Question about Selling Re-Slants

[CatMuse33]

I have several story ideas to pitch, where I came up with the ideas based on interviews I completed for other articles.

Case in point: I interviewed a fitness industry professional for a feature story in a trade magazine but now I want to pitch a personality profile of that woman to a women's magazine.

My question: Should I include the original clip that sparked the story idea, to show my knowledge of the topic and relationship with the interview subject? Or, since I'm pitching a completely new story with none of the same quotes and a completely different slant, should I not even MENTION the original story to the editor? (These are non-competing markets).

Dawn

[samcollie]

If you're proposing a completely different article, there's not much need to mention the original. I would, in the query, state that you've written on this general topic before, and I would also mention that you are planning to interview X subject (by name).
It's common (for me, anyway!) that an interview plants the seeds for new topics. I think as you don't duplicate the content or quotes of the first article, and you're not targeting competing markets, I see the end result as two, independent works.

[CatMuse33]

Sam,
Thanks so much... but would you include the first story as a clip?

And yes, the situation is very common for me, too... but I haven't pitched such a story to a place where I needed to query and include clips (I've only pitched to existing clients who know my work). In fact, I rarely query at all so this is somewhat new domain for me.

Dawn

[samcollie]

If you feel there's no conflict of interests, then it would probably be a good sample to include. Showing you have expertise in an area would give you an edge, I'd think.

When I pitch somewhere new, I try to include clips of articles that reflect some knowledge in the area I'm pitching. I think the only time you'd run into a problem is if you were pitching something very similar to two competing magazines.

Good luck!