Salient welcomes contributions to the magazine from all students!
If writing is your game, here’s what we need from you: if you have no idea what you want to write about or how you want to get amongst, it’s best that you come and have a yarn with us in the office to see what interests you. Details on how to get to the office are on our contact page.
Dirty Guide to Pitching
Welcome to the Salient quick and dirty guide to pitching. Got an idea for a news article, feature, review, podcast or column? This is how you get the editors to publish it.
If you have no idea what to write, but know that you want to get your work into Salient’s pages - best to come see us in the Salient Office in the Student Union Building, and we can have a chat about where and how you can contribute to Salient.
Already got a draft? Send it in with a quick pitch following the guide below.
Before you pitch!
Take a look at our themes for the year, and see where your idea might fit best or come up with ideas to align with a theme. Find the themes here:
And this should go without saying - but have a read of Salient. Look at what has been published in past issues, and you’ll get an idea of the work that fits in Salient.
Introduce yourself.
If we’ve never met you, we wanna know who you are and why you want to write this pitch. Keep it brief. Make sure you include your name, pronouns, and iwi/hapū affiliation.
Elevator pitch.
A short paragraph outlining the kaupapa of your piece. This should include what the main point of the piece will be - the crux of the article, what kind of article it is (investigate? Personal essay? Listicle? if you’re unsure, see our writing guidelines), and any stylist notes, such as the tone of the writing. If you have any title ideas, here is the place to let em loose.
Target Audience
Who are you aiming at with this piece? Who is most likely to read it and be interested in it? This is your target audience - and it’s important that it aligns with Salients uni student readership.
Why?
Pursuade us - why does your column/feature/review/nudes/finsta etc belong in Salient? What is it bringing to the magazine that is new, or hasn’t been done before? If your pitching to a specific issue, how does your article align with that theme?
How?
This involves execution. We want to know that you can follow through with this piece and that you have a plan to do it. Especially if it’s a feature article, include a list of three to four people or places you can go to for interviews, and research you intend to carry out. If you haven’t left your desk, you haven’t written a feature.
Final tips
It can be awkward learning to vouch for your writing for the first time, but back yourself and be confident. No one else is gonna vouch for your idea but you.
Feel free to come in and meet us first if it’ll make pitching easier - we always love meeting new contributors. The Salient Office is deep in the bowels of the Student Union building - down the stairs, past the bubble, through the doors and up the stairs to the right.
Finally: Don’t be boring. Other than that, go forth, write, keep writing, come back to us soon.
Send your pitch into editor@salient.org.nz, with PITCH and a working title in the subject line.
News
If you want to write news, go straight to horse’s mouth news@salient.org.nz.
PODCASTS
If you want to pitch a podcast, send it to podcasts@salient.org
Features
Send us a pitch (follow template below) to editor@salient.org.nz. Features are around 1000 - 2000 words and can basically be about anything. They generally cover a specific, researched topic.
Read an example here.
Column
Send a pitch (follow template below) to editor@salient.org.nz. Tell us what you want the column to be called and what you want to write about. You can write about anything.
For example, ‘Liquid Knowledge’ broke down things like cryptocurrency and OnlyFans so you could use them for pub chat.
Word count: 300 (half page) or 600 (full page). You could submit on a weekly or bi-weekly or just a semi-regular basis.
Reviews
Send a pitch (follow template below) to editor@salient.org.nz. We look for food, film, music, fashion, TV reviews or sports chat. You could also review your flat mates or the bus system.