Several years ago now, I sent an article pitch to a writing magazine here in the UK.
It was accepted (hurrah!); I wrote the piece and sent it.
I heard nothing. Four months went by
... and I finally got an apologetic email from the editor to say that he'd lost the article in his over-crowded inbox. He loved it and wanted to publish it.
That was lovely news but it could've come a lot sooner if only I'd followed up!
Following up is one of the trickiest issues that writers face. I've seen so many people agonise over whether it's okay to follow up, or when to do it. And following up is something that
pretty much all writers face at some point:
- Maybe, like me, you've sent an article to a magazine (or even just a pitch) and the editor hasn't got back to you.
- Maybe you've sent out a novel for someone to review ... only to hear absolutely nothing.
- Maybe you need to conduct interviews for some research, but very few people have replied to your initial email / letter.
- Maybe you sent your first guest post to a major blog, but they haven't
replied.
- Maybe you've written to an author you love to ask for a quick bit of advice but you've heard nothing.
Over the years, I've been on both ends of the "follow up" email: I've sent a fair few, but I've also received quite a lot (possibly because I'm not always the world's fastest correspondent...)
There are all sorts of reasons you might not receive a reply when you're waiting for one. A lot of these don't have much to do
with you or with the content of your message. Maybe:
- Your email didn't arrive at all (maybe a contact form wasn't working or an inbox was full).
- Your email got "eaten" by the spam filter and the recipient never saw it – this isn't uncommon.
- Your email arrived in a manic, over-stuffed inbox and has ended up shunted down under a load of other messages.
- The recipient glanced at your email on their phone while running errands, then forgot to actually
reply to it later.
- Your email got forwarded on to someone else to deal with, but there's been a communications issue and no-one has actually got back to you.
Here are some simple rules-of-thumb about following up:
#1: Leave it Two Weeks
People go on holiday, get ill, have childcare issues, or simply get overwhelmed. Unless you're emailing about something very time-sensitive, leave it a full
two weeks before you follow up.
I've sometimes had follow-up emails after 3 or 4 days, and to be honest, it's hard to not feel irritated and harassed by these! If I'm under pressure to reply to a request, I'm more likely to say "no"; if I can take my time, I might at least be able to offer a few words of advice or assistance.
In some cases, you may feel it's appropriate to wait longer before following-up (e.g. if you know that the
recipient is particularly busy, or if they normally take 3 - 4 weeks to get back to you).
#2: Be Brief and Polite
I'm sure this goes without saying, but do be polite when you follow up! I once had a reader of Publishing E-Books For Dummies email me with some questions, and when she hadn't had a response (it was less than two weeks), she emailed again to tell me she was "surprised" not to have had a reply and
that she thought I was unprofessional!
Needless to say, this doesn't make a great impression when you're asking someone for a favour.
A brief, polite email, though, won't offend anyone. Something along the lines of:
Hi John,
Just checking up about the email I sent a couple of weeks ago (see below). Hope you received it OK, and would love to hear your thoughts when you have
time,
Ali
#3: Make it Easy to Reply
Make sure you include the email (or letter) that you're following up on with your follow up message. Don't expect the recipient to trawl through their inbox to dig out what you sent two weeks ago. (It's also possible that your first email ended up getting eaten by a spam filter, or simply went astray somehow.)
If you
need a reply by post or phone instead of by email, include your contact details – even if you think that the recipient already has those. Again, this makes it easy for them to get back to you.
Ultimately, don't ever feel embarrassed or awkward about following up. If anything, you're doing the other person a favour: think how embarrassed they might feel if they have a horrid moment of realisation, months later, that they never
replied. And on that note, if you ever email me and don't hear back, please do email again! :-)
