I don’t know about you, but I learn best from examples. This is especially true of query letters.

Whenever I sit down to write a pitch, my first stop is usually the Pitches that worked thread on the JournoBiz forums, where writers post the full details of their successful pitches, publisher and all. I could read “how to pitch” articles until I’m blue in the face, but it’s examples like these that best help me figure out how to style and structure my pitch for specific publications.

Here are a few more examples of query letters for magazine articles and book manuscripts that I’ve found around the web, plus a bonus sample query letter of my own that resulted in a commission from a magazine. Hope this helps – and happy pitching!

Sample Query Letters for Magazine Articles:

• Sample Query Letter [freelancewrite.about.com]
• How to Write a Query Letter [PoeWar.com]
• Perfecting the Magazine Query Letter [Allison Winn Scotch]
• Sample Magazine Query Letter [The Published Executive]
• How to Write Query Letters for Magazines [The Adventurous Writer]
• Magazine Query Letter Sample [About Freelance Writing]
• Query Letters That Rocked [The Renegade Writer]
• Pitches that worked [JournoBiz Forums - registration required]
• Getting Published: The Query Letter [NatureScapes.net]
• Sample Query Letter [Six-Figure Freelance Blog]
• Writing for Magazines – The Query Letter [Business Writing by Nightcats Multimedia Productions]
• The Killer Query [Jenna Glatzer]

For an entire book on the subject, check out The Renegade Writer’s Query Letters That Rock. I can also recommend Jenna Gatzer’s Make a Real Living as a Freelance Writer and Linda Jones’ The Greatest Freelance Writing Tips in the World, both of which have great example of magazine pitches that worked.

Sample Query Letters for Book Manuscripts:

• Query Samples [charlottedillon.com]
• The Complete Nobody’s Guide to Query Letters [Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America]
• Query Letter Examples by Carolyn Jewel
• Writing a Query Letter That Sells [writerswrite.com]
• Query Letters for Children’s Book Fiction
• Query Letter Samples [Writing on the Wall]
• Sample Novel Query Letter [Preditors & Editors]
• Anatomy of a Good Query Letter [Nathan Bransford
• Sample Query Letters [Meredith Sue Willis]
• How to Write a Query Letter [Judith Kelman's Writers' Room]
• A Query Letter by Karen MacInerney [BookEnds, LLC]

More examples of query letters for book queries can be found in The Sell-Your-Novel Toolkit by Elizabeth Lyon.

My Query That Worked:

This pitch got me into VegNews magazine last year. To give you some reference, VegNews previously ran a piece on vegetarian travel in London in 2002, hence the reference in my pitch.

Dear [editor's first name],

Things have changed since Alex Bourke first published “Vegetarian London” in 2002. With the Olympics coming in 2012, London is scrambling to clean up its act: parks are cleaner, farmers’ markets are everywhere, and restaurants are putting more emphasis on locally sourced organic ingredients. As a result, London is better than ever for the vegetarian traveler.

Are you interested in an updated piece on London for VegEscapes? I propose an article that covers the following:

* Picnic in the Park
* Dining on a Double-decker Bus
* Market Madness
* Cycling on the Southbank
* Beer and a Curry
* Haute Veg
* Budget Lunch Break

As a vegetarian who lives and works in London, I can provide an insider’s view on this fabulous city, including photos. You can read samples of my writing at the link below.

http://www.monicashaw.com

Please let me know your thoughts. I look forward to hearing from you!

Best regards,

Monica Shaw

Someone on the Absolute Write Freelance Forums recently raised a common question: “How do you manage your time?”

As the 30+ responses demonstrate, “time management” is a popular topic, and not just for freelance writers but for anyone working for themselves. Many of us are trying to squeeze in a writing career around work, family and other life obligations. The “I don’t have time” excuse makes it far too easy to procrastinate.

But as one forum member points out, “time management for sole proprietors is critical…time is money.”

So how do successful writers get things done? To answer this question, I thought I’d share some time management tips that came out of the thread.

First thing’s first: figure out the logistics

If you’re going to make a real go at this writing thing, do everything in your power to set yourself up to succeed. Part of this is creating an environment where you know you work best.

To figure out what that means for you, Tiffany Godfrey has some excellent questions that writers should ask themselves when they first get started:

When I first started writing, I first asked myself the following questions:

1) Am I a night or morning person?

2) What items should I focus on first — blogging, ezine articles, or my book? And how often for each project?

3) How much time can I realistically devote to writing per day?

