My New Strategy for Getting Things Published
Deep in the throes of memoir writing a couple of years ago, I started feeling an itch to submit my work again. This makes sense to me because after spending literal years working on a long-term project, there’s nothing like a fresh burst of energy from having one poem or one essay accepted for publication. It adds another outlet to my byline, but also reminds me I can do this.
I can write. I am writing.
When I was in college, I subscribed to Poets & Writers, and whenever a new issue arrived in the mail I flipped straight to the classifieds section and highlighted places to submit my poems. It’s a long-term ritual that I still do sometimes, only now, there are so many other ways to find good homes for our work.
In the past, I relied on a rudimentary spreadsheet I’d created to both track my submissions and also keep a running list of journals that felt like a good fit for me. Now I use Chill Subs and I honestly don’t know how I lived without this tool before. Their tagline alone—Making your writing life not so freaking exhausting—builds a compelling case for someone who wants to publish but doesn’t have as much time and energy as they used to.
*Use the code NICOLE for 10% off your membership
Here are a few things you can do:
Search and filter: Search by keyword, genre, contests, fees, etc.
Bookmark your favorite listings: I save journals to categories/themes that are relevant to my work—very handy!
Track submissions: You can add them manually or import your list from Submittable.
Never miss a deadline: Every week they send curated emails with places to submit to, and they also send reminders for upcoming submission deadlines, open reading periods, and writing contests.
Custom lists: For $50 (the membership price) you can send them a handful of poems or a story or an essay. A very kind human will read it, then give you 10 journals they think you should submit to, along with an explainer as to why they think your work is a good fit there. I did this for my essay on pet loss and now have it out on submission to a lot of places I didn’t even know about before.
It’s rare that I join an affiliate program, but since I love this service so much I wanted to share in case you’re looking for a new way to stay on top of submissions without sacrificing your time to the abyss of the internet.
