How to pitch features with a very long lead time
When to send pitches to magazines: with two real life examples
This month I have an eight-page feature published in a consumer magazine. And while it’s great to see the article in print I’d pretty much forgotten about it since I pitched the original idea back in January. You see, the thing is, magazines can have very long lead times.
They usually work at least six months in advance which means you need to be thinking way ahead as a freelancer. There is no point pitching Christmas stories to a monthly print magazine now. They were all sown up in the early summer.
Case in point. In September I pitched an article to a magazine which is based on an event I am doing in January. My deadline is the beginning of February but it won’t be published until their May 2025 issue.
As a freelancer it can be tricky to get the timing right, so it’s important to understand the publication cycle of a magazine. Either ask other freelance colleagues or ideally set up a call with a commissioning editor to understand their workflow and deadlines.
With this in mind, in today’s newsletter I am sharing two pitches to magazines which were both commissioned. I will explain the time frame of the pitch, commission, writing and publication, so you can better understand how to pitch in advance.