Making Submissions for Clients

Let's talk a little bit about how I work up proposals and make submissions for clients. For starters, the better the proposal clients sent when they originally pitched me, the better proposal I end up with when I'm doing an agency formatted proposal. I'll never know the client's work as well as they do.

Getting a submission together is the easy part, maybe thirty minutes to an hour if I have a good proposal to base it on, several hours if I don't. The hard part is targeting where to send it. A starting place for me is the market analysis and the comparables the author listed in their proposal. If they've done a good job I find these really do point to books that have a similar readership, which of course points to publishing houses. Their comments on the market in the proposal can help point me to the right market, not to mention give me good fuel to use in justification of the pitch. This is why I try to never skip the proposal step and why our submission guidelines are demanding.

So I start the targeting process, maybe starting at some of these points. I don't start with the market guide, that's where everybody looks, I just use that to check submission addresses and see if there is any new info there or in Sally Stuart's guide that I should be aware of. Seldom does it have the proper contact person. But these guides by themselves are only good for the 'shotgun approach' and that results in burning more bridges than it does in having successful submissions.

I start with the notes I am constantly compiling on who is buying what, how many deals a house has made in the last 12 months, what editor is buying exactly what I'm looking to pitch. I have information here that other agents feed me in our agency, information that clients pass on, I have a half dozen online sources that I search trying to come up with something that points me to a market I feel really good about. I use every resource available to me all to the same end, turning up a genuine market opportunity. It is why I go work so many conferences, to get the chance to directly interface with editors to glean information and why I ask for input from clients who have attended conferences as well. There is no such thing as too much information.

I'm working for the client, but at this point it is more market driven. I may go in looking for a place to pitch a historical romance, following a lead or two and instead I suddenly find myself looking at a great opportunity for a mystery and I have another client that seems a great fit for it. I immediately switch gears and pull the mystery proposal and get it on the way. Then I go back to what I was looking for in the first place.

I'm not looking for somebody who just lists "romance," for example, in the market guide and sending to all who do. That's a serious waste of time for me and for the person getting the submission. If I get a rep for constantly sending them that sort of thing they quit paying attention. No, I want to be sure it is something they are buying RIGHT NOW and want to know the name of the editor that seems to be acquiring it. I want to be able to tell them WHY I think this is a good fit for them.

It isn't uncommon for me to find and pitch a half dozen other things while trying to find something for the one I had as my primary objective. It's a matter of matching the product with the opportunity, and the better I like that match, the stronger the opportunity for the client. If I go too long and just don't seem to come up with a match I may have to go to a client and tell them I just don't have the right contacts for them as I had to do with a couple recently.

It can make a difference what the editor already has in their hands. I don't like to load them up too much and particularly don't want to get in a position of clients competing against clients. Better to wait until they respond on one and then send them another.

I know sometimes it can seem like some can get submitted more than others, and that's because it's true. It's like going hunting for a deer, but all you see is rabbits, the odds are pretty good it is going to be rabbit in the pot at the end of the day.

I like to have three proposals out on a particular work at any point in time. If I don't have those three out then you can bet I'm starting each submission session looking for something for the ones that are under-submitted. It doesn't mean I'll find them, I may find something else instead. But I immediately go back to the ones I need something for.

Any time you find anything at all that might point to a market opportunity I need to know about it. "And just saying, "Zondervan does books like this," is not a market opportunity. Everything in the market guide lists nearly every publisher doing nearly every genre, but in reality at any given time they are only actively acquiring a few things. A good proposal has to be much better than that.

One last note, once I have a proposal or manuscript agency formatted, I'd really appreciate it if you want to make changes to the work in question if you would make sure you have this formatted version to make the changes on so I don't have to go through and reformat. I don't mind doing it, but reformatting a manuscript requires a full read in the process and that is several hours that could be better spent targeting and pitching your work.

I thought you might like to know a little more about what is happening on this end. After all, we're in this together. As my list is getting full, the bar is getting set higher and higher to join out little band, you may be aware of that from the recent additions. But I have to keep looking. There is always a place for that really good project, no matter how full the list gets. And the reason I keep everyone updated as I do, remember, the stronger our list gets the higher the visibility for us all, and the greater the chance we will sell.

Everybody sells in 08.