5 Tips for Pitching a Literary Agent

If you're here, I bet you have a pitch session with a literary agent coming up soon. I am sure you are excited to talk about your novel and also terrified to talk about it with an actual expert in the industry. About a month ago I pitched two agents at the Colorado Writer's Workshop and I was definitely feeling all the feelings that go along with pitching a literary agent.

Before I get started on my tips for pitching a literary agent, I want to first clarity what a pitch, a pitch session, and what a literary agent is.

Pitch: A pitch is essentially an oral version of a query letter. You tell the agent the very basic elements of your book.

Pitch Session: A pitch session is typically a period (usually 5 -10 minutes) of uninterrupted one-on-one time with a literary agent. You get to pitch your book and meet the agent face to face. The agent gets to ask clarifying questions and (hopefully) request to look at your manuscript.

Literary Agent: A professional agent who acts on behalf of an author in dealing with publishers and others involved in promoting the author's work.

The main goal of a pitch is to get a literary agent to request to take a look at your manuscript, but even if the agent ultimately declines to look at your manuscript, their feedback will be invaluable as you move forward with the process of getting your book published. Check out my blog post 5 Reasons To Attend A Writing Conference to see why else pitching a literary agent will be beneficial to your writing project. Reason #5 covers the benefits of pitching a literary agent.

Now, here are 5 tips for pitching a literary agent:

1. Do your research.

Look at all the literary agents at the conference and research them. Sometimes the conference website will provide bios of the literary agents and what types of manuscripts they are looking for, but I advise you to also check out the following for each agent you want to pitch:

• their literary agency website

• the types of books the he/she currently represents

• Twitter profile

• his/her manuscript wish lists

You definitely want to pick a literary agent that represents your genre and who is actively looking for books that have a similar feel to your manuscript.

Some resources to help you find out what exactly an agent is looking for:

• Research #MSWL (hashtag for manuscript wish list) on Twitter. Many agents will often tweet about the types of projects they want.

• Go to the Manuscript Wish List website and look up the agents for the conference you are attending

2. Practice your pitch (out loud).

You need to practice your pitch out loud. I advise you to practice your pitch with other people so that they can ask follow up questions like the agent will when you're actually in the pitch. If you don't have anyone to practice with, you should still at the very least say it out loud to yourself. Not only will this help you recall your pitch better, but it will also help your sound more natural when you go to pitch the agent.

3. Don't take rejection personally.

Don't go in assuming that pitching an agent is guaranteed to get you to the next step in the process (i.e. asking for a sample of your book). Writing is a work of art and an agent's decision to take your book is a purely subjective. A rejection does not mean that your story or even your pitch is bad. Maybe your story has mermaids in it and the agent just simply isn't into mermaids. Perhaps paranormal romance just isn't selling well in the industry right now. It is possible that they already have a middle grade fantasy about unicorns in their lineup. Sometimes agents know that your story is a best-seller idea, but they just don't feel passionate about it (you want someone to be passionate about your idea because they are the ones who have to sell it to the publisher).

Last year at the Chicago Writer's Workshop I pitched my YA SFF to two agents at a conference. One rejected my idea and one accepted my idea. The one who rejected my idea said that YA Fantasy genre was too saturated so in order to break into that genre, you had to have the most stellar idea of all time. When I brought this up to the agent who asked for a sample of my work, she said that because the YA fantasy genre was so saturated meant that it was popular and that opened up more opportunities for writers. As you can see their assessment of my pitch was based purely on differing opinions.

Whatever the reason you may get rejected, it is important to remember that an agent's opinion is subjective and sometimes getting published comes down to a lot of timing and luck. Plus, I always like to think of a rejection as just one step closer to finding the right agent for you and your story.

4. Ask for feedback on your pitch (yes, even if they reject you).

Okay, so you're at the awkward part in the pitch session where the agent says your story isn't for her or you can tell they aren't really connecting with your idea. Instead of cutting your session (that you paid for!) short, ask them how you can improve your pitch. I did this when an agent told me my YA Fantasy didn't fit with what she was looking for so I asked her how I could improve my pitch. She told me to focus more on my characters and less on my world-building in my pitch. I adjusted my pitch using this feedback before my next pitch session and the next agent I pitched asked for a partial of my manuscript.

5. Bring questions.

You should always be prepared for the inevitable question "Do you have any questions for me?" Even if they don't ask you this question, sometimes you'll have a few minutes left in your pitch session and you shouldn't let those go to waste. You paid for all that time so you should use it! There are so many things your probably don't know about the publishing industry and you have an expert sitting right in front of you. Since you are probably still trying to get an agent, here are some questions you can ask them:

• What do you like to see in a query letter?

• What is an automatic "no" when you read a query letter?

• What makes you stop reading in the first few pages of a manuscript?

Hope you found these tips helpful! Good luck on your pitch sessions!

Thanks for stopping by my blog! Hope to see you around here sometime soon!

Taylor

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