Tag-Archive for ◊ query ◊

11 Dec 2009 The Promise of the Pitch
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Uncategorized  | Tags: , ,  | 7 Comments

I’m in marketing mode again this week, after my pitching yielded results right in the first week of December and gave me some extra momentum to push. It’s one of those periods when I’m not as concerned about the writing part (and struggling with it a little bit, actually), but am enjoying tremendously coming up with ideas and sending them out in the world.

Many writers, when they’re first starting out, think of querying or pitching as a necessary step to get established, which is, of course quite true. What most people assume though, is that once they’re a bit established either with a publication or with their career in general, the pitching levels will go down and editors will start coming to them regularly with stories.

That is also true, but I think it’s important to remember that as a freelancer (or any journalist, really), you’re never going to stop pitching. The pitches themselves might change– your editor may be cool with a one-line e-mail or a quick phone call instead of a 500-word outline– but you’re still going to be keeping an eye out for interesting stories, and still coming up with ways to convince your editors why they should publish them. This is especially true if you work outside of the country where the publication is based, or if you’re more interested in writing on topics that appeal to you.

Would it surprise you if I told you that I’ve been sending one pitch a day for the past month? (I have three deadlines next week, though, and should probably STOP!)

Actually, part of my yearly goals is to make one marketing effort a day (if I’ve made five in one day though, I’m off the hook for the next four days), so that even if editors are taking their own sweet time to assign stories, I’m not sitting idle. More than that, as I’ve discussed on the blog before, I’m really interested on focusing on subjects that interest me, and that maybe haven’t been written about a lot already. Then again, if my editors are sitting in the US or UK, I’m going to have a much more informed idea of what’s happening in this country, and why their readers might be interested in knowing about it. I’m more likely to come up with untold stories than they are because they’re dependent on the media to get them the information, whereas I’m working my sources.

Regardless of the reasons, the truth is, I quite enjoy pitching for the most part. Finding an idea that gets you excited and then writing to an editor with the potential that idea holds, is the honeymoon phase of the project– when all possibilities exist and anything could happen.

I’m currently starry-eyed about a story idea that I think has the potential for a series in one of the big international newspapers. For now, as I pitch, I’ll dream of how it’s going to turn out. I’ll deal with the reality once the editor gets back to me on it.

19 Jun 2009 The Grunt Work, Up Front
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Uncategorized  | Tags: , ,  | 2 Comments

There is a method to this madness, I keep telling myself, as I wade through dozens of pages of research that I’ve collected. It’s always the same routine. I’ve over researched the topic, and I’m still at the idea/query stage.

I shared the pitch that landed me my first assignment with Ms. magazine on a writer’s message board a few weeks ago, and a friend asked if I really put all that effort into researching every single query?

Well, it depends.

The article I wrote for Ms. was about sex education in India (several states had banned sex education saying it was against Indian culture) and how the lack of it is sending kids straight to the Internet. The information they are going to find there is going to prove detrimental, I wrote. But education is just the first step. Access to contraceptives is a whole other battle. And then I went on to talk about how unmarried women who try to buy contraceptives or get sex advice from their doctors are treated with disrespect. I had already spoken to one woman who had sounded off about her experience and I mentioned her.

This is not news to anyone who has been in India for more than two weeks, and it is a topic I write about frequently. The query probably took about fifteen minutes to write and send out. I’d recently been interviewed on the subject, so I didn’t even have to look it up.

Other pitches aren’t always so straightforward. The thing is, before you can pitch a story, you have to know that there is a story to write and that there are people who will speak with you about it. That takes some work.

Of course, how much work you have to put in a story upfront really depends on the kind of subject you’re tackling, but let’s say you’re writing about a cool trend that would appeal to a women’s magazine. Well, the first thing you know you’re going to have to answer is, how do you know it’s a trend? Do you have numbers? Off you go to find them. Typically, I don’t do interviews before I’ve been handed an assignment, but I’ve now learned that it may be wise to do so when dealing with sensitive subjects. When writing about virginity restoration, with a deadline of a week, I got very close to losing my mind when trying to find a woman to talk on record. So if it’s a sensitive subject, off you go to find interviewees. If it’s a project, will the people running it speak with you?

