Busy Bee

Ever since I received my mailer, I have been a very busy bee.  I also purchased "2012 Artist's and Graphic Designer's Market".  I figured I would start to compile my own mailing list and purchase additional listings if necessary.  I like that a lot of the listings in the book are open to receiving email submissions.  I can save a stamp and quickly get in contact with certain editors and art directors.  Other listings that prefer to receive samples in the mail tell you exactly what they are looking for, from postcards to tearsheets.  I can really get a feel for what kind of work each magazine or publisher is looking for.  Then by looking at their websites (very important) I can tell if my work would be a good fit.  It has been a lot of work.  I have a multi color highlighting system now and am typing up my snail mail labels.  I ran across a new challenge today also: the query letter.  I needed a query letter for an email submission and had a very hard time finding examples for illustrators since most of them were predominantly for writers.  I did find some helpful tips for writing them though.  I found that query letters are a little less formal that cover letters.  They are meant to basically be a sales pitch.  They should be fairly short, especially in an email.  However, they need to be just as carefully thought out and well written as cover letters.  There are "good" and "bad" query letters, just as there are cover letter.  Now that I have the basic format down, I can change the details for each different editor I send samples to.  Well, it's time to get back to work.  My highlighters are calling me.