As my guest poster today I'm thoroughly impressed. When asked to describer herself Erin Lale wasn't pulling any punches "Acquisitions Editor at Eternal Press and Damnation Books and Editor and Publisher of Time Yarns and an author published both self and traditionally." See what I mean.
Secrets of the Acquisitions Editor: 5 Steps to Getting Your
Novel Published
By Erin Lale, Acquisitions Editor at Eternal Press and
Damnation Books, and Editor and Publisher of Time Yarns
If you want your novel
published by a publishing company, there are five important steps to ensure
success. These steps are based on the five most common reasons why I reject a
manuscript submission from Eternal Press or Damnation Books.
1.
Follow
instructions. Read the submissions guidelines and follow every requirement. If
the guidelines say to submit your manuscript in doc or rtf format, don’t submit
it in a different format. If the guidelines say to include a marketing plan,
then do so. “Market plan: whatever will sell millions of copies J” (yes, that is a quote from a real cover letter) is
not a marketing plan. If you don’t know how to write a marketing plan, it’s OK
to ask for help. An author’s marketing plan is just a list of all the types of
publicity and marketing in which the author is willing and able to participate.
An example would be doing a guest blog post via email, like this one except
about your book. Not following instructions is the most common reason why I
reject a manuscript submission.
