Thank you for your interest in writing for SELF. We are always looking for new writers to work with and want to make the pitching process as clear and straightforward as possible. Before you pitch us, please take a few minutes to read the following recommendations and guidelines.
Jump to:
- About SELF
- Types of stories to pitch
- Types of stories not to pitch
- How to pitch to us
- Editors to pitch
- Our pay rates
We look forward to hearing from (and hopefully working with) you!
About SELF
SELF is a service-driven health and wellness brand. Our goal is to help people take good care of themselves, their loved ones, and their communities. We pride ourselves on publishing trustworthy content that exemplifies our core brand values of inclusivity, accuracy, autonomy, and empathy.
To learn more about our brand, including our leadership team, editorial standards and practices, social channels, and newsletters, head over to our “About SELF” page here.
What to Pitch
Since SELF is a health and wellness brand, we’re looking for stories that explore personal, community, or public health, ideally with a service element. When pitching us a story, you should be able to answer the question: How is this helpful to the reader?
Before you pitch us, please search the site and our social channels to get a sense of our brand’s tone and philosophy (and also to make sure that you’re not pitching something we just covered). Our core verticals and areas of focus include: health (news, trends, health conditions, mental well-being, sexual and reproductive health, and sleep); fitness (workout trends, tips and explainers, gear, and women’s sports); food (nutrition trends, and tips); love (sex and relationships of all kinds, including platonic, familial, and romantic); and life (motherhood, money, career, and culture).
Here are some types of stories we’re looking for from freelancers right now:
Reported Service
We focus almost exclusively on service journalism—stories that give people the information they need in order to take action. We’re typically looking for reported pieces that rely on research and expert insights. Think how-tos, tips, advice, and explainers that people can act on. It’s not enough for a story to simply explain why something is the way it is; it should also help people understand what they can do with that information and how to apply it in their own lives in a practical sense. A good service story should tell a reader: Do this, and here’s why.
Here are some examples:
- Can Seed Cycling Actually Help PCOS and Fertility?
- Scandinavian Style Took Over the U.S. Is Scandinavian Fitness Next?
- What’s the Best Time of Day to Eat Protein?
- 7 Legit Ways to Improve Your Gut Health, According to GI Doctors
- How Frequently Should You Wash Your Workout Wear?
Personal Essays
We accept pitches for health- and wellness-focused stories that are based in part (or fully) on your nonexpert, yet still relevant, personal experiences.
The idea is to share a wellness-related experience or practice you have that made an impact on or accomplished a specific task in your life, and that you think other people might benefit from hearing about as well. These can be tricky to pull off—the key is that the experience or practice needs to solve a tangible problem or challenge, rather than simply be something that makes you feel good or better in general. Think of it as the hack-y, tip-y advice you give your friends who are dealing with something frustrating and somewhat mundane but that doesn’t necessarily require professional assistance. Some examples we’ve published recently:
- Why I’m Done With Confidence—and Choosing Cockiness Instead
- The Method I Used to Reclaim 72 Hours a Week
- Zofran Was My Pregnancy Savior. Why Don’t More People Know About It?
- I Was a Virgin at 41—and It Had Nothing to Do With Sex
- How We Healed Our Friendship After 3 Years of Silence
- I Have a Child, and Now I Can’t Seem to Have Another
- I Thought I Was Just Gassy and Bloated. It Turns Out I Was Bleeding From My Ovary
Opinion
The idea should be timely and relevant, and rooted in research, expert insight, or personal experience. We’re significantly more likely to accept an opinion or criticism pitch if you have an established expertise in the particular area, as well as a clearly stated opinion that you can back up with facts. We’re also more likely to be interested in an opinion piece if it’s a bit surprising or thought-provoking. We’re looking for opinions that will make people stop and think, Huh, that’s interesting—I haven’t considered that perspective before. Some great examples:
- I Should Be Competing at the Olympics—But My Sport Excludes Women
- We Need to Talk About Maternal Mental Health—Before It’s Too Late
- My Patients Are Getting ADHD Diagnoses at 40. Here’s What’s Really Happening
- The New Dietary Guidelines Are Stressing Me Out as a Working Mom of 4
Features
We rarely accept feature pitches (when we assign them out, we develop the pitches in-house). But when we do, the key is that the feature will be heavily reported and also structured around a narrative. This means you should pitch a story you want to tell, not just an idea or trend you want to explore, or a person or organization you want to highlight. The ideal feature will have a mix of well-respected experts and real people, and will be informative and inspiring. We are looking for compelling reads with narratives that reflect the complexity of the subject. When pitching a feature story, you should have already done a good amount of pre-reporting on the idea itself, and also make it clear whether you have access to the sources in the story that you’re pitching. Tell us what the narrative is about and how that narrative ties into the health and wellness space.
- The New Sexy Singles Scene? The Indoor Climbing Gym
- What Women Are Actually Getting Out of Those Menopause Retreats
- JuJu Watkins Hasn’t Stopped Putting in the Work
What Not to Pitch
Some of these we handle in-house. Some of them just don’t make sense for our audience.
- Personal essays that don’t fit into one of our core verticals (health, fitness, love, life, etc.)
- Stories that don’t explore personal, community, or public health
- Explainers without service (i.e., explaining a trend without also providing a practical takeaway for the reader)
- Stories that have been published elsewhere already
- Fiction, memoir, or poetry
- Q&As
How to Pitch Us
When reaching out with a pitch, please send and an email with the subject line “PITCH: Working Headline Here” and include the following:
- A working headline or two that shows very clearly what the story is about.
- A couple paragraphs with a description of the story, including why it’s relevant right now, how it can be helpful to people, and what your angle or approach will be. Be sure to also include the types of experts or the specific people you want to speak with and a word-count estimate—the more specific, the better.
- A little bit about yourself! If we’re new to working together, include clips of relevant work you’ve done, as well as any information that illustrates your expertise in the topic you’re pitching.
Editors to Pitch
The following editors are currently accepting pitches:
Jessica Firger, Health and Fitness Director (jessica_firger@condenast.com)
- Health service and features, including prevention, longevity, hacks and tricks, and social media-inspired trends
- Condition-specific service stories that focus on an aspect of living with a certain condition
- Health-focused personal essays
- Fitness, especially trends
Hannah Pasternak, Lifestyle Director (hannah_pasternak@condenast.com)
- Nutrition service, please take a look at our nutrition vertical to see the types of stories we usually cover
- Nutrition trends
- Motherhood—fertility, pregnancy, and postpartum service and personal essays that focus on the physical, mental, or overall wellbeing of the mother
- Love and sex stories with strong opinions
Jennifer Fields, Executive Editor (jennifer_fields@condenast.com)
- Women’s sports
- Wellness travel
- Financial health
- Opinion, personal essays, book excerpts
- Any health, wellness, and lifestyle topics not listed above
Our editors will make every effort to respond to your pitch within 10 days. If you do not hear from us in that time frame, please feel free to pitch your story elsewhere.
Our Pay Rates
We’re making an effort to standardize our rates as much as possible. Fees are subject to change, but currently, our rates start at $250 for short and quick news stories. Reported service stories start at $500; features start at $750. As a general rule, we may pay more based on the amount of reporting expected for the piece, turnaround time, and expertise.
This article was originally published on August 5, 2020, and was updated on May 15, 2025, and March 20, 2026.
