Begin with a Query via Email
- Compose a concise email (not an attachment) to show how your idea will be of interest to our readers and why you are the one to do the work. Show us how you will cover the topic using words and pictures.
- Use your query letter to show that you can provide a text that is lively and accurate. And, if you intend to contribute photos with your text (or work with someone you know) show how the submitted images will cause our readers to read your text. When possible, include PDFs of prior work and/or links to your work with your query.
- Once we have your query and other materials, you can expect a reply in about two weeks. (If it is a timely topic, such as a festival that’s happening in one week, include “QUERY: Quick Response Needed” in the subject line of your email.)
- We want to receive queries on topics by contributors who give us confidence in their writing ability and their knowledge of and connection to the subject being covered. Queries like this receive a response to go ahead with the idea.
- If your query doesn’t suit our present needs, we will tell you why (possible reasons include): not the right time for the subject, the subject has been covered in the past five or so years, or it’s not a topic that suits the magazine.
NOTE: Answer these questions with your query letter. . . WHY?
- This topic
- This magazine / these readers
- Now. . .
- This angle
- You (as the contributor, vs. someone else)
EXAMPLES OF TOPICS WE’VE COVERED:
- Weekend getaways: Mercersburg, Easton, Hawley/Honesdale, Bloomsburg, and Chestnut Hill (separate issues)
- Dodge NHRA Nationals (drag racing) at Maple Grove Raceway
- Refurbished fountains at Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square
- Rail trail in Cambria and Indiana counties
- Bogs in western Pennsylvania
- Ma and Pa Railroad in Muddy Creek Forks
- Shared commercial kitchens in Pennsylvania
- Cow to cone ice cream dairies in Pennsylvania
- Dog acrobatic activities and round barn in Adams County
- Gettysburg on horseback
- Sullivan Expedition in Revolutionary War
- Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Avella
- Living Dead Museum in Butler County
- Bartram’s Garden in Philadelphia
- Brandywine Valley Christmas attractions
- Lancaster Marionette Theatre
- A Revolutionary War prisoner of war camp in York County
- Dinosaurs for rent by a Selinsgrove-based business
- Ray Owen, storyteller and reconteur
- Sue Hand, artist and storyteller of coal country
- Vintage baseball teams and tournament
- Short-eared owl, habitat and activities (photo essay)
- Aquatic insects in Pennsylvania
- Museum of the American Revolution and David Library of the American Revolution
- It’s a Wonderful Life celebration in Indiana
- Christkindlemarkt in Mifflinburg
- Harry Potter and Hogwarts in Chestnut Hill
- Redball Military Transport fall meet
- Conestoga Area Historical Society
- Sawmill Center for the Arts, Cooksburg
- Schuylkill River paddling through the history of canals and coal
- Timothy Hughes Rare and Early Newspapers in South Williamsport
LENGTH / PAYMENT
PAYMENT FOR ITEMS / TYPICAL FEE AMOUNTS
We purchase First North American serial rights for one-time use. Our fees are 15 to 20 cents per published word.
Payment for photos with an article are usually $35 to $45 per image. Fees for images used in other areas of the magazine are higher: cover is $150 ($250 for wrap-around cover), Contents and Editor’s Choice are $85, Mailbox is $45 to $65, and photo essay is $45 to $85 per image.
DEPARTMENTS, TYPICAL WORD / PHOTO USE
ROUNDUP: (front of the book items)
- Usually 500-800 words, 2-4 photos
Longer items can be 800-1100 words, up to 6 photos
FEATURES:
- Short (up to 1,000 words or less, three photos)
- Medium (1,100 to 1,750 words, 3-5 photos)
- Long (1,750 to 2,500 words, 5-8 photos)
TOWN AND COUNTRY:
- Usually about 600 words and one photo
HANDLING/REIMBURSEMENT FEES:
- We will also pay a handling fee ($5 to $10 per image) for images that we use that were obtained on behalf of the magazine by the contributor from a subject’s file.
- We also reimburse for any related fees (for photo reproduction or publication fees) that are approved prior to arranging for such reproduction by an individual, museum, library or historical society.
- Although we’d like to, our budget doesn’t allow us to pay travel expenses, and we don’t assign stories to contributors who are new to us, those are done on spec.
Popular articles have the following characteristics:
- Statewide interest. The article topic should interest readers in Erie and Scranton, as well as readers in Bloomsburg and Bellefonte.
- Pennsylvania tie-in. The link to Pennsylvania is clearly seen.
- Lively text. Tight copy that pulls the reader from the head and subhead through to the article’s last word.
- Engaging photos. The photos must be engaging.
We want the reader, because of the photos, to want to read the captions, and after reading the captions, to be eager to read the article.
________________________________________
SEND YOUR QUERIES / ARTICLES TO
Matthew K. Holliday, editor
[email protected]
Main Office: 717-697-4660
PO Box 755, Camp Hill, PA 17001-0755
Click here to add your own text
Want your photo published?