4) What non-essential activities could I eliminate from my daily activities and replace them with writing?

The power of To Do Lists

To do lists are great, provided you actually use them. One of the keys is setting your to-do list ahead of time, so you know what’s coming when you actually sit down to work.

Matt Willard likes to “set the next day’s to-do list in the evening. Helps me get up and go more quickly the next day.”

L.M. Preston is a morning person:

Every morning I write several to do lists.

- one for work
- one for home/family
- got to do homework with kids
- usually try to do something fun with them too
- one for writing
- one for exercising (I have to – I love food)

After I do this I trim it down and prioritize…

…my advice to you – start out small. Make of to do list of 1 thing you have to do everyday – set a time for doing that one thing. Then add on the high priority things that you HAVE to finish. Then check off what you have completed.

This takes time to condition yourself to do this, but it can be done.

Time blocking

Your stacks of to-do lists aren’t going to do you much good unless you actually use them. But sometimes tasks seem discouragingly monumental. “I know I’m not going to finish my novel this afternoon, so why bother starting?” And even if you do start, staying focused can also be a challenge.

Lots of writers use time blocking to help them get over these mental hurdles. It’s a great idea – isn’t 30 minutes of productivity a day better than zero?

One member pointed to an interview with Kelly Stone, author of Time to Write, who suggests using a timer:

If simply staying focused is a problem, one success strategy is to write in mini-blocks of time. Get an egg timer and set it for twenty minutes, thirty minutes, or even ten minutes. Set it, then write like mad for that amount of time, then when the timer goes off, reward yourself. Go have a cup of tea or switch the laundry or do whatever it is you think you need to do. Then, go back and write for another twenty minutes until the timer goes off again.

Jeffrey Ober, a self-proclaimed “list person”, schedules his time in blocks:

I break my work time into 1-hour blocks. Then from the 1-hour blocks, I take 10-minute breaks where I get up and wander around, aimlessly. But for each block, I’ve got just one type of thing I do during that block. I might do the same thing in more than one block, but not consecutively. Something like:

7-7:50 Magazine Queries (send, respond, dream about, write, research)
8-8:50 Textbook Writing
9-9:50 Fiction Book Writing
10-10:50 Search for other freelance work
11-11:50 Magazine Queries
12-12:50 Lunch
1-1:50 On-line Article Writing (Demand Studios, etc)
2-2:50 Marketing, Web Pages
3-3:50 Research for books or writing

etc.

I know its kind of anal, but it works for me. And I change the schedule regularly (almost daily) to keep it from getting boring.

Hide from the (virtual) world

When I want to get things done, I often isolate myself in the bedroom with the door closed. Just me and my laptop. But that only takes care of my physical distractions – let’s not forget all of the digital distractions like email, instant messenger, Twitter, etc. In that vein, here is an excellent tip from an anonymous poster:

I use Yahoo Messenger to screen e-mails instead of constantly checking it. I sign in as invisible (to cut down on friends and family instant messaging me) but can still see what e-mails come in and if they’re important enough to check out right away.

Read more

Some might argue that reading about productivity is in itself an act of procrastination. But some books and websites can really help.

• Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen. I read this book years ago and his technique, (commonly abbreviated “GTD”), is still my favorite. GTD rests on the principle that a person needs to move tasks out of the mind by recording them externally. That way, the mind is freed from the job of remembering everything that needs to be done, and can concentrate on actually performing those tasks.
• Time to Write: Professional writers reveal how to fit writing into your busy life by Kelly Stone. I haven’t read this book myself, but lots of writers recommend it. For a teaser, check out her interview on Women on Writing.
• 43 Folders. This blog is all about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

Thanks to everyone at the Absolute Write Freelance Forums for all the great tips. Anything I missed? How do you make time for writing?

In writing my last blog post I happened upon the MPA’s How to Become a Freelance Writer, a 4-page PDF with some good tips for new writers.

The article includes advice on how to send clips and writing samples with query letters to editors:

Most magazine editors receive queries via e-mail, although you can send a query letter by mail or fax depending on your target magazine’s preference. When querying via e-mail, it is suggested that you use one of these formats
to send your clips:

* Copy and paste text into the bottom of your e-mail
* Send the editor links to your work at other sites
* Create your own website as a “calling card,” posting several of your articles online to show editors

Do not send an editor an e-mail attachment unless it has been
requested. More often than not, it will be deleted, sight unseen.

