My intention was to cold call my top publishing houses who would be attending the BEA. But before I picked up the phone, I thought about what I would say. More than likely, I would be directed to customer service, to whom I would say: Hi, I’m Lisa. I’m looking to speak to someone who will be at the Book Expo on May 23rd. Can you direct me to them?
Then once they directed me, I would say a little something like: Hello, my name is Lisa. I’m a recent MBA graduate who will be attending the Book Expo and I was hoping to be able to meet with you...
Don’t just me too harshly; these are simplistic for a reason and just a starting point anyway. But I saw a flaw in them, in the whole plan really. That flaw… I didn’t know whom I was looking for and I wasn’t positive the customer service would either. So I searched around.
On the BEA website, there is a list of exhibitors at the event. This list is really just a catalog of every publisher who will be there and some details about what that company publishes. However, the BEA has a program that allows you to plan your trip ahead of time; the BEA Show Planner. Enormously helpful. Using this feature, I can filter out the types of publishing houses I don’t need. Therefore, I chose to look at only the publishing houses that worked with children and young adult books, as this is where I, ideally, would like to enter into the industry. Once this list was generated, I could click on a box next to the name and send that company to my personal BEA plan. The other nifty feature, and most important to the story, I can email the people who are going to be there, so long as they are in my planner.
Now, this planner still doesn’t give me a name for the person who will be representing the company. But there are other ways to begin an email than dear so-and-so. It’s more formal, and much more professional to write dear so-and-so. But, I was operating on the idea that I’m simply asking for some advice, a chance to get their points of view on the subject, what they might be looking for in an entry level position candidate. A semi-informal topic anyway, so I gave it a shot. I told them I was a recent MBA graduate, I told them that I was interested in the publishing industry and I told them why I was interested in the publishing industry. I said that the current market changes make the publishing industry turbulent and challenging right now and because of its challenging nature, this would be a wonderful industry to get into.
Someone replied.
Now, don’t get too excited. This person replied saying that she wasn’t in charge of the children books department and couldn’t help me in that capacity. However, she was willing to send my resume along to HR if I could send her a copy. I did so, thanking her not only for her time and consideration, but also for her speedy reply. She emailed me once more with the name of the HR contact who I will be able to follow up with next week.
But that’s not all.
I also received an out of office email from another company, which stated the name of someone else to contact within the company while they were out. I haven’t “spoken” with anyone from that company just yet, but I have the names of two more people who I can follow-up with at a later date.
So things are moving. Or at least beginning to head in the right direction. Additionally, on that list created by the BEA, there are publishing houses I’ve not heard of before, I very much aim to look into those more now that I have a place to begin.
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