Blog Coaching - Finding Your Market

Martin (the blog coachee) has sent me the following information about the ideas he has for getting an article published:

"I am considering a two prong attack.

One article that will be a Cocos trip report/questions we commonly get asked about this destination. A second that is more editorial in nature and I really don't have any photos to support but is about a subject that really interests me. Basic working premise: Seas and it's creatures are in trouble due to a variety of issues, more people seem to be getting involved in underwater photography....."

(I've deleted the rest of his e-mail - no point in giving away free ideas!)

I don't want to dampen your enthusiasm Martin, your ideas are sound. But first I would identify exactly which magazine you are going to target. This is absolutely the first step - too many people make the mistake of writing the article and then they try and find a home for it, but as it wasn't written with any one magazine in mind, a number of issues can get in the way of publication:

The article might not be written in their house style
It might be too long or too short
You might not have illustrative photographs and pictures, which might be a must
The magazine may well have featured a similar subject over the past two years (which tends to be the recycle time for most magazines to cover a destination or subject again)
The magazine may not have a suitable slot for your article
The article might be the right word count but is not written in the style for the feature space

There are a number of other considerations - the key thing is to identify which magazine you want to target and then write for them and their needs.

Tempting to do it the other way, but all it tends to do is lead to frustration. Remember, at this stage your job is to please the editor and make it easy for him or her to say yes, not to try and please the reader.

So Martin, the next step is to identify which magazine you want to target, and then we can take a look at your ideas.

Keep writing...

Brendan

Comments

[Martin Heyn]

Well life has gotten in the way of my writing aspirations. But this week its back to the keyboard. I have identified one magazine for a modified trip report. Researched the back issues for one year and could not find any on this area. For this article I have plenty of photos and word count, about 1200, seems to by typical for this publication.

The second article requires a little more research but I am getting numbers from some of the major certification and housing manufacturers. Hunting around in my very unorganized photo files for supporting shots.