How to pitch a magazine: 4 reusable tips for finding ideas editors will LOVE
Wanna know a fun fact? I won the very first professional journalism article I pitched. For my dream publication, no less. And I’m about to show you how I came up with my winning idea, so you can use it to score a paid byline at your fave magazine.
This juicy chunk of intel is a taster from my course, BadA$$ Pitch, which I made 4 years ago and never promoted. Surprise, bitch — here’s the promotion!
Enjoy this free snippet, and if you like it, dive in and treat yourself to the whole shebang.
Not me reading my own article in print! 😱
1) Read the publication you want to pitch for
Before you roll your eyes and say “Well, obviously”, I should stress that a lot of writers don’t do this. And it’s very obvious when the pitch comes in. So, the first step is to read the publication — more than one issue, if poss.
Follow the publication on social media, join their communities, and immerse yourself in their world. This will do three critical things for your research: 1) it’ll show you the articles, topics, and stories they’re most interested in; 2) it’ll hammer home their style; and 3) it’ll help you learn their values and ethos. All very important for a winning pitch and a knockout finished article! And hey — it might even trigger some ideas in itself, so you could skip all the following steps :)
2) Use an SEO tool to find their most successful articles
Are you pitching an online publication? You can use an SEO tool like Ubersuggest to identify their most heavily-visited articles for a better steer on your ideation. After all, online pubs want as many eyes on their articles as possible, so they can make money.
I usually do this by pasting the URL into Ubersuggest and seeing which pages rank the highest in terms of traffic — what types of articles are they, what are the themes, and are there any patterns you can identify in all the best-ranking pieces? It’s all helpful intel.
3) Search trends, anniversaries, and current events
The quickest way to get a pitch accepted is to provide editors with something timely that they can use immediately. You can use tools like Google Trends to check for seasonal spikes in specific keywords. Keep an ear to the ground on social media or in communities to identify pertinent topics, and search for anniversaries of events, films, albums, and other notable milestones. These are low-hanging fruit from your perspective and for commissioning editors, too.
4) Find a unique angle
A good idea is one thing, but a unique angle is worth its weight in journalism gold. Can you get a unique perspective on the story? Explore it in a context or from an angle that’s never been done? This is the kinda thinking that can take an idea from basic to badass.
And just like that, you’re ready to stress-test your ideas and write that winning pitch! If you want to know how I write mine (70% response rate, with 3 out of 5 pitches accepted immediately, don’t ya know?!) you can find everything you need in my course, BadA$$ Pitch. Go get ‘em, tiger! 🐯
