Is it worth trying again?

Community Episode Fan Community
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This question (Is it worth trying again?) has been on my mind for a couple days now.

I started reading Episode stories back at 2014, after a few years of learning English fully, I published my first story around November 2017. My first story gained 20 reads in 2 months, I had no connection with neither forums or Instagram. My directing was basic, I didn’t know how to place an overlay without putting it on the bg. But, I’ve improved myself and entered the “Heroes & Villains” contest. I failed the contest, I didn’t win, but I gained something else. A lot of friendships. Even though my story reached only 200 reads at the time of the contest, I was known around the forums because I reviwed over 30 contest entries in a week. Anyone who spent an entire day on the forums could’ve easily find me.

Time passed by, lost a lot of friends, didn’t enter Fantastical due to some “partner” problems. The Thriller contest came by. Thriller is my favorite genre, just like Halloween is my favorite holiday. (even though no one celebrates it here lol.)

When the Thriller contest was announced, I was already getting ready to leave Episode. But I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t leave without at least joining the Thriller contest. Well, I got a little carried away and said a few things on Instagram, while I do admit, those weren’t nice, they weren’t mean either. I was getting cocky because I was good at directing. (I mean… I had a lot of threads that helped people learn a few things, so…)

Anyway, someone saw my IG story and decided to post in on their story. I woke up seeing over 100 people on my story. (the average was 50 at most, so I figured out someone called me out lol.) No one really said anything mean to me but people watching all of my stories as if I did something wrong when I was just posting memes and being cocky. That really made me both angry and sad. After all, this community has a lot of problematic people that hide in the shadows of their reads, but when a not-so-famous person say something, just turn against them.

I deactivated my IG and never opened the portal again. But seeing how people support each other in this contest, I wished that I also joined. (If only people were supportive as much as this in other contests. :roll_eyes:)

So, here I am again, debating if I should write on Episode again. Because I feel like it’s going to happen again. People don’t care about your story unless its romance with a typical bad boy.

Asking this question to all the forum users

Is it worth trying again?

Thank you to those who took time to read and respond.

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If you really enjoy writing your own stories on episode, then I’d say it’s worth another try.

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I do enjoy writing here but getting only 200 reads after promoting it for weeks doesn’t really help. :grimacing:

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I totally know what you’re talking about. I’ve been writing my story for a really long time and every time I publish a new episode I try to promote it a lot, I’ve been doing read 4 reads and anything really but I haven’t gained too many reads.
Now I decided to complete my story before publishing more episodes. And now I can really focus on the writing instead of promoting my story. And when I’m done and I publish my story, I can fully concentrate on promoting my story.

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I wouldn’t worry so much! I wouldn’t consider not winning as failing! You won because you made an original story that you’re proud of… even if you didn’t get recognised for it! There are plenty of stories in the competitions that are amazing and should get credit even if they don’t win!

What do you mean? How were they being like that? Did they say anything or did you just get that feeling?

That’s not true! You just need to advertise yourself for your story’s unique and wonderful things! Episode doesn’t make it easy to find amazing stories, so it can seem overwhelming to try to continue. I’d say keep going. If you’re good at writing and you love it, focus more on creating something you can be proud of than how many people read it. It makes people love your stories more as they have integrity and they’re good because you want them to be good, and not because you want reads and views. Keep going! One day you’ll tap into an audience that loves your story for what it is!

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That sounds really good, but I kinda wouldn’t say no to an audience who waits for me to publish :thinking:

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Actually, I recommend completing a lot of your story and then publishing it one chapter at a time at the same time every week or twice a week at the same time. Find a time that works well and gets you some attention and the individual episodes being released will raise your reads if you’re consistent with it. When you get 100+ views in a short amount of time, update again while the hype is strong. That way, the original 100 people will read the second chapter and you’ll go down in the rankings even more!

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I got a feeling. Even authors I respected and liked looked at my story. But they never answered my DMs before though. :grimacing:

Thank you for your encouragement.

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People are so caught up in their own bubbles that I think they probably didn’t even notice how they were making you feel. Don’t be put out!

