I carry my clips and samples in a three ring binder with plastic sleeves.

Clips and samples show the writing world what you can do. Appointments with publishers go smoother when you can show rather than tell what you write. Let me define the two.

Clips

These are articles, poems, stories, devotionals, editorials, whatever you’ve had published. The term clips refers to articles cut out of magazines and periodicals. Some of your clips might be copies of magazine pages or print offs of website articles. Your most recent publications are best. No need to show twenty year old newspaper clippings. (I really have some of those.) Be sure the date and magazine title are somewhere on the copy. If you have a link to your work, I suggest you share a hardcopy. Wifi access may not be available where you meet with publishers and you waste precious minutes of your fifteen minutes looking for specific clips on your site. If they are interested in your link, you can write the web address on the back of your business card.

Samples

Samples are unpublished work to show your writing skills. Editors want to see if your style is right for their publication. Some editors want unedited versions. (Not rough drafts, rather items not professionally edited.) They want to see how polished your best work is. Bring only your best samples. You might want to go back over selections and tweak as needed to make them your best. Be sure you do your research about the publishing house or magazine in advance. (I’ll be discussing that in another post.) Only show samples of things fitting the particualr publishers needs.

Presentation is everything

I carry my clips and samples in a three ring binder. Each article is in its own sleeve. I usually have multiple copies of samples. Some editors like to mark up my work. That way I always have a clean sheet to show at the next appointment. The sleeves keep the pages neat. Some people like to bring their laptop to show their work. I find that too cumbersome, and it can give the impression of being unprepared. You grabbed your computer at the last minute because you didn’t have time to print anything off. If disaster happens and your printer dies, it’s worth the cost to go to Office Depot to make copies or buy ink for a friend’s printer, but don’t go without samples or clips. Some like to paperclip their sheets together and keep them in a file folder. Whatever works to keep your papers organized.

What’s in your toolbox so far

Let’s see, so far you’ve made a business card, a one-sheet and gathered samples and clips. You’re well on your way to filling your conference tool box for success. In my next post we’ll define synopsis and proposals. So of you haven’t subscribed to my blog you might want to do that by using the options to the right. I plan on covering the how-tos for a successful conference experience before May is over, and I am on my way to the Write-To-Publish conference in June.

How do you organize your clips and samples?

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