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Did you know that it takes less than a minute for an agent or editor to make a decision about whether to accept or reject an author's query? It's true.

Did you also know that more than 80% (no one knows the exact percentage but this is the generally accepted norm) of all author queries are rejected for the same two reasons?

   1. Bad writing.

   2. Bad marketing.

I can't fix bad writing here but I can help you fix your bad marketing.

Always remember that a query letter to an agent or publisher is equivalent to a resume and cover letter for a job application. If you wanted a job as a travel agent, you wouldn't expect to get that kind of job by applying for a position as a cashier at WalMart, would you? And yet, thousands upon thousands of writers do something similar every day.

When I was a marketing manager for a book publisher, I once got the assistant editor's mail by mistake. Before I realized the error, I started opening envelopes. One of them was a query letter from a man who wanted us to publish his science fiction novel. We didn't publish science fiction and the listings about my company in the Writer's Market and in Literary Marketplace said so.

And so, in less than a minute, the man's manuscript was rejected. He'd wasted time and postage (not to mention a bit of hopefulness) because he had not done the most basic research about the targets of his marketing.

How do you avoid this trap?

A good place to start—for book publishers and agents, at least—is Literary Marketplace. It's an oversized two-volume set of books, normally kept on the research shelves of local libraries. A good second choice is The Writer's Market.

Read the listings for your targeted publishers carefully. Do they accept the type of book you are selling? If not, look for publishers or agents that do. This one step will increase your chances of finding an agent or publisher far above the norm.