I like to write and I've put together various PowerPoint presentations on topics I follow as hobbies so I thought maybe an article on coins I track would be of interest. Does anybody have any experience or suggestions in writing an article ? Possible destinations (Coin Week vs. Coin World vs. The Numismatist) ? Ways to approach the mags or their editors ? I'm thinking since I am not an expert by any stretch that it would be an article that is of interest to the beginner/intermediate investor.
Mike Thorne, who writes columns for Coins Magazine, is here on CoinTalk. Maybe you can send him a PM. @Mike Thorne , do you have any suggestions for @GoldFinger1969 ?
As a general rule, Coin World and Numismatist only accept articles they solicit. Put another way, "don't call us, we'll call you". And, most of what you see in them, unless it's written by staff, was scheduled to be put in them as much as a year in advance. Are there exceptions, sure, but they are few and far between. And yes I know this from personal experience. Both magazines, and all other coin magazines, have in the past contacted me to do interviews, and then published those interviews. But I was the subject of the articles not the writer of them. With the rest of coin magazines it is a bit easier to get an article accepted, but still difficult. Years ago I had a few that were published in Numismatic News. With Coin Week (and its predecessor before they were bought by CU) it's much easier to get an article published. I've written articles that appeared in Coin Week, helped write articles that appeared in Coin Week, and submitted articles written by others to Coin Week - all of which were published. So if you wanna give it a try, that's definitely your best bet, especially your first time out. But that's not to say they're gonna publish just anything either.
Congrats !! Can you post a link to those articles or maybe the PDFs ? I presume it was in your areas of expertise that you wrote/edited the book on, right ? Nice ! Thanks GD...yeah, I worked weeks or even MONTHS on some financial articles earlier in the 2000's and they got shot down by the Publishing Board for the financial publication I submitted them to. They wanted esoteric academic crap with zero relevance to the modern working investment manager. Articles would have been timely and informative but screw 'em.
I guess they have enough of a backlog...unless they pay $$$ for articles, you would think it might be difficult to get enough stuff to put out monthly or quarterly or whatever their publishing rate is. Good to know that the supply of articles exceeds immediate demand, I guess.
The interviews ? No, it was long before I ever helped write that book. I'm assuming you're asking about the interviews ? If so, nope I can't, they're all protected by copyright. But with most the mags paid subscribers usually have access to their archives, but you'd have to go back 20 years to find them. What I can do is show you what it was one of them was about because I posted about it here, back then. Of course it's so old that many if not most of the links are no good anymore, but you'll be able to see what it was all about. https://www.cointalk.com/threads/time-for-a-change-in-our-change.170/ Insider writes and contributes to Numismatic News on a regular basis, so he may, or may not, be able to offer you some insight with them.
Coin World & Numismatic News love to receive short press release type alerts on interesting new varieties, or discoveries THAT THEIR READERS CAN also LOOK FOR. As for articles, there is one very simple rule: WRITE ABOUE SOMETHING YOU KNOW!
Abouetely write what you know about!! (don't throw anything at me...my eyesight is getting bad and I may not be able to duck)
I used to write articles for club newsletters. I was able to get some practice and have some fun. One local club routinely won awards for the newsletter. I know this wasn't the info you wanted, but maybe it's something to consider. I never went beyond the club level and haven't done anything in 15 years but maybe someday. Then I concentrated on PowerPoint presentations for the local club. If you belong to one, they always have a need for people to give presentations, and they shouldn't be too difficult to convert into articles.