One of our goals with Writer’s Residence is to give writers a place to host their writing samples so that it’s easy to send editors links to their work on the web. It’s good to hear that the MPA encourages writers to use the web in this way. I also like their “calling card” metaphor for an online portfolio. After all, online portfolios are pretty much replacing business cards as more and more writing work becomes entirely virtual.

I received an excellent question today from a fellow freelance writer:

I am making my way into freelance writing and I have been rather lost as to what my first steps should be. I am very interested in setting up an online portfolio and was wondering if you could help me figure out the best way to showcase my writing samples. I haven’t yet been published and am not sure how my samples should look in order to appear professional.

Unpublished writing samples should be given the same treatment as published writing samples. Particularly:

• Your writing sample should have its own page in your online portfolio
• It should be displayed in plain text (not as a Word or PDF attachment)
• The text should use a friendly font that’s easy to read

In a nutshell, you’re writing sample should look as professional as a published writing sample, but without the small detail of a publisher’s name included.

The good news is, many publications won’t mind this approach. Take this piece of encouraging advice from The Magazine Publishers of America:

When editors look at samples of your work, they are primarily interested in your writing style and mastery of journalism, rather than where the sample was published or how much you were paid.

In fact, some editors actually want to see unpublished work. For example, HowStuffWorks asks for “a mix of published writing samples and unpublished writing samples (work that has not been through an editor)” in their submission guidelines.

The other option: get published!

The email got me thinking about getting published without published writing clips, and it’s worth noting how easy it is to get published in today’s multi-media world of blogs, web copy, community newsletters, and press releases.

Getting published is not as hard as you think. In fact, you may already have published writing samples that you haven’t considered:

• Do you have a blog? If you’re blogging is of a high enough standard, you can always use blog posts as writing samples. Here’s an example of a restaurant review I posted on my blog, and how I presented it as a writing sample in my online portfolio.
• Have you written business reports, technical manuals, or press releases? These are perfectly legitimate writing samples. For example, I wrote a technical manual for one of my former employers and wanted to use a sample chapter as a writing sample. The chapter was in Microsoft Word format, and would have been a beast to convert to HTML. To get around this, I wrote a little blurb that described the writing sample, then a link to download the writing sample as a .doc file. You can see how I did this here.

For more ideas on writing samples, checked out a guest post I wrote for The Freshman Writer: Getting Published Without Writing Clips.

If you’re a writer with a website, then chances are you’ve got a few samples on your site to demonstrate your work. But have you presented your writing samples in a way that makes people want to read them?

Here are a few things you should do to make sure your writing samples are well-presented and enjoyable to read:

Use plain text

Your writing sample probably lives in a Word document or text file somewhere on your hard drive. It may be tempting to use that file as your writing sample, but it’s well worth the time to put the text from that file onto the webpage itself. There are a few good reasons for this:

• People are wary of downloading files from the internet for fear that a virus might come along for the ride.
• You’ll minimize the number of mouse clicks it takes for them to actually see the writing sample (in general, the more clicks it takes, the less likely people are to actually view something).
• A plain text writing sample is also searchable by web browsers.

Use friendly fonts

Present your writing sample in a font that’s easy to read. Use a standard, web-friendly font such as Helvetica or Arial and make sure the font size isn’t too large or too small. Also, avoid bright colors that strain the eyes. Instead, use a dark font on a light background.

Use thumbnail images

Images are a great way to augment your writing samples with visual pizazz. Here are a couple ideas:

• If your writing sample is from a printed article, obtain a scanned image of the original article and include a small version of that image with the writing sample text (see above). Then link the thumbnail to a larger image of the scan. This way people can see what your article actually looked like in print.
• If your sample is from a chapter in a book, display a small image of the cover of your book that links to a website where they can buy a copy.

Whatever you do, don’t display a huge image that doesn’t fit on the screen. Stick with smaller, thumbnail images that link to larger versions of the image.

An image isn’t necessary, but it can make your writing sample look prettier and give readers a better idea of what it looks like in print.

Use explanatory text to describe your sample

In many cases, particularly if you’re writing sample is an excerpt from a larger piece of work, reading the writing sample can seem a bit out of the blue. A reader might ask themselves, “what am I reading… what is this all about?” Or worse, they’ll be stumped and navigate away from the page.

Give your readers a little guidance and explain what it is their reading. This is especially helpful if you can’t include the text of your sample due to copyright restrictions, or if your writing sample is part of a larger piece of work.