I’ll typically also run a Google search to see what, if anything, has been previously written about the topic. All this takes an hour or two at most, and I’m ready to answer most of the questions the editor has about the subject and how I’m planning to report on it.

When I invest time and energy in an idea, more than an editor, I want to be convinced that I’m not on some wild goose chase and that there is a story there that I’m interested in. By the time I’m done researching it, I’m usually excited and ready to go. The query all but writes itself.

Usually, the article does too. But without a solid idea and a solid pitch, there’s always the chance that the piece will fall apart when you actually go off to report.

How much work do you put in your pitches? Do you wait for the go-ahead from the editor to do the primary reporting or are you so sure of selling your piece that you don’t mind putting in some extra work up-front?

22 Jan 2009 (Unproductive) Day in the Life of a Freelance Writer
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Uncategorized  | Tags: , , ,  | 4 Comments

7 p.m. Boyfriend calls. Turn cell phone off, roll over and go back to sleep.

7.30 p.m. Grumble grumble. Force self out of bed. It’s time to start the day.

7.40 p.m. Make tea. Eyes remain half-closed.

8 p.m. Call boyfriend in India, wish him a good day, tell him I’m currently working on his time zone and hence available to talk throughout the night.

8.10 p.m. Cook, feed self. Shower, make self presentable for no apparent reason. Wonder if putting on lipstick to work through the night is a nonsensical idea. Decide it is. Make more tea.

9 p.m. What’s going on in the world today? Read news. Read blogs. Get depressed after hearing that 2008 was the worst year for layoffs since World War II. E-mail client-gone-missing: “Did you get my invoice?” Leave out the part where I call her a cheating lying scumbag who is trying to run away with my hard-earned money. Think that might be a tad too strong, seeing as I was the one who forgot to invoice. Am a journalist. Can keep emotion out of it. Also know that friend works in senior management in that company. Am sure to get paid.

10.42 p.m. Log on to writer’s forum. Make a few notes about new writing markets, magazines that are folding, and editors who are hiring. Go into further depression. Why did I choose this career again?

11.49 p.m. Decide writing “A Day in the Life of a Freelance Writer” might be a fun idea. Retrace steps. Consider making more tea. Decide to wait half an hour.

11.53 p.m. Make a list of the things that need doing today. Twitter it.

11.59 p.m. Make tough decision about responding to a certain new-to-me editor. The work is good, the money bad. Want to do it. But don’t want to continue writing for low pay. Reject her offer and ask her to reconsider.

12.01 a.m. Look at the spring calendar for Berkeley in order to plan the next move. E-mail friends around the country for their plans in May, which is when I’m supposed to leave The Bay Area. J offers to show me around NYC.

12.14 a.m. Log on to Facebook. See photos of journalist friends from Berkeley who’re currently visiting Delhi and Bombay. Feel jealous and a little bit homesick. Call Mom. She says she’s busy and to call Dad instead. He tells me to hang in there; the economy has no place to go but up. Don’t really believe him, but play along.

12.21 a.m. Make tea. Drink tea while listening to music. Sing loudly along to “Our Time Now” by Plain White T’s. Hear roommate’s door opening. Shut up quickly.

12.59 a.m. Spend time researching new markets. Send out three Letters of Introduction and get back one e-mail verification note. Go through due process to make sure e-mail is received. Find this highly annoying.

1.27 a.m. Spend way too much time trying to locate contact information for an editor who works at an online publication, has LinkedIn and Facebook pages, and even writes a blog. But does he put his e-mail address on any of them? Nope.

