How to Find Email Addresses to Query

I have previously given advice to screenwriters about how to format your query emails to agents and managers. But where do you even get their contact information to email in the first place?

Welcome to my Weekly Email Newsletter! Every week, I do a deep dive into an aspect of the craft and business of screenwriting from a (former) literary manager’s perspective.

Today’s post is for subscribers only. If you’re new here, I recommend checking out the free posts at this link to sample what this newsletter has to offer.

Otherwise, keep reading for my insights on how to get literary manager’s contact information.

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Becoming a professional screenwriter is not easy.

And this year, in the current economy, it feels more difficult than ever.

But movies and TV shows keep getting made, and production companies need scripts. They need people to write the content that Americans can escape into.

If you have a completed screenplay, you might be wondering how to get it into the right hands. How do you find the right agent or manager who can help you sell it or use it to get you hired?

First and foremost, I recommend leveraging your personal connections to build a network in and around the entertainment industry. This is where you will find the most opportunity, and this is where your big break will come from.

You can also apply to competitions and fellowships, but be discerning about where you spend your time and money here. Instead of blasting your script around to dozens of competitions that most people haven’t heard of, focus your attention on just a few of the famous ones that offer to actively promote your script by sending it to agents, managers, and executives if you win.

Competitions like Austin, Page, and Final Draft, all have respectable reputations among professionals in the industry.

(You can visit the comprehensive list of fellowship and competition deadlines I put together and keep updated here).

If you’re interested in having as many irons in the fire as possible and putting into action the recommendations from my Ultimate PDF Guidebook to Querying, you can incorporate cold outreach into your overall submission strategy.

But most literary managers make it purposefully difficult for aspiring screenwriters to find their email addresses.

This is because they don’t want to be overwhelmed by a tidal wave of desperate emails from hopeful writers.

Sure, you can look on a company’s website and send a query email to their general address (something like info@managementcompany.com), but I know from personal experience that no one even checks this inbox.

And if they do, they don’t take the emails in it very seriously.

Mailing your script or query letter to a company’s physical address is not a good idea either.

Agents and managers haven’t accepted hard copy queries in decades. You’ll come across as amateur and foolish. Instead, the best approach is to do a little sleuthing and find your desired manager’s direct business email address.

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Managers don’t make this impossible to find.

Just difficult.

In putting out a few minor hurdles to finding their contact information, they can weed out the lazy and unknowledgeable writers.

That’s why none of these companies have query forms you can submit to on their websites.

But with a little willpower and ingenuity, their personal work email addresses are not difficult to find.

Here are the 8 tactics you can use: