E-query services

Has anyone tried a query service such as Scriptblaster and received a response from a legitimate agent or production company?

Most of these blast services cater to the small produstion companies, indy managers, small agencies and such. There are a few large companies they send out to though but I have never seen a really big success story-- like Paramount or Warner.

Don't get me wrong, there have been success stories and some people swear by these services, but from my experience, they are the same odds of success as doing it yourself.

My advice is to get the hollywood directory on disk, print out labels and do it yourself. Sure you're spending more, but at least you know who your'e sending it to and can followup later.

I did it, full out and slick, with a query letter along and a self addressed postcard (one I designed tastefully to fall in line with the theme of the script.) It had a yes or no interest checkbox on the back. I mailed out 450 letters, got 110 postcards back with 12 requests. Didnt sell the script, but made a contact which turned into a rewrite for hire. (more than paid for the letter campaign).

i'd suggest you just do it yourself.

The Hollywood directory is readily available in hard copy but I can't seem to locate it on disk. Any suggestions?

or you can join www.scriptpimp.com and do it yourself. they have an extensive directory with information about who's looking for what kind of material and who will work with new writers. and many companies will let you query directly from the site.

The Hollywood Creative Directory is only available in print or you can subscribe to the online database. The online subscription is more expensive than the book (because it gives you access to other directories as well).

I suggest you make a little room on your bookshelf and buy the book.

Re: Re: E-query services

HCD is available in a variety of ways. The book of course is the cheapest and if you have a good data entry person, can make up the thousands of labels fairly quick.

BUT, as I said earlier, you may want to buy it on floppy disk (or already printed labels or a one time shot) in order to do a large "scriptblaster type" mailing campaign. Here are the links.

Floppy -- shop.hcdonline.com/mercha...ilingLists

Printed labels. - shop.hcdonline.com/mercha...ing+Labels

Oh. As for Scriptpimp, I have been a long standing member (and this year's top 20 finalist for my script "The Eyes of Mara") and it's worth the money for the membership, however, searching the database is tough and no way to print labels from it. Still, a good resource.

Re: Re: E-query services

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'm sure they will prove to be very helpful. Nice to find a screenwriters site where screenwriting is actually discussed and useful information shared.