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by Suzanne Lieurance
Part 2 of a three-part article
(originally published in Children’s Writer, Newsletter of Writing and Publishing Trends)

The bad news about writing for special interest parenting magazines is that some pay very little or a moderate amount, and some don’t pay at all. Still, a closer look at some of these individual publications reveals other reasons to write for this market generally.

Parenting with Spirit, a quarterly designed “to assist parents in finding inner (spiritual) guidance,” has both an online and a printed version. Editor Judith Costello says, “We can’t pay a lot, but our publication is growing through exposure on Amazon.com and other marketing efforts. We encourage writers to come and grow with us!”

That’s not a bad idea. Developing a working relationship with the editor while this, or any, publication is still relatively small could well result in choice assignments later, when the magazine has increased its circulation and therefore (presumably) its payment to writers.

Parentinghumor.com, a nonpaying market, is an online publication for parents and child-care workers that features humorous articles and cartoons on parenting, family issues, and marriage. In lieu of payment, this publication offers an author’s biography and a link to the author’s website, making it an excellent way for beginning freelancers to gain clips and exposure for their work.

GUIDANCE

If you’ve never written for a special interest parenting publication, it helps to learn what’s available. Go to an online search engine and type in parenting publications or any word or phrase related to the special interest you wish to write about, such as adoption, or African American parenting, or single parenting, for example. Once you’ve located a publication that looks interesting, read as many back issues of the magazine as you can, to get an idea of the kinds of material this publication is likely to purchase. You’ll also see what subjects have been covered recently, so you won’t waste time querying about topics the magazines has just featured.

The most important task, besides reading back issues, is to obtain writers’ guidelines. Luckily, obtaining guidelines for special interest parenting publications is fairly easy now. They’re still available by mail, but most publications also put their guidelines online.

Editor Beth Kracklauer says the online guidelines for Adoptive Families cover what a prospective writer needs to know about writing for this magazine, which bills itself as “the leading information resource for families before, during, and after adoption.” In fact, online guidelines are sometimes more extensive and updated than those found in market guides.

Guidelines for Daughters are available online. If you have published work about parenting teenage girls, or if you have a special expertise in this area, you might want to send a query about the story you’d like to write to Daughters, a newsletter written to provide parents of girls with information, guidance, and the support they need to raise strong, self-confident young women. This newsletter is published six times annually, and has a national readership. Daughters buys all rights to the stories it purchases, with payment made on publication. “Be sure to read several issues of the newsletter before you query, so you’ll know what kinds of stories we use,” cautions Editor Lynette Lamb.

Sometimes writers’ guidelines are simply not available, however. Tiny Tummies is a publication designed to provide information about “good food for growing families.” Editor Sanna James Delmonico uses freelancers from time to time and looks for writers with food or nutrition backgrounds. But, she says, “I don’t have established writers’ guidelines. The way I meet and use freelance writers is usually very casual. I hear they are interested and read their work and go from there.” A query to Delmonico might be the best way to get started writing for Tiny Tummies.

Check out these parenting publications online:

Parenting Humor

Parenting with Spirit

Adoptive Families

Daughters

Tiny Tummies