A Week of Marketing=4 Weeks of Work

My top priority this week was marketing myself to line up some work for the coming month. The results were even better than I expected.
When I'm doing a marketing blitz, I start by contacting former editors, then I send Letters of Introduction (LOI's) to new editors I want to introduce myself to and then query.
I didn't even make it to step 3 - querying this week because contacting current and former editors, as well as the LOI's paid off big time for me.
My first assignment is a rather large one which will consume at least one entire week with research and writing. This editor found me through a professional directory listing and contacted me while I was on vacation. We finally put our schedules together this week and set me up for my first assignment.
The second assignment also came from a professional organization - he had advertised for story title writers on jobs board with the organization. I had contacted him when he put the listing up, and he wanted me to read a story and write a title for it. I never got to it because our house sold that week and I had to complete other assignments before moving and heading to Germany. I contacted him on Monday and he instead gave me a nice story assignment for his trade publication.
The third assignment came from an LOI I sent this spring and followed up this week.
As well, two regular editors continued giving me assignments, which about fills up the month of August.
This week showed me that it usually isn't enough to just send blind LOI's. It was the combination of LOI's and networking through professional writing organizations that landed me such a productive marketing effort.
How about you? What did you accomplish in your marketing efforts this week?