Guidelines are there for a reason

Posted on March 30, 2014 by Michael A. Ventrella

At a recent convention panel I was on called “Editor’s Complaints,” there was unanimity about the biggest problem: Following the Guidelines.

Every editor, publisher, or agent has a preference as to what kinds of submissions they will accept and in what format they want it submitted. These submission guidelines will be posted on their web pages. They are not hard to find.

Why then do writers ignore them?

Read the guidelines! They are not there as polite suggestions. They are requirements.

For my anthologies, I always post my guidelines on this blog and send them to whoever emails me asking about submitting. And still I get stories that do not fit the genre and are formatted in such a way that I cannot read them. I’ve even received stories that have no contact information, so I do not know how to accept the story even if I wanted to. (No, I do not feel like searching through all my emails to figure out where it came from. Once I’ve downloaded it, that’s as far as I go.)

What’s worse are people who don’t even try to determine whether the submission is the right fit. I know science fiction editors who have received mystery stories, children’s books, and even nonfiction. How hard is it to figure out whether the magazine you are sending your story to publishes your kind of story?

It gets you nowhere. You’ve wasted both your time and the editor’s time, and that won’t get you far in the publishing world.

Read the submission guidelines. Read the magazine or previous editions of the anthology if you can so you will get a better idea of what the editor wants. Do your research before you waste everyone’s time.

Does this sound unreasonable to you? Tough. Editors are busy people and we don’t have time to deal with those who cannot follow simple instructions. It tells us that you are not professional and may be difficult to work with when we send you the editorial changes we want.

Remember, although you are a writer and an artist, publishing is a business. You need to treat this with all the respect you would give a job application.