Pennsylvania Magazine is known for its photography.
FYI: Our annual photo contests are a major source of the images we use throughout the year. The entry forms are online in early January and in the January/February and March/April issues.
If you have images that will wow our readers, we’d love to see them to consider them for the magazine.
We pay from $200 for a wrap-around cover and up to $85 for images inside the magazine. You also receive credit and copies of the issue.
Four reasons we use to choose a photo for the magazine (after choosing a theme or season for a particular issue):
1. Has a wow factor (appreciation of the photographer’s skill, luck or viewpoint). This is an image that you’d feel compelled to share with someone else in the same room, interrupting them if needed: “hey, look at this!”
2. Connects with a reader’s experience, history, memory or location.
3. Tells a story (this could be the photo itself or the story around how the image was taken (situation) or both.
4. Has a geographic reach for readers of the magazine (one image may be chosen over another because it’s in a county or area that hasn’t received coverage lately.
If you have images like this (for cover, editor’s choice or photo essay consideration), we’d love to consider them.
We can look at a portfolio of images collected around a theme or individual images.
Share 20 or fewer to get started. Use Dropbox (share with [email protected]) or send a CD or use another cloud sharing service.
Share or send HIGH RESOLUTION images. We rarely use images taken with a cell phone. See the photo details following most captions to see the types of cameras and lenses that are used to capture the images that we use.
We don’t require any specific equipment, but if you’re going to take great shots of wildlife, you’re going to find that without investing in your own expensive lens (or using one by renting or borrowing someone else’s), your results will be disappointing. AND, always, be respectful of wildlife. Your photography actions should never cause an animal to alter their activity due to your presence.
If you have more questions, feel free to write ([email protected]) or call 717-697-4660.
RIGHTS INFO: We typically purchase ONE TIME USE rights. So, you are welcome to submit your image to other publications after it appears on our pages.
MODIFICATION / ALTERATION POLICY: If you’ve significantly altered an image, please let us know. We don’t want to publish an image that is not “how things actually appear” and then have a reader write to let us know the “real view.” If you’ve simply removed a few branches or wires, fine. But, if you’ve removed a building or flipped the image, we’d need to know. In those cases, please include the original capture with your submission.
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Writing Magazine Articles
Advice from Editor Matt Holliday, Pennsylvania Magazine
1. Picking topics—solve a problem.
We’re living in an age when people have a BIG problem: too much free time. We don’t know what to do with ourselves. Consequently we eat too much, scroll on our phones, and complain, doing little to solve the problems we complain about.
- Come up with creative ways to solve this problem, and you’ll create interesting article ideas.
- Find topics that will motivate people to go more, sit less and discover places and people they hadn’t imagined existed.
For example, when developing a travel article idea, start with a map. Plan a trip for yourself. Contact visitor’s bureaus and tell them what interests you (your THEME for the article) and ask what types of businesses and attractions exist that match your intersest. Try grouping three counties as a driving tour. Some visitor’s bureaus already have such driving tours developed, and you can easily modify their tours.
Spend some time on the phone talking with the businesses and attractions. Discover what makes them unique or interesting. See if any of these contacts have ideas of other places you can visit along the way that the visitor’s bureau didn’t mention. Invite people to help you plan your getaway. Develop your ultimate trip.
Now, assemble the essence of the trip and what makes it interesting for you into a 200-word query. Send the query to magazines with a focus that matches your THEME, and you’ll likely have a marketable story idea.
Remember that readers want YOU to do the work for them: tell them what’s best, tell them what saves time and money, and share with them your experiences so that they can venture forth armed with wisdom (wisdom: gaining knowledge through your own, or someone else’s, experiences). Otherwise you’re producing a promotional brochure.
2. Write in the ACTIVE voice.
People turn away from texts with passive voice (watch out for TO BE verb usage). People pull themselves toward texts with action!
3. Show, don’t tell.
Compare these two paragraphs that describe an amusement park:
Knoebel’s Amusement park was built many years ago and families since then have made going there a tradition for reunions and days filled with wholesome entertainment.
vs.
When we arrived at Knoebel’s Amusement park, instead of finding the typical acres of asphalt, we found ourselves parking the car in a grassy field. Old-fashioned trams circled the lot, and after we hopped onboard, we waited while a young family took time to load their cooler and stroller. You see, at Knoebel’s, the management encourages visitors to bring picnic lunches to their free admission park. We soon realized that we had discovered a gem in central Pennsylvania.
Writing that compels the reader to keep reading doesn’t just happen. Revise and polish.
4. No risk, no readers.
Move readers to new thinking about a person, a place, an event, or a historical fact. Shift their thinking. This happens best by putting yourself into a situation and showing the reader your location, your emotions, your senses, and your reaction/response. You must share yourself to connect with a reader.
