By: Caroline Blaha-Black

So you have decided to start freelancing and after several years of hard work and many rejections you have succeeded in placing your articles in smaller national and regional publications. Your work and the many sleepless nights of waiting for responses from editors has finally started to pay off, and you get more and more articles published as the days go by. Now you've decided to shoot for the big ones, like Woman's Day and Good Housekeeping. The ball is rolling and last week you wrote that precious filler for the Backpacker magazine, and the next month you have a short article due for yet another large magazine. You have embarked on a serious freelancing career and you're sending out several queries a day.

How do you keep track of all the submissions, editors' names, stories, and payments?

Get organized. Organization is a good tool for beginners and seasoned writers alike, and it is a sure path to success. Different writers use different organization tools and I will highlight a couple of them.

If you're a computer person (and most writers are to some extent), why not use Excel? This widely- available program is standard on almost every computer and is easy to use. On my home PC I have created a master file in Excel called "Submission Log 2005-06", in which I keep track of all my submissions for the current year. Within this master file, every month is a separate file, such as January, February, etc. Each month has columns marked with headings such as Publication, Query, Story, Deadline, Submitted, Status, Contact and Payment. This system allows me to easily keep track of all my submissions, and the cells on Excel are easily shrunk or expanded for easy viewing if more space is needed.

Let's take a look at the individual headings and see what they're all about.

- The Publication heading tells me which magazine, e-zine or newsletter I am submitting to at the time.

- The query column informs me of the date when my query was sent, and whether it was sent by mail or by email. Always keep copies of your queries for future reference and for possible reuse.

- The story column shows me the name of the article that I am offering.

- Deadline tells me when the article is due, if accepted by the magazine.

- The column entitled "Submitted" tells me the date in which I submitted my finished piece. Again, it's helpful to distinguish whether it was sent by mail or by email.

- Status column: sometimes there is a kill fee, you get rejected (God forbid!), or the editor decides to postpone your article. Whatever the status of your piece, write it down in this column, so you'll know what the publication's doing with it.

- The contact column contains the names of persons you can establish a professional relationship with, and to whom you'll be addressing your correspondence that has to do with that particular publication. It can be the name of the editor, associate editor, etc. It's always better to have a name than just to address your queries to the "editor." Always make sure to spell his or her name correctly.

- My favorite and last column in the monthly Excel file is the Payment. Did you get paid for your story? Put it here, even if it means that you were paid only with complimentary copies. Writing it down reminds you of the reward and stimulates you to do more writing and submitting.

The Submission Log can be shorter, depending on what entries you want to keep track of. The same thing can also be accomplished on a scientific square paper notebook, available at any college bookstore.

Always be sure to make a copy of your Submissions Log on a floppy disc or CD, and make sure to update it regularly. You never know when the computer will have a bad day and freeze on you, or a virus will mess up your files. Better safe than sorry. Have a backup file ready on hand and carry it with you, such as a floppy disc that fits easily into your purse or backpack.

Whatever you write and however you decide to organize your data, make sure to use a system that works well for you. Writers need to be professional, so stick to a system that gives you the best overview of what you're writing and submitting. Have fun and happy writing!

There are multitudes of writing resources available on the Internet. Go to any search engine and ask for writer's resources, writer's markets, writer's contests, writer's conferences, etc

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