Small author would like advice from larger authors (or anyone lol)

Oh nothing. I was just making a bad joke. :joy:

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I am a first time publisher. And I hope this week we will get 5000 reads. Its not much but as a first time writer with like 0 followers on the begining I am not complaining. I actually do see it as succes. :grin:

What I believe helped us is that we were in the clue contest. We did not won but people were curiouse about the contest stories and it helped us to get the first reads.

Reads for reads helped bit too… But in my openion it make sence only if you have under. 1000 reads. Problem with r4r is, that people read your first 3 chapters and as it seems to me lot of them read it that thay onli click and do not really read and thay will not go on if you publish new chapters… I do not say everybody does it. We got several fans for our story this way. But it might not be their gender or style an because thay havent picked up the story they simply are less interested in it.

Good is to get feedbet… And I honestly would go for the hard critisizm reather the one not so painfull… Because what I have learned on the beggining… My writing was rush and unclear but I was not able to notice it because I knew what I wanted and what is behind… And the soft critisizm would not help me to wake up and see it, so I reather went for the harder one. It might hurt when somebody tells you he got lost confused or bored… But this is the best way how to learn to write better (in my openion).

Instagram… I am not at all insta person. But we did it because it was recomended to us… Giving sneak peeks and infos about publishing new chapters. And (thanks to the contest I guess) we got several shout outs from people who read our story, which I believe also helped to make other people to give the story a chance.

What I see we stil gain new readers sloely but the one who give the story a chance seems to stay and eagerly wait for new episode… So after each release of new episode the reads jump up.

I have no clue how to get to 500000 reads. :grin: :thinking::joy: But this is what I can tell you from my still small experience.

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Readers are more likely to read the more episodes there are or if the story is complete. The point is don’t quit if it doesn’t gain reads with only 3 episodes and is incomplete. And the readers you gain are more likely to stay invested the faster you update. There’s a new stories section where readers find new stories and there are tags you can place in the search section that make your story more accessible. There was a post here where one person gained a lot of reads just by publishing really fast and no promotion whatsoever lol.

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Yeah, definitely this.
One of my friends became a really big author because on her first story she just kept publishing one episode every day.
Publishing a lot and consistently definitely works, especially since it means you trend higher and higher without falling.
I can’t do it though, I’m too slow :joy:

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If this really works you can do it so, that you will prepare the whole story first without publishing so everything will be ready and you than can publish as you wish. :thinking::grinning:

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That could be a good tactic for people who lose motivation when they feel they aren’t getting enough reads. If you’ve already written the story then it doesn’t matter :joy:

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I guess being super passionate about what you’re writing would help to actually keep you motivated. I entered a few contests when I was starting on the app because people were saying it was a good way to start out, but ultimately none of my contest entries were ever as special to me as my popular story and I feel like that’s just because readers could tell that I was really passionate about what I was writing.

And as much as I totally understand this feeling, what’s important is that you care about your story. I know it’s hard to switch of that way of thinking, but I swear on my life that if you actually enjoy writing your story and start out writing it just to please yourself, readers pick up on that energy.

I meannnnnnnnnn… this varies from person to person. I’ve been in the community for about 2 years. My first story was really slow to gain readers, but I didn’t have instagram or forums or any real way to promote my story. Then I entered a few contests with short stories and they never really got more than 50 reads during the contest time frame. Lol :rofl: But the story that did eventually take off only really got attention because I was promoting it on the forums, meanwhile I was reviewing other people’s stories and making friends in the community who would then read and share my story too and then eventually Episode somehow noticed me and put me on a weekly shelf in January this year. I went from 25k reads to 100k in a week, which was pretty impressive to me and so sorta gave me a bit of a platform where I know now people do care about my story :relaxed:

I know everyone’s going to have different experiences but I really do think that when you are first starting out, the most important thing to do is write a story you really care about… and then update frequently :joy:

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I don’t know what amount of reads make you a small author, but I have 5.8k reads and 6.6k views on my story. To be honest, no matter what just keep writing, update regularly, create an instagram account, (for readers to follow you) and ensure that you have little to none, directing errors on your story. This is what I did. Also, try not to think about the views and reads, just do it because you love it.

It depends on either the quality or the “clout-level” as my best friend likes to call it.

