Excerpt from The Writers Conference Guide: Getting The Most of Your Time & Money
Now that you have absorbed the lessons learned from Johnny Cash in the movie Walk the Line and developed your elevator pitch through the original idea you don’t need to worry about your editor or agent appointment. And really, you don’t.
Prep at Home
We often see writers who have well developed pitches, get to the conference, start having group ‘pitch practices’ and before they know it, they have no idea what they are pitching anymore or it has become so rehearsed the excitement has left the building.
If you have your original idea, you have the foundation for your pitch. Take that, sit down with your fellow writers and brainstorm it out. When you hit the perfect idea, the entire group will feel it.
Take a Class on Pitching
Many writing groups have monthly meetings where they bring in speakers. Jennifer often volunteers her time to a couple local groups right before the summer push for National Conferences to work on pitches. There are on-line groups, such as many of the workshops we offer at Write It Forward.
Bob spends a good portion of his Novel Writer’s One-Day Workshop and in his Write It Forward Workshop developing Idea and Pitch.
We also recommend that you attend a pitch workshop at the conference, although we highly recommend that you don’t go stressing over your pitch and start reworking it. It might be a good idea to take this workshop during a conference where you are not pitching.
Also, it doesn’t have to be a pitching class. Workshops on developing idea, character and plot can be helpful to developing the perfect pitch.
The Pitch is Really a Conversation
Remember, your editor or agent appointment is a two-way conversation. So, after the introductions are done, and you give your one-sentence, pause. Take a breath. The one sentence you worked so hard on with your group is meant to entice, intrigue and make the person on the receiving end want to know more. At this point, the editor or agent might have a question.
If not, you move on. This is where Jennifer’s idea of having at least five sentences that, while they are not a rehearsed pitch, they are a natural progression in the conversation comes in. It’s also good practice for back cover copy writing and the foundation for the rest of your query letter. One thing always leads to the other.
For example:
- What if your mother hadn’t been murdered, but she was alive and well and living sixty miles away?
- Katie Bateman has spent her entire career finding lost love ones for other people, but she can’t find one missing body, her mother’s, and give her a proper burial.
- Now the man accused of murdering her mother is out and Katie’s world is turned upside down by a rash of break-ins, threatening letters and a mystery woman who has the same red hair and green eyes that Katie has.
- Could Katie’s mother really be alive? If so, then why did her uncle go to jail, almost willingly for a murder he didn’t commit.
- As Katie unravels a legacy of lies she must choose between the mother she always wanted the uncle who gave up his life for her.
If Jennifer were pitching this story, she would start with the first sentence, and then pause. If the editor did not ask a question, she would continue, pausing after each sentence.
Nine out of ten times, we don’t have to go past the one-sentence because when we pause, the person to whom we are conversing with often asks us something. Answering a question is always easier than having to ‘tell’ someone about your book.
Know your Genre
Understand the type of book you are writing and which publishing houses would be interested. This not only helps in picking who to pitch to, but often editors and agents want to know you have a good handle on the industry and know your genre.
Have Questions
Often writers view editors and agents as the be all end all of publishing and they are an important aspect of the publishing business, but this is YOUR career. Bob has had 4 agents and Jennifer has had 2. The agent/author relationship is a business relationship and you have to make sure the person is the right agent for you.
Some of these questions might not be appropriate during the actual pitch session, but some will be. If they request material (and they most likely will) you need to know how to get it to them. Many have moved into the digital age and want only email submissions. How long does it take to respond to a partial? A full?
Often you can find these answers on their websites, but it doesn’t hurt to discuss them face-to-face. While they are deciding if the book is something you can sell, you are deciding if this is a person you can do business with.
Nervousness
You are going to be nervous. That is a given. The editors and agents know and understand this and try to make you feel comfortable. They want to find the diamond in the rough. They want you to be the one they buy and say “I met this person during a pitch session at such and such a conference.”
When you are in line, waiting to go to your pitch session, help ease your mind, and the mind of other writers by asking other authors who they are pitching to and about their books. It will help you relax before your pitch. This is the only time we give you permission to practice at the conference.
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