Boost Your Income With Trade JournalsWritten by Terri Pilcher
Why would anyone want to write for trade journals? Aren’t topics are dry? Don’t they require specialized knowledge? Not necessarily. You may want to consider trade journals to increase potential market for your articles – and for money. Trade publications make up a significant portion of hidden source of funds for professional writers. Breaking in can be surprisingly easy – when you know tricks. What Can You Write? Use a brainstorming list to begin your search for a specialty. To write for a trade publication, you will need in depth knowledge of a topic. Don’t force yourself to learn inner workings of gravel mines when you love elegant designs of classic furniture. Trade publications require professional knowledge of a topic, so make sure it’s a subject you’ll want to spend a lot of time with. Start your list by including things you enjoy and love. Whether you volunteer for a non-profit organization or have a degree in agricultural science, include all of categories in which you have experience. Some trade publications accept articles of personal experience or interviews with recognized authorities in their field. Include your connections with professionals to make your list more complete. Keep this list handy and add to it regularly. Where Can You Find Those Trade Journals? Now that you have a list of specialty areas that you want to be immersed in, you need to find journals that pay for your information. Almost every profession has a trade journal. The first place for you to look is with a professional organization related to your area of specialty. If you love elegant furniture, than perhaps you should consider “Interior Decorators of America”, “American Furniture Manufacturers”, or “American Pine”. Join at least one of these major professional organizations. Membership rates are often cheaper for affiliate members (those not practicing professionals in field). Marketing companies buy organization’s list and send free publications and resources to members. These items may include “throw-away journals”, free journals paid for by advertising. Even if you join organization only one time, professional materials will appear in your mailbox for years. This information will keep you on cutting edge of your chosen industry. Online resources are helpful in finding associations, but they include only a few of possibilities. The most complete resource available is Encyclopedia of Associations found in your local library. It contains most complete list of organizations, many of which produce magazines specific to their members. It may take days for you to wade through this tome, but when you find ten journals that correspond to your qualifications, it will be worth effort. How Do I Start? Begin by researching past issues of magazine. Editors always recommend that potential writers analyze at least six months of back issues and a copy of their writer’s guidelines. This is essential with trade journals. Articles seen in trades are far different in style than those seen in consumer magazines. Pay attention to complexity of sentences, commonly used terms, and assumed knowledge of readers. Style is often less conversational and more technical than what most people read. Many trade magazines use technical terms that are a foreign language to industry outsiders. Make sure you use their language, or you will sound amateurish. Make a list of published topics. You want to know what not to do as well as topics they prefer. Painting and Wallcovering Contractor focuses on professional painting industry, while Walls and Ceilings focuses on plaster restorers and finishers. There is some crossover, but you increase your chances of selling interview with restorer of Sistine Chapel to Walls and Ceilings because of focus. In addition, Painting and Wallcovering Contractor likes articles on how-to meet regulatory standards. If you know of a regulation that has not been covered recently, send a query offering to update their readers on topic. Trade journals often recycle subjects with fresh information on three to four year cycles. If you can approach old ideas in a new way, you can give them an article that they will buy.
| | Give Your Readers A SampleWritten by Jean Fritz
Manufacturers of food products are masters at marketing. When they launch a new product, they hire crews of merchandisers to pass out samples and coupons during peak grocery shopping times. The result – a large percentage of shoppers become first-time buyers after receiving their free sample and an incentive to buy. Many of those buyers will end up loyal customers.Self-publishers need to think like Frito-Lay. Realize that you, as a self-publishing and (probably) relatively unknown author, need to give your potential customers a reason to buy your book, and offering your readers free samples may be just sales boost you need. The great part about your particular craft is that you don’t have to hire merchandisers or deplete your resources; free sampling for writers is cheap or free, thanks to Internet and current printing technology. If you have your own web page (something I recommend), offer your readers a chapter or book synopsis as a free download. Your manuscript is probably already in .pdf format if you’ve worked with any of subsidy houses. Extract your table of contents, promotional copy from your back cover and first chapter of your book, and create a link to them on your site. Be sure to back-link to your sales page, or area on Amazon, Alibris, or other site offering your book for sale. If you do not have a web page but are internet-literate, you can submit your first chapter and Table of Contents directly to Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, or to site FirstChapterFree.com. Use any of “click-for-hits” programs to drive traffic to your excerpts. As these programs are targeted, you can use keywords to drive targeted traffic to your sales page, which increases probability that someone will buy your book.
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