Sarah Jane Abbott, an associate editor for Paula Wiseman Books and Beach Lane Books/Simon & Schuster, spoke at Austin’s SCBWI conference. She had lots of useful information. I am going to just give a couple of her points here.

Make connections by going to conferences.
You can’t just attend. You have to meet and talk to people.
Beach Lane Books finds a lot of authors and books at SCBWI conferences. (So there’s a set you need to check out.)