1.34 a.m. Success. Send off another LOI. Have no idea what they pay, so can’t be fussed to write a query.

1.36 a.m. Get bounce message from editor’s mailbox. They really make it fucking difficult, don’t they? Give up. Need a break. Watch Meet the Press on iTunes.

2.34 a.m. Respond to publicist who’s sent me an idea about a client that (surprise) I can actually use. E-mail and ask for a copy of the client’s book.

2.38 a.m. Friend e-mails to say she’s back in Berkeley and do I want to have dinner? I do. I’m going to have to change my schedule again if I want to see her, but she’s one of the most adorable people on the planet, so I’ll make the sacrifice. She better be buying. Strike that. Tell her I’m broke, and she suggests she come over to my place instead. Agree happily.

2.47 a.m. Have a dozen e-mails to respond to. Challenge self to finish those before starting edits on a piece due tomorrow.

2.53 a.m. Boy, there sure is a lot of e-mail. One informs me that Slumdog Millionaire won several awards at the Golden Globes! Woo! Get all giddy and try not to start congratulating people in Hindi, but am thoroughly pleased that good Indian movies are being made and receiving international recognition. Even if they needed that little support from the Brits.

3.05 a.m. Should stop responding to e-mails. No sooner have I hit “send” that a new response arrives. Don’t people ever sleep?

3.22 a.m. God, how I miss spicy Indian food. Don’t know where that thought came from. Feel hungry. Time for uh… lunch.

3.28 a.m. Eating old (and possibly bad) ham and pretzels (yeah together), and watching a PBS special on Afghanistan on iTunes. Call boyfriend to tell him about it, and he tells me he’s going to Pakistan.

“Bastard,” I say.

“Thanks, darling. I thought you’d be happy for me instead of calling me a bastard.”

“It’s only because I’m jealous.”

“They don’t want your kind there, that’s all.”

“Clearly.”

Have wanted to report from Pakistan since the day I became a journalist. Father was born in Pakistan, back when it was still a part of India. His family escaped to India after the partition. Indian journalists aren’t always welcome. Wonder if the same is true for Pakistani journalists in India. Make a mental note to ask Pakistani journalist friend when I see her next.

3.53 a.m. Reply to more e-mails. Will they never end?

4.03 a.m. Video chat with boyfriend. Make fun of American teenagers. Say “Technology is, like, you know, awesome,” in best American teenager voice. Make plans for spring break and end of semester.

5.15 a.m. Tibetan friend, who is a monk, writes to give an update on his life. He says, “We Tibetans say if you don’t make yourself happy, other people make you unhappy.” Twitter it.

5.27 a.m. Make tea. Hear from client-gone-missing who informs me that she was on vacation and just got back. She’ll be sending out my payment as soon as she can. Feel good that I didn’t call her a scumbag. Especially since I forgot to send her the invoice in the first place.

6.03 a.m. Have four edits due to a publication, so think I’ll finish those off today. The publication is a low payer, but I’ve needed the work, so I’ve kept going. They’ve just slashed their ridiculously low rates by half, so these edits is the last of what I’m doing for them. After that, sayonara suckers. Am not really motivated, but decide to finish these so I can move on with my life.

6.31 a.m. Editor e-mails. We’ve been negotiating. She asked for all rights. Said no can do. She’s just doubled the pay. Realize, as I make a note in my income goals list, that it’s almost the middle of the month and I have met half my monthly goal. Had set a target of three times my average income. Am pleased no end. Realize it’s the second time in a year an editor has doubled payment just because I asked. Must do more often.

7.15 a.m. One edit down. Three more to go. Need to go to the grocery store to buy food. Check the grocery store timings online. It opens at 9 a.m. Good.

7.20 a.m. Just saw a call for submissions to an anthology for women. Totally up my alley. Deadline’s in two days though (why did I not see this before?), and already have three deadlines in the next four days. We’ll see.

