An old saying is applicable to this secret: “It’s not what you know but who you know.” This adage isn’t totally true with book proposals and book publishing. You do need to know what to send to a publisher to meet their expectations, which I encourage through the bulk of this book. Once you understand and write the format for the proposal, the next key ingredient is a relationship with an editor within a publishing house.
You may wonder, where do I meet these editors?
I suggest you plan on attending one or two writers’ conferences a year. Hundreds of these events are held annually around the world (see http://bit.ly/wconferences). Part of the conference agenda is to help writers realize that editors are regular people who love words and books and magazines. At these conferences, you can eat meals together, discuss books at a coffee break and begin to form a causal relationship. It’s also an opportunity to exchange business cards and talk about the specifics of what the editor is looking to acquire for their publishing house.
Almost everyone at these conferences attends for the main purpose of selling the editor a manuscript, proposal or magazine article. The aim of new writers, however, should be to gather information about the publishing business, rather than toT sell an article or book project. The goals for these writers take a dramatic shift during the teaching sessions and they return home with renewed determination to learn the business and reshape their idea. Other writers come to a particular conference year after year and they intentionally target a particular group of editors for their work. These prepared writers study the market and the particular publishers before the conference and target ideas that are appropriate for that publisher or editor.
The editors are eager to talk with these prepared professionals because they have done their homework and are the people most likely to have something the editor needs and wants.
Don’t be like some of the people who attend these conferences.
This particular brand of writer doesn’t want to interact with the editors; rather, they take the hit-and-run approach. During a conference where I was representing a publishing house, I was engaged in a conversation with a writer during a coffee break when another writer interrupted us. He was roaming through the crowd reading name badges (editors usually wear a different color ID at these conferences). When he found one of his targets, he thrust a manuscript into their hands. He looked at my name tag and, knowing that our house took children’s material, he reached into his briefcase, pulled out a bound copy of a manuscript and almost threw it into my hands. “You need this manuscript,” he said. “I read it in the elementary schools and the kids loved it.”
I graciously thanked the writer for his manuscript, tucked it into my bag and continued my previous conversation. At a glance, I could tell that the manuscript title didn’t merit any attention. The writer had included rudimentary and ugly drawings throughout and his format marked him as a beginner. This writer definitely made an impression, but rudeness, like politeness, is memorable. In my role as an editor I didn’t have a “blacklist” per se, but in my mind, I knew that if I acquired some writers’ books, these authors were not going to be good representatives of their books or the publisher. It’s important during your face-to-face interaction with an editor to make sure your impression is positive and lasting.
W. Terry Whalin, a writer and acquisitions editor lives in California. A former magazine editor and former literary agent, Terry is an acquisitions editor at Morgan James Publishing. He has written more than 60 nonfiction books including Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams and Billy Graham. To help writers catch the attention of editors and agents, Terry wrote his bestselling Book Proposals That $ell, 21 Secrets To Speed Your Success. Get a free copy of his proposal book (follow the link). Check out his free Ebook, Platform Building Ideas for Every Author. His website is located at: www.terrywhalin.com. Connect with Terry on Twitter, Facebook, his blog and LinkedIn.
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