If you are writing to sell to magazines or newspapers, then you have to do some time travel. That’s right – you must think ahead! Publishers of magazines have to map out each issue well ahead of time and need to choose the best eye catching articles received well in advance of publication.
Your plan should be to decide on a subject or topic at least six months ahead of time, research and write an interesting article, then submit it to the publication three months in advance.
Ask yourself “What can I write now for magazine XYZ that will be published in six months time?”
Ask yourself, what season will it be? Christmas, Spring, Valentines Day? Or maybe an anniversary will be celebrated, or perhaps some momentous event occurred like a national disaster, or maybe a major triumph such as the lunar landing took place at that time.
For example, here are a few momentous things that happened on 1st December in the past:
1742 Jews are expelled from Great Russia by Empress Elisabeth
1750 First American school to offer manual training courses opens
1783 Charles and M.N. Roberts ascend 2,000′ in a hydrogen balloon
1787 The first lighthouse, built at Kinnaird Head, Fraserburgh, by Thomas Smith and Robert Stevenson.
Each one of these would make a topical article in some publication somewhere. And you should leave enough time to do research, write it up and submit it.
In case you’re impressed with my encyclopedic knowledge of history – don’t be. I picked up this information from a very useful site called Important Dates in History. Click Here to take a look www.datesinhistory.com
Plus, if all you want are ideas for articles then this site gives you ideas in buckets.
Getting your well researched and topical article to a publisher well ahead of time will give you an edge over other writers who leave it until the last minute.