Every so often I teach classes on how to pitch books to editors and agents and I’m also working on a new book on pitching. Among the questions that always come up are how do you know when you have just the right pitch and how do you even get started with a pitch? Unfortunately, there are no easy answers – most pitch opportunities will be different and your books will be different too. You can always find a better way to say something and different people hear things differently and take different meanings from things.
But the one thing that I do know works for pitches or even
for getting started on any book is brainstorming. Recently, I have been working
on finishing edits on a book as well as working ideas for a new story with
several friends. What is the best way to get things started? Well, ideas, of
course, but how do you come up with them? There’s a simple answer whether you’re
pitching or starting a new book. The key
is brainstorming!
Years ago, when
I worked as a TV news producer, I worked alongside several other producers. We
all had our various programs that went on the air at 4, 5 and 6, and we usually
had different stories we wanted to tease or “pitch” during our newscasts.
One of the things I learned over the years was that we
all had our strengths and challenges, and we all wrote our teases to the next
segments in different ways. Those teases
were actually very much like the blurbs I often teach in my pitching classes.
Just like pitches are for promoting or selling a book, those teases were aimed
at getting viewers to stay tuned for the next segment of the news program. We were all arranged in a row 4pm, 5pm and
6pm producers and one of the things we all did every day was to test our teases
on each other. We all knew the stories so
we sort of competed to see who wrote the best one. We also tested our individual
teases about stories the others didn’t have to see if they sounded interesting.
We often found the other person might
not understand exactly what we were trying to get across and we might then
re-write our tease to be more accurate or more understandable.
I often recommend
writers do that with their pitches, especially if you’re preparing to meet with
one at a convention or if you’re looking to write a query letter. Write out
your pitch and then test it on those around you, or your friends, your loved
ones, your writing buddies, your critique partners. . After all, this is
something you will be sending out to total strangers. If your friends have
questions, consider what the interest or the questions of those other strangers
might be. Or eventually you might be writing that in the blurb that goes on
your book or online at Amazon. Are you saying
what needs to be said? Are you attracting
interest?
But there are more cases to be considered. Are you being
too vague? But that isn’t necessarily a
bad
thing. Vague in some cases is good.
What you’re looking for is for them to say, “Yes, I want to read that,”
or “I want to publish that.”
Brainstorming can be useful when you get stuck in the
middle of the book too. Why not try a wine party and let everyone come up with
some ideas for where to go next in the story? Input doesn’t need to be
followed, but it might get you out of a rut and into a new direction that
allows you to move forward.
The writing process can be a quiet, lonely time, but
getting those around you interested in your book can also lead to suggestions
that can help you. Just don’t feel obligated
to do whatever anyone says and let them know that too. Trying to please one
person may be a big mistake. You know what your readers are expecting from your
work, or if you are a new author, pay attention to what draws readers and what
they say in their reviews.
The more you learn about your story whether coming
from others or from inside yourself can only make the story better. I often set my stores Currently I am working on a book set in southern Colorado. Whenever I need brainstorming help, I check in with my brother and sister who can bring me back memories of the old days and the countryside we remember from t he past.
Now I know that some of you may feel awkward about sharing your pitches or ideas with those around you, but keep in mind when you pitch, you will be giving that pitch to and when your book is on the shelves or at Amazon, you are selling that book total strangers. Don’t be afraid to test your pitch, and it’s easiest to start with people you know. When we were writing teases for our news programs, we would be constantly changing things until the words came out of the anchor’s mouth and were heard by millions. Until then, even the anchor might change something. For you, until it is set in print perhaps as a blurb on your book or a description on a website, you can still re-work and fix and polish the pitch. Don’t be afraid to experiment and polish. That can only make your work better.
My only caution is that you don’t want to lose the meaning
of the book. Remember, the story is at
the bottom of everything and selling that story is what we want to achieve. Listen
to suggestions, but don’t let someone else force a change on you that won’t
work for the story. A pitch that sounds great won’t result in a sale if the
story is not as promised. The story is still the bottom line.
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