best editor to pitch and their email address, and then I send my LOI to that person.

    “I do this non-stop, even if I have a full plate of assignments. I typically earn 50 cents per word — so a 1,000-word article will pay $500. That would take me six hours to research, interview and write, so I’m earning $83 per hour.”

    Bake your own loaf

    A metaphor I like to use is that many writers go out and pick up crumbs tossed out there by clients who advertise gigs — where they could learn to bake their own entire loaf.

    Do you see the difference in the amount of effort the two writers we interviewed expend in landing writing gigs? One works to find high-quality markets to approach and customizes her pitch for each one (that’s the loaf baker), and another waits for markets to extend an engraved invitation asking him to apply for low-paying gigs (that’s the crumb collector). And you know which one makes the big bucks.

    If you want the impressive-byline, lucrative writing gigs, you need to go out and get them. Search for businesses in the industry you want to write for. Read magazines at the bookstore, at the library and online. Pore over magazine directories like Writer’s Market.

    Learn how to write a compelling query letter and kick-ass Letter of Introduction; these formats are challenging at first, but they get easier the more you do them. Research how to cold call potential copywriting clients. Take the time to qualify your prospects and pitch only those you have figured out will pay you well.

    Don’t just wait for assignments to fall into your lap. Make them happen. Bake your own loaf.

    Your effort will be paid off in dollars — and you’ll be laughing in the face of the clients who want to pay you pennies.
    links

  • Freelancer Asks: Is It OK to Pitch a Piece to Several Publications at Once?

    Freelancer Asks: Is It OK to Pitch a Piece to Several Publications at Once?

    This is one of the most common questions freelancers ask, so it’s a good one for us to address:

    I have a piece I’ve pitched to one outlet, but I know that outlet can be slow in getting back, and the piece is time-sensitive. Is it kosher to pitch it to several places, then to let the others know if one picked it up? Or is etiquette to just do them one by one?

    Our managing editor Alexis Grant, who has experience both as a freelancer and an editor, weighs in:

    Whenever an editor is slow to respond to a pitch, it puts the writer in a tough position. If you pitched that publication, you’re likely hoping, perhaps even desperately, that the editor will say “yes.” But freelancers also can’t wait forever for a reply, and sometimes busy editors don’t respond at all.

    So how long should you wait before pitching a different publication? And when you do, what’s your responsibility to the first editor?

    Here’s the key to handling this situation: communication. (Click to tweet this.) So long as you keep the first editor in the loop about the status of your story, you’re good.

    One of the most frustrating ways to get burned as an editor is to reply to a writer a few days after she has pitched you saying you want the piece, only to be informed the writer has sold it to someone else. So when you decide you’ve waited long enough and it’s time to move onto publication #2, shoot the editor a quick note — preferably in the same email string as your original pitch so she is easily reminded of which story you’re talking about — and let her know you’ve pitched it elsewhere.

    Not only is this courteous; it might work in your favor, too. This is an opportunity for you to give the editor one last chance to claim the story. If it’s time-sensitive, remind the editor about that, too.

    So how long should you wait before you take a stab at publication #2?

    While there’s no hard-and-fast rule, I’d give an editor at least a week to get back to you, unless the story will be old and stale by then.

    Before you move on though, be sure to send the editor a gentle follow-up — I’d send one four or five days after the initial note. Editors often suffer from full-inbox syndrome, and sometimes that means missing pitches that are a good fit for their publication.

    Let’s recap your timeline

    Again, there’s no ONE right answer here, but your timeline might look like this:

    Day 1: Send your personalized pitch

    Day 4-7: Email your follow-up

    Day 8-14 (unless your story is time-sensitive): Pitch another publication, and email the original editor to let him know

    Sound like a plan?

    Do you have a loose timeline you use for pitching editors? Share it in the comments!