7.26 a.m. Books. The heart wants to write books. They’re closing magazines right and left, but they’re still publishing books, right?

7.37 a.m. These are not edits. These are bloody rewrites. Hate, hate, hate this publication. So happy I never have to write for them again. (Write under a pseudonym anyway, that’s how much I detest this work.)

8.05 a.m. Editor of Big Newspaper has asked me to do some research for an article she’s assigned. She wants to know what’s new about the topic I’m writing about. I start with Google.

8.31 a.m. Aha! Have found the perfect hook. E-mail my editor a revised story plan.

8.41 a.m. Am hungry. Time to go to the grocery store. Get dressed.

9.55 a.m. Am standing at the cash counter at the grocery store, waiting for my turn when I spot the magazine in front of me– Spirituality & Health. Something clicks. Oh! Have an article in this issue! Flip through– sure enough, my words and photography are in there. Am thrilled. Try not to point at photo in front and tell people around me, “That’s me!”

10.01 a.m. Buy all kinds of healthy food– ham, corn, pasta, potatoes. Get carried away and spend way more than I should. Then come home and have a big bowl of cereal.

10.08 a.m. To and fro with editor on the story I’m fleshing out. She keeps sending me questions. Research continuously and send back answers. Would be fun if I didn’t know that at the end of it, am going to have a fact-checker on my case demanding proof for every word I’ve uttered.

11.12 a.m. Off to read for an hour or two and then call it a night. G’nite, world.

09 Jan 2009 A Marketing Effort a Day
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Uncategorized  | Tags: , ,  | One Comment

For the last couple of years, one of my goals is to make one marketing effort daily. This could be in the form of a query letter, a phone call, a meeting with the editor, or a letter of introduction. 365 marketing efforts is really not that much. Usually, I manage to do a bit more than that.

That’s because all these years, I’ve been cheating a little. You see, I’ve been counting LOIs sent to Craigslist ads as marketing efforts. And they’ve all been the same.

This year, however, I’m changing that strategy. Your mileage may vary, as they say, but those jobs on Craigslist? I haven’t really found that many. Not in relation to the LOIs I’ve sent out. My queries on the other hand, get responses. And acceptance.

This may be because I’m not a web writer, don’t promise ability in SEO, and will not even look at the pay-per-click websites. My queries and LOIs to magazines and newspapers, however, are well-targeted with neatly fleshed out ideas and expert commentaries. I know what I’m doing, and I know I’m good at it.

My goal for the year– and this has to be ambitious because of the number of publications going out of business– is to have one query out every day until either I’m so busy with work that I can’t breathe or it’s the end of the year. Though experience tells me that if I send out one query every day for the next thirty days, I’ll have more work than I can handle in the next two months.

So here’s my challenge to you. If you’re feeling like you don’t have enough work, aren’t writing for high enough pay or are simply up for a challenge, send out a query letter for the next 30 days and see where it leads you. And then come back here and tell me how you did.

07 Feb 2008 QLTS: 6 - Get the Oomph
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Query Letters That Sell  | Tags: , , , ,  | Leave a Comment

Once you’ve mastered the basics, get ready to move beyond mediocre to stellar queries that’ll put you several levels above the competition in the rush for assignments.

While formula queries may be extremely popular with writers, they look pretty average to the editor who receives a hundred or so good ones each week. Editors know how easy it is to copy a writer’s successful pitch and repackage it. And come on, editors are human too. They get bored of seeing the same stale pitches landing in their Inbox day after day. If you can do something interesting and different, you’ll be remembered. And hired.

In her book Feminine Wiles: Creative Techniques for Writing Women’s Stories that Sell, Donna Elizabeth Boetig suggests thinking of your query as a love letter. She advises readers to toss out their conventional notions of a query letter and instead focus on passion, emotion, a sense of urgency, and even a bit of breathlessness. Only by writing this way will you shake the editor from the stupor evoked by reading all those staid, letter-perfect proposals, she says.