Basically, for a story to blow up, it either has to be amazing or pander to what readers want enough that people will read it even if it’s bad. Stories don’t just blow up in a certain time frame, unfortunately! :sweat_smile:

Plus, you have to spend the time promoting yourself, cracking the algorithm and doing everything you can do get exposure.

The better — or more pander-y — your story is, the less work you have to do. If your story isn’t good quality or isn’t what people are looking for, you’ll be clawing the views for a long time.

I know that sounds harsh! I’m sorry! But I’m being honest with you. I can provide you with a link of a good list of ways to get reads, if you want

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I guess I do have my own two cents to offer on this, since I just started writing a couple months ago and my story has recently hit the 60k mark (nowhere near as impressive as those who gain 100k reads within a week of publishing, I know, but my first batch of stories all collectively gained less than 5k so…)

Some things I have learned as a new writer (and, as I like to tell myself, is well on her way to becoming a successful writer lol :rofl:):

  1. Instagram is your best friend. It’s the heart of the Episode community, readers and writers alike, and if you want to get noticed, don’t shy away from reading and sharing your favorite stories. This might usually spark friendships that would later go on to work in your favor as you publish and your fellow authors would read and support your story (but they are NOT obligated to do so and you must not demand it of them that’s just rude :angry:) Make friends, read and support, like, share, comment, whatever, just maintain a regular presence on Instagram.
  2. This might come across as contradictory to the “write what you love” rhetoric but the truth is if you wanna get noticed on Episode you HAVE to cater to what’s popular among readers. To a certain extent. I don’t mean you should write soft porn right off the bat if that’s not your forte but if LL is the popular style and you publish your first story in Classic or Ink it’s much less likely to get noticed. Then again, I guess it all comes back to how important reads are to you so… Likewise, make sure your story has CC, choices, the reader’s pick of Love Interests, that sort of thing.
  3. And this worked for me but I don’t know if it will for you: try writing in a genre that is other than Drama or Romance. Because it’s going to be insanely difficult for a first-timer to get noticed among those than, say, Mystery or Thriller genres. Establish your foothold in any other genre then move on to Drama/Romance if you like.
  4. Request an eye-catching cover from any of the Instagram accounts that offer their services. Off the top of my head, these come to mind: (episode.luxe, episode.infinitum , episode.axiom, episode.royals). Let’s face it: some of us don’t have the artistic gifts to create a pretty cover that’s going to attract readers, or we don’t have the money to commission one. Your best bet is requesting a cover from any of these groups (read their terms of condition carefully before requesting and always be respectful) because readers will seldom pick a cover that is, like, an aesthetic moodboard or a badly-cropped LL character doing that flirt_wink_happy_atcamera pose.
  5. Keep promoting! Promote your story whenever people ask for recommendations, submit it for reviewing, and try to get featured on a shelf. Remember: Editor’s picks are based on reader retention so it doesn’t matter how many reads you have just that the few you do have read your published chapters until the end. This’ll help a lot, trust me.

Aaaaand that’s all I can think of lol. Again, these are just my opinions and my own experiences so it won’t necessarily apply to everyone. Just thought I’d share :blue_heart:

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I’m not a larger author but I have 28k reads on one of my stories and I got that amount of reads by updating chapters frequently. Honestly, when I started writing, I was getting like 10 reads a week. I stopped updating the story because I was really focused on getting reads. Then I started working on another story, and later I stopped writing that one because I felt like I still wasn’t getting enough reads on that one. Therefore, I went back to the first story and I told myself that I don’t care how many reads I get this time and that I was going to complete this story.

I kept updating every week and I noticed that I slowly moved down into the 200s and 100s. I even dropped to #88 one time. When that happened, my book was trending and easier to find on the app. I was getting about 1000 reads a day and about 10 - 15 followers on the Episode interactive app a day.

This was when I learned that the key is to add chapters your story weekly or as frequently as you can and gain a lot of readers by promoting on Instagram or on the forums. The more you update your story, the more you move down the ranks and at the same time, you will gain a lot of readers.

The more readers you have the lower you will be in the rank when updating chapters. For example, I’m at a point where I can be #10000 after not updating for a while but as soon as I update a chapter I end up in the 200s or 100s because I have a lot of loyal readers.

So just keep updating and don’t think about the number of reads you’re getting, instead think about completing your book and telling your story. Don’t stray away from your vision to please the public so that you can get more readers. Stay on your path, make it a hobby, update frequently, focus on your vision and you will get there.