The New York Times, after half a century, has retired the term “op-ed,” but that doesn’t mean you still can’t get your opinion published in what remains the world’s most respected newspaper. The Times now calls these columns “guest essays,” and it still wants them. Whether it wants yours, of course, is another question.

Odds aren’t good, of course, that what outsiders send to major newspapers will make the cut. Newspapers each get hundreds of unsolicited opinion pieces a day and can publish maybe one or two. EUobserver, an online newspaper in Brussels, says it receives up to 15,000 words of unsolicited text each day, not to mention the articles its editors ask non-staffers to write. That’s a lot of verbiage to get through, and — believe it or not — the editors do try to give these articles a fair hearing. The same is true, for the most part, for weekly and monthly publications and for many websites.

Not Enough Room

When David Shipley was a Times op-ed editor, he said that the staff received 1,200 unsolicited submissions every week. “Many of these submissions are first-rate — and most get turned down simply because we don’t have enough room to publish everything we like.” Space considerations frustrate not just contributors, but editors as well.

Unfortunately, the guidance that outlets give to people hoping to get articles published isn’t especially helpful.

Beyond limiting yourself to 800 words, they will tell you to get the reader’s attention in the first paragraph, be clear and concise, write punchy sentences, stick to one point and avoid jargon. That’s all true, but it also applies to anything else you might write hoping to interest general readers.

They’ll suggest that you address an issue of current interest about which you have some expertise or relevant personal experience. This is true, too, but also obvious.

The best advice might come in the form of “what not to do,” and what EUobserver’s Matthew Tempest says about that can be helpful.

• Don’t neglect your homework, Tempest says. If the paper has already said what you want to say, save your breath. And if it never covers the topic you want to talk about, there might be a good reason for that — a reason you need to know.
• Don’t time your submission to coincide with “International Day of X” because “no one cares that some PR department pronounced it their day.”
• Don’t belabor the obvious. Don’t start an op-ed on the war in Ukraine with “Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022.” Everybody knows that.
• Don’t pester editors. Once you’ve submitted your timeless prose, don’t deluge them with chirpy “follow-up” emails to find out if they received it. If you haven’t heard back, assume they’re not interested — and show it elsewhere. (This is true, by the way, for “media relations” generally. Become a pest, and the likelihood of getting anywhere with an editor will plummet.)

I’ve written and published a lot of op-eds, under my byline and those of others. And I like to think that my biggest frustration when writing under the byline of business leaders and politicians is their fault, not mine.

They say in all sincerity that they want to get their opinion published in a major publication — even a trade journal — to position themselves as a “thought leader” on an urgent issue of the day.

But they can be maddeningly reluctant to put their name on anything that might be thought-provoking enough to get editors’ attention. Wanting to play it safe, they sabotage their chances of getting published.

When you encounter that situation, you might remind them of what Shipley said the editors look for: “timeliness, ingenuity, strength of argument, freshness of opinion, clear writing and newsworthiness.” (Italics added.)

And if you’re trying to place an op-ed from a CEO, remember this from Shipley: “The bar of acceptance gets nudged a little higher for people who have the means to get their message out in other ways — elected officials, heads of state, corporate titans. It’s incumbent on them to say something forthright and unexpected. Op-ed real estate is too valuable to be taken up with press releases.”

A final thought: Don’t neglect smaller local newspapers. They’re struggling to fill their pages and need your help. And if your boss is the CEO of a local employer, what they say could carry a lot more weight locally than in a national or even international newspaper. Maybe it won’t be as glamorous, but it might do more good.

ANNOYING WORD OF THE MONTH: preplanned. An April break by the grand jury in former President Donald Trump’s hush money case was “preplanned,” The Washington Post reports. This is to distinguish the break from being simply “planned.” I’m not sure what was gained by this choice of words, but “preplanned” seems ubiquitous these days. Bonus points to CNN legal analyst Karen Friedman Agnifilo who said that any post-arraignment remarks from Trump would be “pre-prepared and preplanned.”