WDC Part 1

 

Pitch Slam

Alright, let's get right to it. Sitting in the West Metropolitan for the last speaker of my one day conference adventure (the day absolutely flew) as I type this. I had a lot of notes in my bag that I will type up later and post, but for now we'll review the highlight of the day (for many. Or the nightmare of the day. Which I was beginning to think would be my case):

THE PITCH SLAM

Brief breakdown to a pitch slam, for those who may not know what it is (me a month ago):

• Huge conference room
• 50-60 agents sitting behind tables
• Chairs in front of these table for you, the writer
• Lines. Many lines.
• 3 minute intervals--90 seconds for you to pitch, 90 seconds for the agent to respond
• Passing of business cards

 Add all of these elements and you get a great opportunity to wow potential agents with your verbal pitching skills, dazzling charisma, and witty sense of humor**

**And if you don't have any of these skills (me), then you can load up on free coffee prior to the event and let the buzz distract you from your nerves.

Here's what I learned after recovering from over-dosage of 90 minutes of pure exhilaration. Or Frenzy. However you'd like to view it:

1. Writing all fancy and nice is...great. But when you memorize fancy and nice writing, you end up sounding too polished and your voice kind of sinks into a monotone and you start worrying oh no, did I memorize this part wrong? Did I skip a word? Another thing about memorizing your pitch is that you end up talking in one big, fluent stream. Which is great. But it's hard for an agent to break into that stream and maybe start up some meaningful conversation of let's-get-to-know-each-other or ask any questions about your story. I'll confess that I didn't realize the difference between a pitch and a query until last night. Then I was frantically scrambling to put together my pitch, bugging my CP at 10PM to look at two versions (Thanks, Deborah!). I recited it about forty times before I went to bed, forty more times on the bus ride. But ultimately, after pitching to two agents that way, I realized that it wasn't working. So I forgot about the memorized pitch and just went with it, tried to tell the story the best I could and as naturally as I could. Writers are still humans after all, not pitch generating machines.

2. Be flexible with your agent list. Last night, I finished up my research (stalking) and finalized my Top Ten List of agents to whom I knew I wanted to pitch. But let me tell you that the minute you walk into those pitching rooms, it's chaos. The mere line to the room wound up and down the hallways of the hotel. Once you're in that conference room, you have to be expedient with your time. Quickly, I narrowed down my list to my top three and promised myself that no matter what, I would get to those agents. The rest of the time, however, I was vigilantly searching for the shorter lines. The agent packet was my best friend. If a line was short and the agent repped YA, then I'd hop in. I didn't get all of my top ten, but I got to more agents than I would have gotten to had I stuck to my original plan.

3. It get's better. It does. I'd be the last person to say this because I honestly wanted to crawl into a hole after pitching to my first agent--I turned SO red and completely butchered my pitch and had to read it off the paper because I was blanking and my hands were shaking and sweating and I bumped into the table as I rose to get up (Bad, right? Surprisingly, I got the standard request of query+10 pages--maybe she felt a bit bad for me :) ). After that, I walked around in a bit of a daze. Could I do this? Could I go through the same ring of fire six, seven, eight more times? But the fire does go away after you adjust and by the third agent, who was lovely and extremely friendly (the writer before me had finished early so we had time to chat), I felt a lot more confident. I was still nervous before each new agent, but some old-fashioned heart pounding doesn't hurt anyone.

4. Watch out--I stood in line for ten minutes before I realized that the agent was from an agency that I had already pitched. I'm sure that it's not strict like querying, where etiquette dictates that you only submit to one agent per agency, but it'll still be awkward if both of them request material. So don't be like me and waste time standing in a line. Little bumps here and there such as that probably cost me a few agents (though I did get to talk to a writer all the way from Seattle while waiting in that line!).

5. Do not drink too much water before the Pitch Slam. Holding pee is a really, really bad sensation, especially when exacerbated by anxiety. Which also brings me to my point: SIGN UP FOR THE FIRST SESSION IF YOU CAN (if there are multiple pitching sessions). I don't care about the whole "there are too many people" excuse. The rest of the conference will feel like cotton candy and clouds if you can muscle down the harder part first.

Highlights!!!!!

•   I MET JULIA. The one who introduced me to the whole concept of a writer's conference in the first place. We were standing in parallel lines from each other. It's always to exciting when you meet people whom you interact with online via blog/twitter/email in person :) I also met Mel, writerly buddy of Julia and another all around awesome person. Heck, everyone was super nice at the conference--the speakers, the line-waiters, and the agents. Pretty unbelievable, right? Who knew that the gods of the form-rejection could actually laugh and smile?

• I actually got materials requested. Here's the boring breakdown of stats:
• 7 agents total
• 5 requests
• 3 standard query+first 10 pgs
• 1 larger partial of 50 pgs
• 1 full MS

• Lastly, the food! Actually, no. The food was kind of eh. But when you've been on your feet for one and a half hours and fidgeting in line and talking a lot, any food will taste pretty good.
  
  That's all for this post! If you've ever been to a conference, share your tips/advice/success. If not, ask me any question and I will answer!