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I think the same. But thinking about it the whole day made it seem worse than it is. I’m guilty as well.

Btw, you are a really nice person. I saw your other threads as well. You’re one of the kindest people here who help the community a lot.

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I get that but for me I decided this was the best option, because I started writing my story (it’s my first story, so this has been a learning process too) and then I published some episodes, I got some feedback on what I should improve on so I went back and made changes, again and again. A few times I got tired of always having to improve on something and I ended up not writing for long periods of time a few times.

So, I felt like I had to disappoint my readers time after time. I went back and changed episodes so now my readers had to read the same episodes again. And this kept me from writing new episodes too. So I couldn’t publish new episodes either. And trying to work on my story like this and at the same time promoting it didn’t just work anymore.

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This is actually what I am planning to do when I complete my story.

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Maybe we really should write most of the story then publish it weekly. The writer of “I Married a Millionare” is always #1 and trending. She updates 3 times a week. Maybe that’s the key :thinking:

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Could be. I really think it’s important to have an updating schedule and keep to it. That way the readers can trust you to be true to your words. :joy:

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It also helps that she’s written 2 featured stories, so she definitely has the fanbase from that!

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It is worth trying, love!

I know it’s disheartening at first when you publish and barely get any reads, but promote your story on here, and the right people will read your story. I didn’t care for reads at all (I still don’t because every and any read is amazing to me) when I first wrote my story, but I kept publishing for all of those faithful readers who loved my story even if it was 20 readers at the time.

200 reads is great because it means a decent amount of people took the time out of their day to read your story!

It’ll grow and you will find the right audience for you and your work that love your story. Write for you because you love it and I promise something will grow from that.

Also I agree with @ShanniiWrites - you did not fail the contest! Not winning does not mean failing. Contest entries are hard because of the time constraints and following the themes and guidelines. Be proud of yourself for taking that leap.

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I can only join the previous comments: if you enjoy writing, don’t give up.

When I started working on my first story it felt like I was writing to myself, but I thought “screw it, it’s fun!”. Then: “Yay, new update and nobody cares!”

But this is not true. There are people out there who would be interested in your story, they just don’t know yet it exists :slight_smile: It’s really hard to get noticed among thousands of other authors. I remember how I kept updating with 0 followers and like 3 readers, and after a few months I started to get reads. I can’t portray romance, I don’t really have typical bad boy characters and my stories don’t often make any sense, but we all have different tastes and for some reason people are reading my stories as well :smiley:

If you enjoy writing and try to improve, it will be seen on your work and you will eventually gain some loyal readers. And yes, many people are really supportive in the community, so if you need any feedback while you are waiting for the reads, I’m sure you will find someone who would be happy to review it.

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Thank you for encouragement. I’m trying to develop some ways to get more reads. I’ll try harder this time.

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Thank you so much. I figured out that I have to surround myself with positivity. I’ll write for myself, if anyone wants to read it, they can. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Of course it’s worth trying again.

Eh, every contest there are always people that I’m surprised to see not win. At the end of the day, it’s always going to be a little subjective. I don’t consider not winning failing. Failing would be if you hadn’t finished or didn’t even start.

Okay… I’m pretty sure I know who you are and what you’re talking about. If I’m thinking of the wrong person- then disregard everything I’m saying now ahahha.

Honestly? I didn’t think your comments were that bad. A little cocky? Yeah, it did come across that way a little bit but it didn’t come across as mean (to me) and I agreed with a lot of your points. I did see your posts shared by one or two people but not with really negative comments. More just with things like “If you want to enter then enter”. It seemed to all be forgotten about super quickly though.

If you’re worried about people still remembering those comments? I honestly think nearly everyone would have forgotten :). Plus, they really weren’t that bad.

If you enjoy writing then you should definitely continue! I know it sucks when you publish a story and it doesn’t seem to get many reads but 200 reads in a short period of time is pretty good and it shows that you probably had genuine readers who read the whole story and were probably waiting for more! I think you just need to keep persevering. Keep writing and updating regularly and the reads will come. Maybe it won’t be millions, but personally, all I need is a few “loyal” readers to feel like I have a good fan base haha.

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