It’s mid-August, so it’s clearly time to start thinking about hearts and candy, right?

Don’t look at me like I’m crazy. I really am planning five months ahead, at least when it comes to pitching projects. I’m not doing this because I’m super-organized, either.

Right now, magazine editors are planning their February and March issues. They might leave a little room for last minute news, but most of the features and big stories are already getting assigned. If you want to land those big (and well-paying features), you have to plan at least as far ahead as the editors.

Copy writing projects have equally long timelines: a company planning a major marketing campaign for Valentine’s Day isn’t going to be hiring someone to write their copy in January.

There are a few exceptions to this rule, and all of them are web-based. Fewer ezines and websites plan months ahead, but they don’t really have to. A print magazine needs a month to handle printing, distribution and other details. That means that all writing and design for February has to be done in January. A website just needs to ready to go the night before.

What do you have in the pipeline for the next six months?

This entry was posted on Monday, August 18th, 2008 at 10:01 am and is filed under Freelance Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.