Hitting the Ton: 100 Submissions

I’m a car and motorcycle enthusiast, and one of my favorite bits of (now outdated) slang is “hitting the ton”, which means going over 100 miles per hour (usually on a motorcycle). For me, there’s a literary version of hitting the ton, too, and that’s getting 100 or more submission in a calendar year, something I achieved for the third time in my career a few days ago. So, I thought I’d do a little post about it and talk about what it takes to hit the ton. 🙂

First, lets look at the stats.

So, as you can see from the screenshot I just took from Duotrope, I’m still sitting at exactly 100 submissions, and here’s how that 100 subs breaks down.

• Submissions: 100 (obvs)
• Acceptances: 8
• Rejections: 67
• Pending: 21
• Withdrawn: 2
• Never Responded: 2

It’s been a tough year, and my acceptance percentage, though not terrible at just under 11%, is not where I’d like it to be. Lots of close-but-no-cigar rejections. Still, it could be worse, and the bright spot is that I’ve managed to break through with some prominent markets, including Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and Abyss & Apex. I also still have 21 subs pending, and there might be another pro sale or two in the mix. If I can end the year with around a dozen acceptances, all of them paid, and half of them at pro markets, I’d be satisfied.

Now let’s talk about what it takes to hit 100 subs (or more) in a year.

1. New Material: It goes without saying that to send a lot of submissions you need a lot of stories to submit. One of the goals I set for myself this year was to write a new story every week. I even maintained that pace for three or four months before I burned out. Still, the sixteen new stories I wrote in those first few months, plus another dozen I’ve written since has given me plenty of grist for the mill. There’s also some resuscitated trunk stories in my 100 subs, two of which I even sold.
2. Consistency:  To send 100 submissions, you need to send roughly 8 submission per month, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but even with a bunch of new stories to work with, you can run out of markets fast. I’m constantly doing research to find new markets and keeping my eyes peeled for markets opening to submissions. I’ve been shooting for 10 submissions per month, and, for the most part, I’ve hit that. I set a monthly goal, and try to plan my subs around markets that are opening to submissions. For example, I’m ever watchful for Uncanny, Apex, Strange Horizons, and a few others to open up so I can fire off a submission before they close again.
3. Perseverance: If you send a lot of submissions, you’re gonna get a lot of rejections. Hell, even if you somehow manage an otherworldly acceptance percentage of 20%, you’re still looking at EIGHTY rejections from 100 submissions. That’s a lot, and let me tell ya, those rejections tend to come in bunches. There’s a 28-straight-rejection streak in my current 100 subs, and that kind of thing can wear on you, even if you’re used to the slings and arrows of the process. So take those rejections in stride and keep sending those stories out the door.

And that’s how I got to 100 submissions this year. My record is 120, and with two months and change to go, I might be able to beat that. Another, loftier goal I’d like to hit is 1,000 submission since I started tracking them on Duotrope back in 2012. I need 55 for that, though, so unless I find some boundless reservoir of writing energy between now and the new year, that’s probably unlikely.

How’re your submission going? Closing in on any personal goals? Tell me about it in the comments.