was sold for, movements of editors from one publishing house to the next, and
publishing house changes.
Collecting and maintaining all this information shouldn’t be viewed as a
chore. It's vital business intelligence. It could also help you to increase your income
by many thousands of dollars each year.
Task Two: Send out ten query letters to agents and publishers
Agents and publishers take time to respond. So today you'll create a query letter for
your proposal, and will send it out to ten agents and publishers. You can choose to
send only to agents, or only to publishers, or you may want to send out five to each
group.
Today you write your proposal query letter
Now you're written the blurb for your book, and the chapter outline, the next step is to
start asking agents and publishers whether they’re interested in looking at the proposal
for your book. This means that you'll send out a query letter, asking agents and
publishers to look at your proposal.
Note: some new authors want to omit this step. They figure --- hey, I'll just
send the complete proposal, so I get a response faster. Unfortunately, sending a
complete unsolicited proposal will SLOW the process. Agents and publishers receive
so many packages of material that they stack them in a spare office, and the office
junior gets to read them once every couple of months. Send a query letter, then send
the proposals to those people who've asked to see it.
Do you need an agent?
Yes. And no. It can sometimes be harder to get an agent than it is to get a publisher,
so it's a good idea to query both. When you get an agent, you can tell the agent which
publishers you've already queried. If you get an agent before you get a publisher, you
can approach agents who are a good fit for your book to ask them whether they will
handle the contract negotiations for you.
You definitely need an agent if you intend to write more than one book. As to
whether you should go agent-hunting, the answer is a definite yes. This isn't only
because an agent will take a lot of the submission and negotiation workload, and
because the agent has (one hopes) her fingers constantly on the pulse of publishing