E-Mail Queries

Market Your Screenplay

E-mailing your queries to Hollywood producers offers numerous advantages in terms of speed, efficiency, and 'cloaking' your actual location. Making it work for you, though, requires some forethought and careful action.

Individual Names

Insert the name of the development executive you're sending each individual e-mail to.

No Mass Queries

Don't send out mass queries with everyone in the cc: or bcc: line. They tell when you bcc: them, since you don't address the e-mail to a specific person at the company. This information is easy to find on who you should send it to from the Hollywood Creative Directoryor IMDBPro.

Every e-mail query should have the name of a specific person that you want this e-mail to go to.

Call for Specific Addresses

Most of the e-mail addresses in the Hollywood Creative Directoryor IMDBPro are a general mailbox where unsolicited mail goes. If you can make a call before the e-mail goes out, try to find the specific address to send it to.

Usual E-Mail Formats

Usual e-mail formats for Hollywood production companies:

firstname@domain
lastname@domain
firstnamelastname@domain
firstname.lastname@domain
firstinitiallastname@domain
firstnamelastinitial@domain

Very few companies fail to follow one of these formats.

Appearance of L.A. Presence

Even though a company doesn't accept unsolicited queries, it may scan them for:

a local address or phone number in the LA area--if there is no address or phone number listed, it is assumed the sender lives out of the area;
- most cellphone plans are now nationwide so you should be able to get a number from anywhere in the country.
- several mailbox companies will forward your mail on a weekly basis to wherever you may live. (Scriptcopier.com allows this and gives you an address on Wilshire Blvd).
an e-mail address that makes it seem like you're in LA already;
- like JackinHollywood@something.com.

Should you decide to 'cloak' your actual location, or make it look like you reside in Los Angeles, be prepared to fulfill the promise . . meaning be there when the meeting is called. Otherwise go with sheer talent and present yourself as being where you actually are. Some people simply don't like being fooled.

Killer Title

If you still don't have the phone number or address that is local, you better have one killer title. Half the projects that sell lately have a great catchy title that really tells you about the project. If you have a great title that might just get your logline read.

WARNING:

Apply any guidance you find here with discernment, and at your own peril. No claim can be made to the fundamental correctness of any approach, and not every possible situation and outcome has been considered in the forming of this advice.