Writers like to talk, and a favorite topic of conversation is where to submit manuscripts. How do you decide where to send your latest masterpiece if it wasn’t written with a specific market in mind? It’s a good questions, with as many answers as there are writers.
I subscribe to the start-at-the-top-and-work-your-way-down philosophy (for the most part). I consider pro-rate publications first, then semi-pro publications, and finally token-rate ones. In general, I don’t submit to non-paying markets by principle—I put a lot of work into my story, and I’d rather publish it myself than give it away.
Within each of these categories—pro, semi-pro, and token—how do I decide where to send something? This is where things get subjective, and there’s no easy answer. I first narrow my choices based on the story itself by asking: “Does the magazine publish this type of story?” For example, Analog (one of the “Big Three” in speculative fiction) doesn’t publish fantasy, so if my story has magic and dragons, I cross Analog off the list. (This may seem obvious, but I’ve read interviews with editors who talk about receiving stories in the wrong genre.) This will shorten my list, sometimes considerably.
From there I consider a combination of the exposure my story would get, the prestige of the publication, and the response time. I find it a little surprising, but my first cut is based on response time. Some publications take a ridiculously long time to review manuscripts (Tor.com, I’m looking at you and your 365+ day response time). Most pro-rate publications frown on simultaneous submissions, and I simply don’t want to tie up a manuscript that long, especially when the acceptance rate at many pro-rate publications is significantly less than 1%. I’m usually willing to wait two or three months for a response, but the shorter the turnaround, the higher on my submission list I’ll place a publication.
Prestige and exposure tend to go together. The higher the prestige of the publication, generally the larger the readership. I want people to read my work. I want a lot of people to read my work, so I aim for markets with large readership. Most of the pro-rate publications have good readership, but some don’t. I’ll submit to Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine before I submit to one of the lesser known pro-rate publications because I know Asimov’s has a large readership.
I know some writers will only submit to pro-rate publications, but I not one of them. I don’t make a living writing short stories, and in all likelihood I never will, so I have few reservations about submitting to semi-pro and token rate publications. Besides, many of the semi-pro and token publications are well-respected and have strong niche readership, for example Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine and Shimmer are well-respected and have their diehard fans. For semi-pro and token rate publications, I use the same three factors when deciding where to submit: response time, prestige, and exposure. I submit until I sell the story, lose faith and trunk it—this has only happened once—or I run out of markets, which has yet to happen for any story.
So there you have it, my philosophy of submissions. Is it the right approach for everyone? Probably not, but I find it works for me. If you have a different approach to chosing markets, I’d be interested in hearing about it.
D. Thomas Minton 
I too focus more and more on response times, rather than pay levels. It’s one reason why I’ve gone off ASIM. If you get through their first rounds you go into an ‘editors final round’, where you sit for 3 months in the hope that one of the rotating editors will like your story. In my experience they never did, so the story would sit with them for something like four months total before being rejected.
That points to another thing, which is that I think a writer has to develop a feel for who likes their schtick, and who doesn’t. Not everyone is going to like the kind of stuff you write, and you need to identify those markets that don’t and rule them out from future submissions.
That also relates to ‘never give up on a story’. Well, maybe ‘never’ is too strong, but just because 4, 5 or 12 places rejected it, doesn’t mean the next one won’t love it to bits. People are not all alike in their tastes, and nor are editors.
Colum
I think you make a good point about assessing editor preferences, but I think it’s very difficult to know if they don’t like your style in general or the specific story (unless they tell you they didn’t buy it because they don’t like present tense, for example, and you write frequently in present tense–then it becomes a “suitable” market thing). I guess after several tries you might think it’s your style, but I wouldn’t necessarily cross a publication off my list because I really just don’t know. Now if they took a fairly long time to review things, I might be more inclined to drop them waaaay down on my priority list….