How To Pick a Publisher

One of the biggest tragities in the writing world is the number of writers who play 'roulette' with their manuscript. Most new writers receive dozens of rejection letters, not because the novel is not well written, but because the author sent their manuscript to the wrong publisher.

The trick to reducing rejection letters is to understand how publishers pick novels. Not all romance publishers handle every type of romance genre written. Most publishers will advertise that they handle romance, or fantasy novels, but they are only interested in three to five different sub-genres.

Here is a short list of tips for finding the right publisher for your novel, and to reduce the number of rejection letters you will receive. I used this list for five years, before I became CEO of Enspiren Press www.enspirenpress.com

How to Pick a Publisher

1.Surf the web and use Writer's Digest to find 10 publishers in your genre
2.Visit their website to see if they handle books like yours
3.Read excerpts to see if the books sound' similar, and have plot lines, problems, and characters that are similar to your book.
4.Keep working until you find 10 publishers who sell books that are similar to yours. This could take several months, so start now.
5.Buy at least one recent release and map it.
6.Join the publisher's fan group and/or author group. Sign up for their newsletter.
7.Narrow the list to five publishers.
8.Get to know the authors. Try and become familiar with them. Learn what you can about the publishers, how they want submissions, and even see if you can get a sample synopsis.
9.Learn their guidelines and how they want manuscripts formatted - and follow their rules to the letter.
10.Learn the aquesition editor's name

This will not guarantee that you will never receive a rejection letter, but it will reduce the number of rejection letters, and the time it takes to get published.