How to Get Your Local Event Listed in Mesa Mag: A Step-by-Step Guide

A good event listing looks effortless: the right date, a clear address, a photograph that makes people stop scrolling. Behind it is usually a form filled in at eleven at night, the day before the deadline. It doesn't have to be that way. Whether you run a village fete, a walking festival or a one-off talk in a church hall, here is how to get your event into Mesa Mag's listings without the last-minute panic.

What we can list, and what belongs elsewhere

Our listings pages are for community events: open days, guided walks, gigs, exhibitions, markets, jumble sales, quiz nights, talks, workshops, junior sports fixtures and coffee mornings. Free events and fundraisers are welcome, and so are ticketed ones.

What sits outside the listings is promotion for a business's own products or regular services. That belongs in advertising rather than editorial, and it is not a snub — it is what keeps the listings credible for readers who trust them. The same goes for weekly timetables: we will happily list the launch night or a special session, but a permanent class schedule usually needs an ad.

If you are not sure which side of the line your event falls on, send the details anyway with a short note. A two-line email is quicker than guessing.

The details every listing needs

Missing information is the single biggest reason listings get delayed or dropped. Editors either chase you for it or leave it out, and neither helps. Send all of the following:

• Event name as you would say it aloud — "Summer Craft Fair", not "SCF final v3".
• Date and times, including doors open and finish. Say if it is outdoors and rain-or-shine.
• Venue with street address, postcode and which entrance to use.
• Entry details: free, donation, or pay on the door, and where tickets come from if not.
• Contact — a phone number or inbox you actually monitor, plus a website or social handle if you want it printed.
• Practical notes: step-free access, parking, whether children or dogs are welcome, whether there is food.
• One-line summary of around 25 words, plus a short description of 80–120 words.

Deadlines: work backwards from your date

Print listings are compiled weeks before the issue appears, so the deadline that matters is the one for the issue covering your event, not the day itself. An event on the first weekend of September will sit in the September issue, which closes while most of us are still thinking about the summer holidays.

As a rule of thumb, get your listing in at least three weeks before the event if you want it in print, and earlier if the date falls at the start of a month. Confirm your venue before you submit; a listing with a provisional venue is worse than no listing, because readers will turn up somewhere.

Online listings can often be added closer to the date, so a late submission is still worth sending. If you are inside a week, put "urgent" in your subject line and assume nothing — check the current copy deadline before you decide it is too late.

Photos that reproduce well

A strong picture does more for attendance than a paragraph of description, but only if it survives the printing process. Landscape images work best in our layout. So do bright, uncluttered shots: a wide view of the venue or last year's crowd usually beats a huddle of committee members squinting into the sun.

• Send the original file. Screenshots, messaging-app forwards and images saved from social media arrive too small, and anything under about a megabyte will look soft on the page.
• Include a caption and a credit: who is in it, where it was taken, and who took it.
• Check your permissions. If children are clearly identifiable, you need consent from a parent or guardian. If you are using a professional photographer's image, check the terms first.
• Do not send a poster as your photo. The text will be too small to read and we will have to ask for something else, which costs you days.

Writing the description

Concrete detail beats adjectives every time. "Fun for all the family in a lovely setting" tells a reader nothing. "Bouncy castle, face painting and a 2pm dog show on the village green — bring a chair" tells them whether to come. Name the stalls, the performers, the route of the walk, the subject of the talk.

Then add the practical bits that generate phone calls if you leave them out: parking, access, whether it is outdoors, whether under-fives need a ticket. Keep the long description to a short paragraph. If you send 400 words we will cut it, and we may cut something you wanted kept.

Submitting it, and what happens next

Send your listing in the body of an email or through the online form, not as an attached flyer or a scanned document. Plain text means nothing has to be retyped, and retyping is where dates get mangled. Use a subject line such as "Listing: Summer Craft Fair, 14 September". If you are not the organiser, tell us who is.

We cannot always confirm every listing individually, so check the issue or the website. If something changes — a new venue, a cancelled morning session — tell us immediately with "Correction" in the subject line. The print version can only be amended until it goes to press, but the online entry can usually be updated. Please only resend a listing if the details genuinely change; weekly reminders to the same inbox slow everything down.

Your pre-submission checklist

• Event name as it would be spoken
• Date, start time and finish time
• Full venue address, postcode and entrance
• Entry arrangements and where tickets come from
• One-line summary and a short description
• Contact details you will actually answer
• Access, parking and catering notes
• One landscape photo, original file, with caption, credit and permissions
• The issue you are aiming for, and its deadline

If you do only one thing, do it early. A listing sent three weeks out can be checked, queried and slotted in properly; one sent the day before we go to press is a lottery. And if you are ever unsure whether your event qualifies, ask us — it takes less time than finding out afterwards.

Photo: AJS1 / Pixabay