Your Literary Agent--How To Get One Fast!
There are a few ways to find and get an agent quickly for your
book. In this report I'll deal with the most popular.
To begin with, your book doesn't need to be complete. You could
have written only a couple of chapters and have a complete
outline of your book and that will do nicely. In fact, agents
and publishers almost always take on books before they are
completed. They need a couple of chapters to see that you can
actually write and they need the entire outline to know what the
book will be about.
And, to be even more specific, the two chapters don't have to be
the first two of the book. They can be completely random. Again,
their purpose is to show the agent or the publisher that you can
actually write.
By the way, this technique works for both fiction and
non-fiction. Your first step is to get yourself to the local
book store and find a handful of books written in the same genre
as your own. Thriller, mystery, self-help, carpentry, whatever.
Open the books and on one of the first few pages you'll see the
name of the publisher of the book and their city location.
Jot down the names of these publishers and the book titles. Then
you're off back home.
When you get there, pick up the telephone and call these
publishers. If you don't know how to do that, no problem.
In the front of your telephone book there should be a listing of
area codes for the cities you're interested. All you have to do
is call information for these cities and ask for the telephone
numbers of these companies.
You can find them on the internet as well, of course, this is
just the old method. You call information by dialing the area
code, followed by 555-1212. It's the same number regardless of
the area code. Ask for the correct number, jot it down for
future reference, and you're on your way.
Now you've got to call the number and start getting that agent.
When the publisher's phone is answered, tell them you're trying
to find the person who holds the rights to (name of book)
because you want to make a movie of it, or a video training
guide, or a work book, create a calendar, or develop an audio
program, or whatever else you can think of.
The person who holds the rights to this book will almost always
be the agent for the author. Ask for a contact name, number and
address if they have it.
Now you have the agent contact information for your. Send each
one an agent acquisition letter. This is a simple, one-page
letter that sells your book aggressively and tells the agent why
you book would be a very big seller. Remember, the letter must
convince the agent that your book would be a very big seller.
Any sentence, ANY sentence that does not tell the agent why your
book will be a big seller should be removed from that sales
letter.
The agent is not really interested in you (unless you're a
celebrity because that means the book will sell more). And,
frankly, they don't care how well you write, or your commitment
to improving the world. They want to know only why this book
would be a best seller and why they'd be out of their
(financially greedy) minds not to grab it right away!
One page, that's all. They can make their decision based solely
on that. When you're finished writing it, read it over yourself
and ask yourself, candidly, does this letter make you want to
reach into your own pocket and pay $20,000 to get hold of the
rights? If it doesn't, then you've got to make that letter
better.
Mail the letters, Remember, just the letters, not the chapters,
to all the prospective agents and then start working on your
next book or find a few more agents for this one.
Once you've sent off about 20 to 30 letters, you can stop.
You've covered all the agents who are significant in this area.
Don't bother following up. If the agent doesn't call you, it
means they don't think you book (as you've presented it) is a
good bet for success. And it also means your agent acquisition
letter was weaker than you thought.
Revise it, re-write it and send it to other agents, and even
back to those original agents.
Now, want to get that agent in just hours? No problem. Fax the
letter to them. I've had success with this strategy in as little
as 6 hours!!