A few months ago I wrote that market research takes me at least two full days. In retrospect, I’d say that’s conservative. It takes far longer than that. My eyes are always sore by the time I skim through enough issues of a magazine to decide that it is or isn’t worth sending.
And sometimes you never can tell.
Right after Julianna was born, I wrote a piece called “Not My Plan.” It detailed all the things that weren’t supposed to happen, and how I realized later that they really were. I sent it around for critiques. Family members cried and told me I was a genius (Maybe they didn’t want to hurt my feelings.) :). Cooler heads told me I used the word “supposed” too many times. But the repetition was deliberate. Again and again I put the whole essay aside, and every time I came back to it, no matter how hard I tried, the structure remained.
Meanwhile, of course, I pored over my market guide, I wore out my eyes on sample copies and web sites. Nowhere could I find a place that would take something exactly like my piece. It didn’t tell a story–or rather, it did, but not in the usual form–it didn’t present a grand inspirational argument. In fact, I couldn’t find anything, anywhere, that really looked like a good fit for my little personal experience.
So I put it out of my mind for a while, until Christian asked whatever became of it–had I sent it out? Well…no, I admitted.
I sat down and did what, perhaps, I should have done in the first place. I made a list of every magazine that I thought might possibly consider it, and put them in order by who had the biggest readership and paid the most. 🙂 The first one rejected it outright, the second didn’t respond at all (which they warned meant rejection), but the third accepted it. With lovely compliments.
It just goes to show that market research only takes you so far. Sometimes, you just need to let your baby fly the nest.
Kathleen M. Basi 