Your excitement about a topic, your belief in why something should be written about, your enthusiasm for going out and finding people to talk about this story—it’s all tangible. It comes across in your writing. Which is why, for new writers, I always suggest starting with topics that mean something to you personally.

To put that extra oomph in your pitches, you’ll also need to show the editor what else you have on offer other than impeccable research abilities and a keen eye for detail. Depending on the piece, you could offer photographs, important but not overly written about statistics, and quotes that bring interesting findings to light. I’ll discuss all that in this section.

But an important question before we begin: why put so much effort into one query in the first place?

There are a lot of different opinions on the subject, including the uncertainty of doing so much work up-front for no reward, and the argument that this brings down the hourly rate. You’ll find a lot of reasons for not doing all this research and writing upfront, and maybe that will work for you.

For me, it all boils down to two things: is there a story here, and can I sell it?

Before I take on (or even propose) a topic, I need to know whether there actually is a story there. For that, I need to talk to people who’re involved in those issues, see the current research, and figure out what exactly I want to say. If I don’t know what I want to write, how do I expect my editor to?

Secondly, can I sell it? Since I’ve been doing this for a fairly long time, I can almost certainly be sure of at least one market where my article can be placed. So I have that security and can do some (or a lot) of work upfront.

But let’s consider you. Let’s say you’re a new writer. Let’s say you don’t have much previous writing experience. Let’s say you’ve found a brilliant story, say on new research that could possibly cure AIDS, and you want to propose it to an editor at a national magazine.

What reason does the editor have to hire you?

The more you give to an editor upfront, the more she’ll come to trust you. After you’ve worked with an editor a couple of times, you have a relationship. Indeed, I’ve sent single-sentence ideas to some of my editors and they assign the story. I’ve already proven that I can hack it. But until you have those relationships, my opinion is that you’ll need to do a bit of work upfront to make yourself valuable.

***

Get to the Point

One of the biggest pet peeves that editors have is that writers will send them pitches for list articles, such as twenty ways to find freelance work, and then not list any of the ways. How is an editor going to assign you an article unless he knows what you’re planning to say? Your tips could be brilliant, or they could have been done hundreds of times already. Give the editor a sample or two.

In my experience, editors will often ask you to flesh out a point or two to make sure it works in the magazine’s format. So if you’re proposing eleven ways to make Christmas special, go ahead and list a couple of ways. Or if you want to talk about the five health checks you need to get done regularly, talk to a doctor and mention his list of recommendations.

***

The Name of the Game

The most important “secret” that I’ve learned so far has nothing to do with negotiating, finding fabulous ideas or even querying. It has to do with envisioning.

Yeah, that sounds pretty inspired. But what does it mean?

It means “visualize.” Visualize the cover of the magazine with the title of your article in bold letters. Visualize the page on which the article appears, along with pictures and illustrations. Visualize how the designer will place the text and interweave it with the images to reach the desired effect.

And now help your editor visualize the same thing.

Come up with a working title for your piece. And make sure it’s according to the magazine’s format.

How do you come up with riveting titles? Here are some suggestions from Shaunna Privratsky’s book Pump Up Your Prose:

Alliteration: Choose words with the same beginning letters or sounds, especially for articles, such as “Garage Sale Guru,” “Confessions of a Coupon Queen,” or “Kudos to Kindergarten.”

Play on words: For instance, “The Purr-fect Pussycat,” “Oops! My Dot-com is Showing!” or “The Write Path.” Try to avoid the ones already done to death.

Get poetic: Rhyming your title is a sure attention-grabber. Shaunna’s article about finding an inexpensive wedding dress is titled “Spend Less on Your Dress.”

***

Easter in December?

Being timely isn’t just about sending Valentine’s ideas in October or Christmas saving tips in March. It’s about converting those evergreen topics and giving them a certain time factor. Ways to do this are to associate your idea with a news item (after 9/11 many journalists wrote about dealing with death), linking with a recent survey or study, an upcoming anniversary (September 2004 marked thirty years to the birth of ATM), or a calendar holiday.