For example, one of the writing samples on my website is my Master’s Thesis, available as a PDF download. Not only is the thesis long, but the content is very technical. So to help non-technical people understand my writing sample, I wrote some text to introduce the sample, and explained how they can download it:

This paper was originally written for my MSc in Computational and Applied Math at the University of Texas, Austin. A link to the full text (PDF) is available below.

When most of us hear the word “DNA”, we typically think of the famous picture of a “double helix”, a coil of two strands wrapped around each other like a twisted ladder. This image represents a magnified view of DNA, a molecule small enough to fit inside the nucleus of a cell. If we zoomed out from this view, the double helix would become blurred into a single, thin strand, twisting and turning within the viscous goo of the cell. These motions are governed by the laws of thermodynamics and are the subject of my Master’s Thesis, A Monte Carlo Algorithm for Polymer Chains.

mastersreport.pdf

Make it easy to find

Make sure you have clear and obvious links to your writing samples from the front page of your website (the part of the site that users see first). If you have lots of writing samples, categorize them in a logical way, such as “Press Releases” and “Newspaper Articles” so that readers can easily find the samples they’re looking for.

As a writer, no one expects you to be a web designer. Luckily, most website authoring tools make it pretty easy to adjust what your page looks like. This can be a blessing or a disaster depending on how you use it. Follow the above tips to make sure your webpage encourages users to read on.

Yeasterday’s freelance folder featured a great article by Danny on the 15 Applications No Online Business Can Live Without. In many ways, writing is an online business in itself, and it got me thinking about the applications I rely on to get the job done. Some of mine overlap with Danny’s, while others are specific to the writing craft.

1. Writer’s Residence

Every writer should have an online portfolio. Naturally, I’m a little biased towards my own.

Alternative Resources:
Wordpress
Type Pad

2. GMail

Gotta have email, right?

3. Google Reader

The ultimate organizer for RSS feeds.

Alternative Resources:
iGoogle
Netvibes

4. Google Analytics

Everyone wants to know how much traffic their website is getting.

5. Google Docs

Web-based word processor and spreadsheet, especially good for collaboration.

6. Skype

Skype rules for making phone calls with people all over the world. Plus, it’s free if the person you’re calling has Skype, too!

Alternative Resources:
Sight Speed
Google Talk

7. Highrise

Highrise rules for keeping track of contacts, leads, queries and more.

8. Twitter

Twitter is a great way to connect with other writers and potential clients, especially people in your target market.

Alternative Resources:
Facebook
LinkedIn

What are your essential apps?

Do you have any applications that your writing business couldn’t live without? Let me know in the comments!

I recently wrote a post that describes how Twitter can be used to publicize your work and gain exposure to your writing portfolio. If you’re still stumped when it comes to Twitter, Janet Barclay has a great series of posts on Twitter Basics:

• What is Twitter?
• Creating Your Profile
• What Should I Tweet About?
• Who Should I Follow on Twitter?
• Odds and Ends

For example, today’s post taught me about Mr. Tweet.

Mr. Tweet will look at the people you’re currently following, your followers, and the subjects you tweet about, and provide a list of recommendations.

So if you’re looking for fellow writers, follow Mr. Tweet and he’ll show you the way! And if you’re already a twit, feel free to follow me!

There’s a great interview with Jennie Crommie over at serenity for the self-employed in which she talks at length about how’s she’s used social media marketing to grow her freelance writing business. I, too, have been adding social media to my marketing arsenal – it’s right up there with my website, LOIs (letters of introduction), pitches and funky business cards.

I agree with Jenny that “social media is all about connecting, building relationships, finding people with common interests, networking, expanding horizons, and learning new things.” But with so many social media sites out there, and new ones cropping up all the time, which are the best social media sites for writers?

I’ve been asking writers this very question and while everyone has a different approach to social media, there are a few specific sites where writers congregate. Check em’ out and dive right in, because as Jenny says, “Social media is not a fad. It’s here to stay… And if you’re in business (and want to continue to stay that way), you have two choices: change or die.”

Best Social Networking Sites for Writers

LinkedIn

Of the writers I’ve spoken to, most agree that LinkedIn is the most useful social networking platform for career advancement. Most social networking sites are all about your personal life, but LinkedIn focuses on your professional life. And with over 16 million users, you’re bound to find other people interested in your niche. The best way to get noticed on LinkedIn is by filling out your profile, expanding your network and getting recommendations from your “connections”. For more details, check out Collis Ta’eed’s article on FreelanceSwitch.com,
8 things you can do to get work through LinkedIn.

