What Are Some Guidelines for Pitching Ideas to an Employer?

In some fields, particularly writing, employers don't come to you with a job they need done. Instead, you generate ideas, and must then convince an employer that your idea is worth buying. A few tips for pitching your work: — Research the market. Publications like Writer's Market are a useful complement to your own searches of trade websites. A good place to start may be the products you already buy. — Generate ideas that are different, but not too different. You don't want to pitch a repeat of something that's already been done; at the same time, Cat Fancy magazine is never going to buy your article on golden retrievers. — Network, network, network. Most people prefer to buy ideas from those they already know. — Even if you're pitching an idea to someone you know, it's vital to compose a great query letter with an attention-getting first sentence. You may spend more time on this than you do on getting the work done! It's worth it to get it right. — If the prospective buyer has rules for submitting queries and pitches, follow them to the letter. Don't think that the sheer greatness of your idea, or your name-dropping letter, will let you get away with breaking the rules. Many companies use interns or entry-level employees to do a first look at submissions, with instructions to toss anything rule-breaking.

Tags: advice, creative freelancers

This entry was posted on Friday, June 19th, 2009 at 12:39 pm and is filed under Career Resources. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.