***

Picture Perfect

While editors at national magazines and newspapers generally assign their photography to professional photographers, some articles may call for the writer to supply pictures. This is especially the case if you’re writing a profile for a regional publication or a how-to crafts article. If you know that a magazine buys pictures and pays extra for them, suggesting their availability in your query letter is a super idea.

***

Sneaking in With Sidebars

Here’s a winning prospect: offer sidebars. Editors love sidebars, readers do too. So on top of earning brownie points for thinking up extra ways to make the article work, you also get paid for those tip boxes.

Sidebars don’t just have to be tips though. They can be short quizzes, fun facts or statistics that didn’t fit into your article, or quotes. For instance, in an article on what to do if you’ve failed college, I included some concentration techniques in a sidebar (and then sold a whole article on concentration techniques to the same magazine), and in an article on avoiding spam, I included alarming spam statistics (way back when spam was actually new and of interest.)

***

Read, read, read

Another technique that you can play on is the I’ve-read-your-previous-issues sell. It’s not enough to get you the assignment, but combined with all the other elements, it makes for an irresistible query letter. Here’s a sample of what I’ve used in my own pitches:

Inspired by the feature “Name of Article” in your latest issue, I began to think about how much romance has changed in the digital era. The guy who gave me RAM on my birthday just a couple of years ago graduated this year to a comic book created with our caricatured heads as characters. So simple and so much fun! This tech-savvy girl returned the favor by sticking his head on top of a Shrek body. The picture now sits on a photo frame in his living room.

Would you be interested in a piece on fun and DIY tech gifts for the “Name of section” department?

***

A Note on Overstuffed Queries

It can be quite tempting to include quotes from all your experts, the timeliness factor of your piece, each of the fifteen ways of organizing your home that you’re proposing, details of all three sidebars, and research that shows organized homes make for happier people.

But chances are that you’re not only making it harder for yourself to actually send the darn thing out, you’re also wasting the editor’s time.

That’s not to say that you should leave out all these important elements. Just don’t over do it. The elements I’ve described here are optional. Sometimes you use them, sometimes you don’t. But in no case do you stuff your pitches with all of them. You need to see what works best for your piece and which of these elements could be included. Do you have great pictures but no title? A bulleted list of points but no sidebar ideas? Put in a couple of quotes, state the points, mention the pictures, and send it out. Mix and match. There’s only so much a two-page query letter can do.

02 Feb 2008 QLTS: 5.2 - Hook ‘em Right
Author: Mridu Khullar |  Category: Query Letters That Sell  | Tags: , , ,  | 3 Comments

The first sentence of your pitch is by far the most important thing you’ll write in the entire duration of your article’s life. If you get this one line right, you have hope. Lots of it. If not, you’re out even before you’ve had a chance to tout your credentials, show the editor how unique you are or why this article is great for her audience.

Busy editors are generally pulled in or turned off by this “hook” so it needs to grab her attention from the get-go.

The leads I talk about below are mostly from queries. Some are also from articles. Most writers, including me, pretend we’re writing the actual article and start our queries the way we would our finished piece. The idea is that eventually, you’ll need to work on a lead to hook your reader as well. Why not do the grunt work initially and increase the chance of getting the assignment?

But be warned: writing the lead is for most writers, the toughest part of the piece. It takes practice and it takes work.

(A wonderful article on leads:
http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=52&aid=35609)

Here are some of the leads I’ve written over the years.

***

The Problem-Solution Lead

It’s no surprise your friends will come banging on your doorstep trying to drag you to a party right when you’re in the middle of studying for an exam. Or, you sit down to write a report, but find yourself thinking of the latest season of The O.C. instead.