Twitter

Twitter is like a cross between a blog and an instant messenger, what the “tweeters” call a “micro-blog”. Twitter lets you post short, 140-character text updates to a public website, which people can follow and respond to if they feel like it. Twitter’s a great place to publicize your work, find new work and find sources for work in progress. For more, check out my previous post on Twitter or read Robert Janelle’s article, Putting Twitter to Work For Your Freelance Writing Business.

Facebook

When my mom joined Facebook, I knew I was in trouble. But this just goes to show how omnipresent Facebook is. What was once an outlet for college students to keep in touch with friends is now the second most popular social networking site in the world, just a notch below MySpace. This means it’s crawling with fellow writers and publishing professionals. You can find many of them by searching for “Groups” focused on writing. For example, there’s the National Union of Journalists, the Poets and Writers Registry, Science Writers and Writer’s Market.

In addition to Groups, you can also use Facebook to promote your website and blog by linking to them on your Facebook profile. You can even set up your account to update everytime you’ve posted a new blog post, thus driving more traffic to your blog. The sky’s the limit with Facebook, it’s all a matter of how you use it.

Best Forums for Writers

Social media marketing doesn’t end on social networks. Forums can be a great source of advice, job leads, moral support, feedback and good old-fashioned banter. Here are a the most popular writer’s forums. Check em’ out and don’t be shy – everyone is very friendly!

• Absolute Write Water Cooler – One of my favorites. With over 14,000 members, this forum is huge and its membership diverse. This very active forum has rooms for just about every kind of writing genre, from fiction to freelance to erotica.
• Journobiz – This UK-based forum has over 1,600 members, many of whom are well-established and a fountain of generous advice. For anyone in the UK, this is a great place to share contacts, information, stories, or ask for help on anything journalism related.
• Accentuate Writer’s Forum – This relatively new forum already has over 700 members and is primarily focused on freelance writing, blogging and web writing.
• Mediabistro.com Bulletin Board – This forum is a great place for anyone in the content industry, including editors, writers, producers, graphic designers, book publishers, and others in industries including magazines, television, film, radio, newspapers, book publishing, online media, advertising, PR, and design. Their mission is “to provide opportunities to meet, share resources, become informed of job opportunities and interesting projects and news, improve career skills, and showcase your work.”

What are your favorite social media sites?

Is there anything I’ve missed? Let us know in the comments!

And feel free to connect with me in the social networking sphere. You can find me on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. Hope to see you there!

We’re in the business of helping writers create online portfolios, so naturally the subject of writing samples comes up a lot. Even so, we don’t often discuss the challenge of managing printed writing clips such as those that have appeared in newspapers and magazines. Specifically, how should you store your printed writing samples so that they’re easy to find when you need them?

Terreece Clarke has a few suggestions on today’s Freelance Writing Gigs. Her key point is: make sure you have electronic versions of all of your articles stored in a convenient place so they’re easily accessible when it comes time to send them to editors or job employers.

Specifically, if your article appears on the web, save it as a PDF. If your article appears in print, save a JPEG scan of the article and store the prints in flat folder or file.

Whatever your style, you need to develop a system. Save time with web articles and keep a list of links and the PDF versions easily accessible to cut down on the amount of time you spend Googling yourself to find your clips. Keep your print article clips organized and in good condition – no one wants to look at a rumpled piece of paper in a submission packet.

My advice is to save all of your electronic writing clips on your website so they’re easily accessible to you and anyone else who wants to read them.

Taking Care of Your Writing Clips [freelancewritinggigs.com]

Have you found yourself out of a full-time job, suddenly forced to cobble a living from various freelance, contract and part-time gigs? Then you’re not alone. Tina Brown calls this “The Gig Economy”, and according to her poll in The Daily Beast, one third of Americans are now working either freelance or two jobs, with nearly one in two (45%) taking on these additional positions in the last six months.

Of course, just because you’ve been wooed into freelancing by the Gig Economy doesn’t mean it’s easy to run your own show. To help all you new freelancers out there, Michelle Goodman of The Anti 9-to-5 Guide has an article on ABC News sharing her 10 recommendations for navigating your newfound freelance status.

In addition to some softer recommendations such as “the alarm clock is not your friend” and “your bed is not an office”, she also includes some really useful advices about taxes (their not optional), contracts (don’t do work without one) and health insurance (a necessary evil).

Read on at ABCNews…

10 recommendations for navigating your newfound freelance status