Ten Tips for Overseas Success
By Patrika Salmon

There are many pitfalls when you market overseas and it’s worth avoiding as many as you can if you want to sell your work. The following tips should help you get an editor’s favourable reaction.

1. Be aware that you are the outsider, the stranger. What you do at home in the U. S. of A. for your editors might well be incorrect, annoying or even offensive to a British or South African editor. Do your research, get the market guidelines and be very polite and careful. Formal and friendly is the way to go, but no lined, coloured paper, fancy fonts or cheery greetings; be business-like.

2. Don’t give overseas editors the idea that you think their markets are easier to be published in than your own, or that you are a failure in your own country and have to market overseas. An overseas editor has to understand why you are sending her your poem, article or story. If you can be genuine about it tell her that her magazine is one you enjoy very much, but you’d better have read a copy first!

3. Sometimes your Americanisms will be welcome and sell the piece; indeed, they may be the point of your article. American fiction is bought by overseas editors because it adds a ‘different’ flavour to their fiction slot, but New Zealand isn’t America. If you want to sell a piece on parenting you will have to have a universal truth in it that applies to all parents and children, not just American parents, and this applies for everything you write for overseas markets. Travel articles are a little different, but if you use expressions and dialogue that are peculiarly American, you must find a way of making clear to the reader what they mean.

4. Be postage savvy. Don’t stick American stamps on your self addressed envelopes when you want a Canadian or Australian editor to reply to you. Use the International Reply Coupons you can order from your post office. (They are expensive.) The editor can trade IRCs at his post office in exchange for a first class stamp. Or get onto the net. U.K. stamps are available from: www.royalmail.co.uk  Some other countries sell their stamps by Internet. Check out their government web sites to see if they do. It’s also easy to find a writers’ group in the country you want to market in and arrange a swap of stamps. You trade your American stamps for their New Zealand or Irish ones. Just don’t infuriate an editor with an American stamp on your envelope.

5. In American you say "SASE" but elsewhere, editors may ask for an "s.a.e." It’s the same thing-- s.a.e. means stamped, addressed envelope. You are expected to understand that if you are asked to send a stamped addressed envelope it is obviously your address on the envelope!

6. Many editors really prefer the ease of a disposable script and it’ll save you lots of postage. They also dislike spending time having to send off postcards saying your script has arrived and then a letter saying "sorry, not this time," or "yes please." Include your e-mail address on everything and tell the editor you’re happy to receive an e-mail note, but do include IRCs or the correct stamp and a self-addressed envelope as well.

7. Only America is non-metric. The rest of the world uses metric measurements, so their paper and envelopes differ in size-- they're larger. For overseas markets, use what is known as A4 sized paper. It is commonly used as photocopying paper and you can get the large A4 envelopes as well so that you can post your script flat.

8. Do give British, Australian, New Zealand, Canadian, South African, Irish, or European editors the courtesy of using their spelling. Consult the Oxford Dictionary (your local reference library will probably have one, or go online to www.oup.co.uk) and use its versions of words like color, center, etc. It will endear you to editors because they won’t have to spend time altering your spelling.

9. It’s better if your article/story/poem/essay looks like the others the editor deals with. Read the market guidelines and follow them. If the guidelines are not specific about format, be careful-- American format is different from most other countries. Generally, overseas editors will expect a cover sheet on your script. This is the page that goes at the front of your work. Starting at the top of the page, centre your title, then print under it the type of work, under that, the word count, and under that, your name. E.g. ‘Three Whale Days in Kaikoura’ - a travel article - 2000 words - Fred Dagg. You can use a larger font size than the usual 12 point. In the bottom left corner, in normal 12 point size, put your name and address, and other contact details like your website, fax and phone number, and e-mail address. Always use a plain font like Courier, Times New Roman or Arial.

10. The rest of your script should have your name and page number in the top right corner of every page. Your title goes in the top left corner of every page. You can use a 10 or 12 point font for this. Each page should have equally wide margins top, bottom, and each side - about one and a quarter inches in your measurements - and a left justification. Most editors prefer a staple or paper clip to hold the script together. Don’t use folders or fancy boxes or binders.

That’s all there is to it. Just a few simple things to help you impress that overseas editor.

Patrika Salmon is a writer in New Zealand.