If you constantly find yourself wishing you’d rather do your roommate’s dirty dishes than finish your assignments, you might have some concentration issues, and it’s likely to reflect in—gasp!—grades.

This hook is usually used for service pieces, and is meant to outline a problem that concerns a large number of the publication’s readers. You should be able to convince the editor that this is an issue that is important to her readers and that you’ll be providing the solutions to this problem through the article. In the lead, of course, the challenge is to convincingly describe the problem. New twists on a common problem or new problems that are coming up due to modern technologies are very popular these days.

***

The Personal Experience Lead

I grabbed my coat, begged dad to lend me his car, and drove as fast as I could to college. As I anxiously walked through the gates, an emptiness in my stomach warned me of what was to come. I pushed along the crowded corridor to stand by the group of students eager to find out how they had fared. A glimpse of the notice board made my heart sink. The worst had happened.

I had failed.

I often use the first-person, “I’ve been through it” approach since it immediately tells the editor that I’m familiar with the subject matter, and can provide great anecdotes and insights. It also suggests that I can give advice from the standpoint of a person who has been there, done that. I know what to do, and more importantly, what not to do. It makes me an indirect expert, it builds reader confidence, and it validates my advice.

A good idea is to look at how articles in the magazine you’re targeting are handled. If they start with first-person, this lead will almost always work. It won’t work with news pieces and trend stories though.

***

The “Wow, really?” Lead

Over her husband’s funeral pyre six years ago, Heena Patel, then 21, was informed by her in-laws that he had died of AIDS.

Till then, Ms. Patel had repeatedly questioned his frequent illnesses and received nothing but silence. After he died she had to face the reality that not only had her husband and his family known about his HIV-positive status when he married her, but that she was infected as well.

This is a hook that should make the editor go, “Wow, that’s crazy!” or “Really? I did not know that” or “Oh no! What happened then?” She knows that if she has that reaction, most of her readers will as well. A startling fact, a little-known anecdote about a famous person, or something about a different culture that may be seem bizarre.

This is a great way to open, but of course, remember not to push it too far. You’ll also be required to tie in the shocker with the actual article. And you have to validate it. You can’t use something purely for the shock value. Make sure it’s relevant.

***

The Scene-Building Lead

Inside the walls of the Cleopatra restaurant, the atmosphere is serene. Soft music plays in the background while laughter comes in spurts from the tables across the room. Women talk over empty cups of tea and half-eaten sandwiches, and apart from a mobile phone ringing in a woman’s purse, which she scrambles to find and answer, there is peace. The sign on the door reads: “No Male Entry.”

Sometimes, especially in travel pieces, you need to take your editor (and your readers) to some place with you. That’s when you’ll need the scene-building lead. It should be clear very soon though, exactly why you want to take the reader with you on this journey. The scene-building lead works better for articles than it does for query letters. But sometimes it works. In the example above, for instance, I wanted the reader to discover for herself that there are no men allowed inside the restaurant, rather than flat-out saying it. I used this in my article, but if I were querying, I’d use it as well.

***

The News/Study/Event Tie-in Lead

The facts: People with disabilities are among the most excluded in Indian society. According to a new World Bank report, disabled adults have far lower employment rates than others–reduced from 43% in 1991 to 38% in 2002.

While estimates differ, most show that people with disabilities form between 4-8 percent of the Indian population, that is, approximately 40-80 million people.

These are some very important, and very interesting statistics. Not to mention, representative of a huge problem. Which is why, even though my article itself was about a project and an industry taking positive and remedial measures, I’ve focused more on the statistics.

In the article itself, I started with the human picture. I began my story by talking about a person’s struggle getting employment. But for my query, I needed to show my (American) editor that the problem (and hence the solution) involved very large numbers.

That’s what this kind of lead does. It doesn’t always work for the final article. But it’s very effective in query letters. This is because it shows, right there in numbers, why your article is important.