5. Do adequate research, in person.
Nothing matches experiencing the place, person, event or history yourself. If it’s a historical subject, go to the archives and hold the old newspapers and other documents in your hands. The sterile internet will give you a direction in which to hunt, but do your hunting in person. You’ll interact with others who may give you new information and hot trails to pursue. You may even find new article ideas as you go.
If you’re writing about a NASCAR car driving experience, get in a car and go around the track. How else can you say what it feels like to drive a car?
If you’re writing about the Gettysburg Battlefield, go and walk around the battlefield at daybreak, at dusk, and in the middle of an early July day. Feel the sun on your face and see just how big and rough those rocks are in Devil’s Den.
Talk with people, ask questions. Nothing substitutes for first person research.
6. Converse with your reader.
You’re sharing a story with a person: your reader. Bring other people into the conversation. Use quotes to tell stories or add facts. Let people shine in your stories. And, most important, tell stories.
An effectively-written article doesn’t need a photo to keep the reader’s interest. The photos help to stop the reader from turning the page. The text must stand on its own when being read.
7. The opening paragraph grabs or sags.
The opening paragraph to a story will either hook the reader or tell the reader to look elsewhere.
Use a personal experience as the opener if it works for the article. Such as this one from a recent issue:
Hundreds of cyclists form a wide, slithering line, curving around the sidewalk by Independence Hall in center-city Philadelphia. My children and I are near the back of the quarter-mile-long line, but we aren’t concerned. This isn’t a race; it’s a celebration. Eighty-five years ago, the 19th amendment was ratified, giving women the right to vote.
8. Make sure you have a “nut graph.”
Placed at the beginning of the story, the nut graph outlines for the reader the story that will follow. It
contains everything necessary to orient the reader as to the article’s content.
Here’s an example in an article by Cindy Ross in a July/August issue:
I had a bad case of “bird envy.” With my two feet firmly planted on the ground, I’d raise
my eyes to the sky and long to be that red-tail hawk soaring amidst the clouds. Instead, I
did the next best thing we humans can do and took to the skies via seven flying methods: a
Cessna prop plane, a powered parachute, an open-cockpit biplane, a hot air balloon, a helicopter,
a glider, and sky diving. In the process, I learned the incredible value of leaving the
planet behind and seeing it from a different perspective—a bird’s-eye view.
No problem knowing what that article is about.
9. Refer back to your “promises.”
When you compile your research into a finished article, go back and see how your finished product
matches what you promised in the query and what the editor said okay to in response to your query. Have
someone else evaluate this match-up. (See the Third Party Checklist, Article Submission form.)
10. Include the “extras” with your story.
There’s a hamburger joint that provides a well-stocked “fixin’s bar” where a patron can add lettuce, tomato, barbeque
sauce, and a lot of other stuff that interests many. However, they don’t include anchovies as they would
likely interest no one. Keep this in mind when writing sidebars for visitor’s
info. or other information. The farther you stray from the topic being covered, the less relevant the sidebar
(the less of interest for an editor to buy it.)
Include the following in a visitor’s info. sidebar: hours, location, directions (if hard to find), admission
cost (simplified), handicapped accessible (or not), nearby lodging or eating places (if desired by the editor/
regularly used by the publication), other places of interest in the area that are related to the topic. Refer to the
magazine’s guidelines before embarking on your travels to see what information you must include.
11. Write about what you enjoy doing.
Find a niche. Magazines exist because people spend money on their interests and hobbies and activities
(niches). When you combine what you enjoy doing with your ability to research and write, you now have
a combination aimed toward success. Why cover subjects that you find dull just to grab a check when
you can write about topics that will give you access to experiences and people you’ve always dreamed doing or
meeting.
12. Read magazines.
If you want to write for magazines, read magazines, especially ones with writing that inspires you. When
you surround yourself with excellence, some will rub off.
13. Develop your craft.
Attend writers onferences. Join a writers group. Work one-on-one with another writer (perhaps
one that likes a different style of writing—a prose writer working with a poetry writer) so that you can stretch
your boundaries of what you can do.
You may have talent and you may have a love of writing. Unwrap those gifts in the presence of others.
Share what you know and learn from those who share with you.
14. Editors are people, too.
People will let you down. People will fail you. People will say dumb or demeaning things.
People will use their positions to boost themselves at the expense of others. People will be cruel.
People will discard other people for no reason at all.
AND!!!
People will lift you up. People will care about your success before their own. People will love you.
People will use their positions to give you a chance.
People will compliment you. People will rain blessings on you for no reason at all.
Be open to the good things that can happen to you. If you’re always under an umbrella hiding from the rain, you’ll never see the rainbow. You won’t feel the warm
sun on your face. You won’t know what a cool shower on you skin can do to your spirit.
What you discover along the journey will prepare you for the destination. Take time to celebrate your
progress and successes. Take time to correct your direction. Take time to care for others, and most
importantly, take time to care for yourself.
Matt Holliday, editor
Pennsylvania Magazine
717-697-4660
PO Box 755, Camp Hill, PA 17001-0755
www.pa-mag.com | [email protected]