An editor does not read your email as a text. They read it as a request for a decision, and they make that decision in about a minute. The question in their head is not whether you write well. It is whether there is something here for the reader they have, this week. Anything that does not help them answer that gets in the way.
This is the shared part of pitching, and it is the part most people get wrong. The guides in this series go into what changes for a painter, a musician, a writer or a publicist. None of them repeats this page.
What an editor sees before opening the message
Two things: the subject line, and your name in the sender field. That is all they get before deciding whether to spend a minute on you.
The subject line has to carry four facts: what this is, where it is, when it is, and what you want. Compare:
Subject: Exciting opportunity
Subject: Album launch, [town], 6 March: a choir of forty retired shipyard workers
The first gives an editor nothing to sort by. The second can be filed, forwarded, checked against a diary and answered. Most people write the first kind because they think a subject line should be short.
Your sender name is read the same way. "Jo Smith" tells an editor who you are. "Fine Art Services" tells them you are a company, and it does not tell them whose work it is.
The first two lines decide whether the rest is read
Open with who you are, what it is, when, and why this publication. In that order. Nothing else.
A biography does not go here. Editors do not need to know where you studied before they know what you are proposing, and a paragraph of credentials at the top of an email is the most common reason a pitch is closed unread. One line about who you are is enough; the rest can come later, if there is a later.
Three decisions, not two
Writers imagine two outcomes: yes, or no. Editors make three.
Yes, and they reply with a question about scope, timing or images.
No, and they do not reply, or they tell you plainly it is not for them.
Not now, or not me. This is the one people misread as a no, and it is the most useful of the three. It means the pitch is sound but the timing is wrong, or the subject belongs to a colleague, or the issue the piece is aimed at has already been commissioned. A pitch that makes a forwarding decision easy gets a reply of this kind far more often, because an editor can forward something in five seconds and will not do that for a message they have to reconstruct.
That is the argument for putting everything needed in the message itself, or behind one link that opens without a login. An editor forwarding your email to a colleague is testing whether your work survives being read by someone who has never met you. If it needs a paragraph of explanation from you first, it does not survive.
Silence is the normal answer
Publications say this themselves. Colossal states that every submission is considered but that it cannot reply personally. Creative Boom says it does not accept pitches through social media and cannot reply to everyone. Others name a period on their submissions page. Where a page gives one, that is the date to count from.
So the number of replies you get tells you very little. If your list is thirty names and two reply, that is a normal afternoon in this field, not evidence that your work is bad. Judge the pitch by what you sent, not by what came back.
If a page says the publication cannot reply to everyone, that is the answer. Put the effort into the next pitch.
Following up
One message, about two weeks later, in the same thread, not a new thread. Add something new if you have it: a date that has been confirmed, a second image, a change of venue. "Just checking in" gives an editor nothing to answer and is the most common reason a second message is ignored.
If the publication's own page says they cannot reply to everyone, do not follow up at all.
Four words you will meet on submission pages
Exclusive. The right to publish first, held by one publication for an agreed period. When you offer it, say how long you can hold the news, and be ready to name a date.
Embargo. Information given in advance on condition that nothing is published before a set date. It only works if it is agreed before you send anything: an embargo announced in the same email as the news binds nobody. And it cannot cover something you have already mentioned elsewhere.
Press view, or press night. A showing for press before the public opening, usually on the day of the private view or the morning before. This is the one occasion where a short invitation list works better than a general email, and the reason a regional critic will travel.
Lead time. How far ahead a publication plans a piece. An online title thinks in weeks; a monthly print title thinks in months. Sending a print pitch the week before publication is the wrong lead time, not a rejection.
Writing to several publications at once
For news, write to as many as you like, one message each. Say what you are offering and do not apologise for writing to more than one.
For an exclusive, one publication, one offer, one date. The clearest version says so in the first line: "I am offering this to you first and will hold it until Friday." A second editor who learns of an exclusive already given away stops reading your name in the sender field.
What is never right is one email copied to forty addresses. It is recognised in the first line, and it is the reason a genuine pitch gets filed under circulars.
What not to do, ever
- A mailing list. Forty addresses in one message is not coverage.
- Ten-megabyte attachments, or a zip archive. Compress the images before sending.
- A link to a folder that asks for permission, or to a private drive. Nobody is logging in to look at your work.
- A message through a social media account, if the publication's page says it does not take them there.
- A pitch and a paid enquiry in one message. A story goes to the editor, a paid feature goes to the advertising or partnerships contact. See the questions below.
- Signing as your own "manager", "team" or "office". If you are the artist, write as the artist.
What happens after yes
Expect to be asked for the scope, the deadline, images with captions and credits, and the rights. One common point catches people out: for a piece about a person, a company or an event, the words are usually the publication's, and the subject does not get to approve them. Many publications say so on their submissions pages.
This is normal practice among editorial publications. Know it before you start, not after.
Questions people ask
Should I pay to be featured? Often it is the practical route. Media is a market like any other: writing, editing, photography and distribution all cost money, and coverage that costs nobody anything is about as common as a free hotel room. Sponsored features, partner content and paid profiles exist at most publications, they reach the same readers, and plenty of careers started with one. Two things keep it simple. Send the request to the right desk: an editor commissions stories, the advertising or partnerships contact sells space. And when you list the result later, describe it as what it was.
Can I see the article before it is published? Almost never. Editors do not send copy for approval, and the reason is structural rather than personal: a publication that lets a subject approve the words is no longer an independent publication. If you need to correct a factual error about you, say so once at the point of the commission and accept the outcome.
Should I write to a named editor or to the general address? Use whatever the publication's page tells you to use. Where it names a person or a desk for your kind of work, write there. Where it gives one address or a form, use that, and do not hunt for personal addresses elsewhere.
Is it a problem that my English is not my first language? No. Write plainly, say what you mean, and do not apologise for it. A simple sentence is read faster than a careful one.
Guides by profession
- Painters and visual artists: How to Pitch Your Work to the Press
- Novelists and short-story writers: How to Pitch Your Book to the Press
- Poets: How to Pitch Poetry
- Non-fiction authors: How to Pitch an Essay
- Sculptors and installation artists: How to Pitch Sculpture and Installation
- Photographers: How to Pitch Photography
- Musicians and bands: How to Pitch Your Music to the Press
- Publicists and PRs: How to Pitch the Arts Press
- Artists looking for an exhibition: How to Approach a Gallery or a Curator
More professions will follow.
Does your publication take pitches, and should it be in one of these guides? Tell the Journal and the editors will open your page and add it.