Be careful though. Use statistics and research that are new. Also use them only if they actually are interesting and relevant. Numbers for the sake of numbers will mean nothing.

***

The Not-What-You-Thought Lead

Picture a Tibetan Buddhist monk and what do you see? A man with a shaved head, maroon and yellow attire, and rosary beads dangling from one hand?

How about speaking English, carrying a cell phone, or releasing a music album?

This is a lead I’ve developed over the years, and that I continue to love. It works so that it starts with one idea, and shocks you with the next. It also sometimes embraces contradictions and challenges stereotypes. Another example of this lead:

Think stereotypes, and you’ll have a variety to choose from. Americans are obese, ignorant and arrogant. The English drink tea, talk posh and assume they’re better than you. Africans are uncivilized. Italian men are womanizers. And Indian women who live alone are morally flawed.

I am one such morally flawed woman.

***

The Look-What-She’s-Doing Lead

On September 24, 2006, in nothing more than jeans and a t-shirt, Line Tvete, 48, left her home in Norway, got on her bicycle and started a journey around the world.

Over the last eight months, Lena has cycled through Norway, Sweden, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India. I met up with Line in McLeod Ganj, India, where she was volunteering, teaching Buddhist monks English, attending yoga classes and taking a small break from her physical and spiritual journey before heading to Nepal, Tibet, China and then Thailand.

There are many variations to this lead. The above lead is for a personal profile, for instance. But, look closely, and you’ll find that it’s often used for feature articles or service pieces as well. For instance, using the above lead, I could write a whole trend story about how women these days are packing up and taking off for solo trips around the world. I’d interview experts about this trend, I’d locate more women who had done similar things, and I’d cite research and statistics.

Or using, the very same lead, and similar research, I could write a piece on how you can plan a cycling trip around the world. I would interview Line, and instead of focusing on her life story, I’d ask her for tips that she could give to other women. Instead of digging into her personal life, I’d focus more on what she packed, what she read, and how much money she needed to save. Then I’d write a step-by-step piece for my readers.

Needless to say, this is a very popular lead. And it enjoys a high success rate. So much so, that it has an official name– The Zimmerman lead.

The only problem with this lead is in the execution. You really need to spend time with people (your sources) to get the kind of information that would make this lead effective, and like I’ve discussed before, that’s a bit of a problem if you don’t actually have an assignment.

***

The Lead that Misleads

A theater troupe consisting of unemployed job seekers, hawkers on the streets of Kolkata, and people who’ve been told they have no prospects in life, come together each evening to sing, dance and hone their acting skills.

Earning little more than Rs. 100 per show, they perform in small theaters, villages, local parks, even on the roadside. Their movements are perfectly coordinated, their dramatically delivered dialogues impressive. And it’s only when you see the ropes placed strategically around the stage to demarcate the boundaries that you begin to question, that you look closer and realize—almost all the performers in the troupe of Anyadesh are blind.

This is a complicated lead, and used very rarely. I’m including it here because I thought I was very clever when I wrote it, though I feel less clever now.

After reading the first paragraph, my reader tends to think that this is a story about very poor people turning to art. I continue to lead my reader down this path of thinking, but then throw in the shocker at the end—-the real story—-the performers are visually impaired.

Now, poor people turning to art is a great story in itself, but by adding another layer, I’ve raised the bar higher. And it comes suddenly. Which is what makes it work.

***

The Holiday Tie-in Lead

How often do you run out of cash before you run out of holidays?

The holiday tie-in is very popular. Let’s say you’re thinking of an article on how to lose weight, and it’s April. Considering lead times for national magazines, it’s the perfect time to be proposing a Christmas idea. That’s when people are putting on a lot of weight. And they’re out shopping a lot. Bingo! An article on how to lose weight while you shop.

Any idea can have a holiday tie-in, some holiday tie-in. Think Independence Day, Valentine’s Day, World AIDS Day… so many national and international events that can be tied into your ideas to make them timely.

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