Blogger: Rachel Zurakowski
Location: Books & Such Main Office, Santa Rosa, Calif.
Here’s my last list of conference advice for you! It’s a good idea to know what you’re getting yourself into before you attend a conference. I suggest you follow these suggestions to make the most of your conference experience:
1) Get enough rest before and during the conference. Even though I know I need rest, I find myself packing my bags until 3 am the night before the conference. I’m trying to change my ways–do you need to change yours? Conferences are exhausting. If you start out exhausted, you’re going to end up crashing. During the conference, remember to get enough sleep. Allow extra time for falling to sleep if you have trouble sleeping in a new place. Don’t take that extra hour before bed to chat with friends, if you’re going to suffer for it the next morning. (Starbucks isn’t always available at conferences!)
2) Set goals. Write down what you want to accomplish before you attend the conference. Often, conferees get so nervous that they don’t fulfill the dreams they had for the conference. If you have your goals written down, you can’t change them as easily once your nerves start talking. If you want to speak to a certain agent, write down that goal. Make the list in order of importance and try to accomplish at least your first two goals. It’s also easy to get wrapped up in the busy-ness of the conference to the point that you forget why you went in the first place. Having your goals on a note card will help to keep you focused.
3) Don’t set unreasonably high expectations for a conference and then think the conference is a failure when your expectations aren’t met. A conference is a time of learning. Yes, at times authors do find an agent at a conference and sometimes proposals are requested, but the one thing that is guaranteed at a conference is that you will learn something new. Publication is a process. It’s usually a very long road, and the writers’ conference is just one portion of the journey.
4) Do your research before the conference. Find out who’s going to be there. Figure out what the agents and editors are looking for. This will help you to make your appointments with the appropriate people. You should be able to find faculty information on the conference webpage, and you can do more research on the various agency and publisher websites.
Have fun learning more about your writing craft!
Do you have any writers’ conference experiences (good or bad) you would like to share?
Fun Fact About Rachel:
I’m not a morning person, and I totally need my coffee every day. I used to think this was a secret, but this last year for my birthday nearly every gift I received was a Starbucks gift card. At a conference I’ll be the person who shows up last for breakfast (because I couldn’t drag myself out of bed) and runs to the coffee pot. The coffee near the bottom of the pot is the strongest anyway–right?
Rachel,
Thanks for excellent suggestions. I met my agent at my first conference–but she wasn’t an agent then, she was an editor. After a number of years (thank goodness, because my work wasn’t publishable yet), circumstances brought us back together as author and agent, and the result couldn’t be better.
I have to agree with your suggestion. Don’t set a goal and be disappointed if it doesn’t pan out right then. You may have to wait a few years to see the result. Don’t worry–God takes the long view.
Learn all you can, meet and make lots of friends, and let God speak to you. If you do that, the conference will be a success.
I haven’t gone to an overnight conference yet, but I remember my first conference. OMG, I wish I couldn’t. But hey, we have to start somewhere, right? The editor (independent…new start up) asked me what I wanted to get from our meeting. Oh my, I hadn’t researched him enough. I fumbled with my answer and I could tell he was doing all he could to not laugh at me. **LOL**
I can laugh now…but then, grrr. But, the next appointment with a different editor went much better, even had some interest…. So, we all start somewhere, I guess.
AFCW will be the first overnight one, and I’m very excited. Lots more experience and six books later…hopefully that’ll help.
Great topics this week. Have fun in FL.
Shortly after God created writers, he created coffee.
It’s good to bring up unreasonable expectations. When I attended my first writer’s conference, I had visions of selling my book, becoming world famous, and telling Oprah, “Sorry, but my schedule is just too full to make an appearance on your show with Stephen King.”
I didn’t sell my book at that conference. In fact, it would be four years before an agent (a certain somebody who writes blogs for this website) would offer to represent me.
I learned a lot from that conference, most of all, Oprah is overrated.
Richard, I love that line: “Don’t worry–God takes the long view.” Great advice and so true.
Rachel,
I remember my first conference…I was sure I’d walk into the room and someone would just sense my aura and fall in love with me. (My writing had to be great, if I was so amazing, right?) I’d be on Oprah the next day, have dinner with the President the following week, and sign a movie deal within a month. THEN, I woke up! 🙂 Thanks for these tidbits to help keep us grounded. 🙂
~Anngela Schroeder
http://www.at-last-aschroeder.blogspot.com
Hi, Rachel!
Great conference tips! Thanks for sharing! I always encourage writers to go to conferences when they’re trying to land a book deal. I made my first two sales as a direct result from meetings at writers’ conferences. But, it took awhile. I was going to conferences each year for five years before I was able to sell a novel!