How high do you aim?

I aim for the top ones that don't require an agent. Print publications only.

I go to Duotrope, and put in "pro pay". My plan is to submit to those first. If I'm aiming too high for my current writing level, so be it. The worst that can happen is they will reject me. Then I will send to the semi-pro markets and so forth. Last, I will send it to the non-paying markets. (If I don't get accepted at those then I will spend a lot more time in SYW, and join a writing class.)

Literateparakeet said:

The worst that can happen is they will reject me. Then I will send to the semi-pro markets and so forth. Last, I will send it to the non-paying markets.

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My strategy exactly. What can it hurt?

And when I get a rejection, I immediately send another story to the same magazine, especially when given personal feedback. You then start getting personal replies, even requests.

I hate the very long response times with some places who do not take sim subs, so I don't know when I'll ever sub to those

I burned first rights too easily before, so I don't have experience subbing to a really high publisher because they usually want those themselves.

I do have experience subbing a brand-new piece to Mac, though! I didn't expect to get into the AW spec fic anthology (Absolute Visions) because the writers here are so good. And I got in

I'm thinking of starting to aim high now most of the time, really. It couldn't hurt.

I have no idea how to gauge other than having other folks react. That's the part I'm too close about. I don't expect that mine will be particularly outstanding, but if it were I'd have no clue. How could you tell? I don't know. So get outside opinions, imho.

Look at it this way. If you start at the top and work your way down, the best magazine that wants your story will get it. This may be the third, or the tenth, magazine you send the story to, but it will still be the best magazine that wants it.

But if you start at the bottom, the worst magazine that wants you story will get it.

Why let a story go to a low-pay or no-pay magazine when a much better magazine would have taken it, had you given it the chance?

Start at the top. If you start at the bottom and the bottom accepts you will always wonder if a higher paying market might have liked it.

Off-topic, but do I hafta write shorts to be a Very Serious Author? Because I don't really wanna.

Honey Badger, no I don't think you have to write short stories to be considered a VSA, especially if you don't want to.

If you're writing a literary fiction novel, it always helps to have placed a few short stories in some literary fiction journals. Or there may be some chapters in your novel that you could tweak into stand-alone short stories. Since I've finished my novel, I've been concentrating on doing just that and have gotten good responses.

gettingby: Almost all publications accept simultaneous submissions. There's no reason to have to wait too long. Some of the fledgling ezines don't really count as writing credits, or are not taken as seriously by the bigger publications. With the ease of getting short stories published online, I've seen some literary journals stipulate in their guidelines, they don't want to see an extensive list of those eCredits in the cover letters.

If you write mystery, you can start at the top and not wait long.
The return time for Ellery Queen Magazine is usually just a little longer than a week. (In my case, three days!)
However, Alfred Hitchcock Magazine makes you wait for ages.
Here's my thing: If I'm going to wait that long on somebody, they damn better publish me.

But I never have the patience. Basically, the maximum response time I'll wait for is about six weeks. Anything longer is too ludicrous for me.

LillyPu said:

What can it hurt?

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They can steal your soul, chop it into little pieces and feed it to their pigs.

caw

You will save a lot of time, in the end, by reading the magazines where you're submitting your work. I know no one does it. But it really does help, both on your end and on their end. You will immediately know if your work fits at a publication if you read through an issue.

gettingby said:

Of course I am reading the magazines. How can you say no one does it?

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Honestly, I sometimes submit to magazines I don't read.

Especially when dealing with smaller ones.

I'll read one issue, but I'm almost never a constant reader.

The only magazines I've submitted to, that I read regularly, are Ellery Queen and Alfred Hitchcock and those are basically the highest you can go with mystery.

And sometimes doing your homework doesn't matter as much as with others. If you want to get into a big one, then yes, do your homework. A smaller one doesn't usually matter quite as much. If it's a smaller publisher --by smaller, I mean the ones that reply in a day, and give no to little monetary payment--, and they don't have a story in that particular genre yet, then how do you do you homework?

You can't.

You submit, and if they reject it, who cares? It's your work, and only you can defend it and speak for it. (If you don't, who will?)

Have tried high, have tried low, and every permutation in between, with equal result everywhere I've submitted. The only two stories that have been published were never submitted anywhere, but were picked up on request after posting on web forums (one here).

My attitude toward the "submission process" is very bad.

caw

gettingby said:

I think a lot of you are right about aiming high first. To make this more realistic I am really trying to step up my writing. From now on, I plan to stick to the top layers and see if I can get anything to sick. I actually wrote a story this week that really fits the market and has a shot, IMO. I do have a few submissions currently at lower-level publications, but I kind of wish I had aimed higher with those. Would you ever send a story to a top magazine after it was rejected by a lower magazine?

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On submitting stuff to lower-end magazines: I've done it as well, and somewhat come to regret it, being that it was the first places I sent it. Aim for the clouds, and slowly come back down to the ground.

On the resending: Depends on the story and why it was rejected. Often times, I'm getting rejections because it's the content they're not looking for, not my craft. But yes, I've done it.

gettingby said:

The only thing I don't like about starting at the top and working my way down is that it could take years to get published given the response times. I kind of just want to place a few to build up my credentials and confidence. But I also want to be proud of where my short stories are published. I wish they didn't take so long to get back to you.

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They really don't take very long. Worrying about submission time is almost always an indicator of low story output. If you want to sell short stories to magazines of any level, you'll probably have to write a bunch of them.

If you do write a bunch of short stories, and keep them in submission, it won't be very long before you're hearing back from one magazine or another pretty much every week.

WordCount said:

I'll read one issue, but I'm almost never a constant reader.

The only magazines I've submitted to, that I read regularly, are Ellery Queen and Alfred Hitchcock and those are basically the highest you can go with mystery.

And sometimes doing your homework doesn't matter as much as with others. If you want to get into a big one, then yes, do your homework. A smaller one doesn't usually matter quite as much. If it's a smaller publisher --by smaller, I mean the ones that reply in a day, and give no to little monetary payment--, and they don't have a story in that particular genre yet, then how do you do you homework?

You can't.

You submit, and if they reject it, who cares? It's your work, and only you can defend it and speak for it. (If you don't, who will?)

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Doing your homework is just as important at small magazines as at large ones, and I care the heck when a story gets rejected. I don't have a clue what "defending you story" means, but no writer gets to speak for his story. Either the story speaks for itself, or it should be rejected.

If a magazine responds in a day, well, good, but not having a story in a particular genre yet has nothing at all to do with it. You either read the magazine to see what they do have, what the editor likes or doesn't like, or you aren't going to get accepted at very many magazines.

There's anotehr side to the aim high or low question that many writers seem unaware of. Sell a few stories to very small, no pay, no prestige magazines may boost the writer's confidence, but it does not boost the confidence of editors at larger magazines.

Too many such sales can tag you as a writer who just isn't good enough to sell to top magazines. Fair or unfair, it's a tag no writer should want. Though from my experience as an editor, the tag is most often pretty darned accurate.

Get used to writing for tiny magazines with low standards, and you'll probably keep writing stories that fit those standards. If you want to grow as a writer, you have to aim high. You learn to sell to top magazines by trying your best to write for top magazines, not by writing for tiny ones.