I'm new at this and I know people have different preferences. I've been posting chapters over the last two weeks with certain themes in mind (pantyhose in particular in my case). My first two chapters did fairly well with kudos in the forties and fifties while the numbers went down after the third chapter, which was admittedly darker. Since then, despite things being lighter (and maybe a little kinkier) my kudos have been in the thirties. My last chapter only pulled 25 kudos but that's understandable as it's really a transitional (and thus not very erotic) chapter anyway.
Anyhow my question is... How many kudos and comments would be the barometer here to suggest that something you wrote had been successful? Also is there a way to attract people who are like minded who not only that would read your material, but you might have interest in reading theirs as well?
It is not unusual
for the first part of a story to score well on the Kudos front.
Most of mine show a gradual decline but there is often an uptick at the end.
The decline is Kudos is usually matched by a decline in reader counts. If it is drastic then the story has either failed to grip the reader or it is not the right topic for the current readership.
That last point is important. Nine years ago when I first started posting, the type of story that got a lot of Kudos is different to what it is now. Like many things in life things change. Topics go in and out of fashion as rapidly as the hemlines in Paris go up and down.
I took well over a year before I reached 100 kudos points. Now I can get them in a day or two.
Why? I don't know but from the comments I receive I know that I have become a better story teller.
Did I get depressed when a story didn't work at first? You betcha I did but I carried on. Writing back then was Therapy. I'd just had a close call with Leukaemia and not only was my body a mess, my mind was crash site. Writing got me back on track and I started to enjoy it. I still do.
Don't worry about the Kudos count. Try different things. If Pantyhose does not rock people's boats then try something else.
I'm sure that over time you will hit your stride and not worry about Kudos counts. They are nice but not the be-all and end-all of writing. Write for yourself until you are able to tell a decent story. Then and only then think about your readers.
It is no use having an absolute humdinger of an idea if you can't express it in ways that others can appreciate.
I've learned so much from joining a Creative Writing Group. I'm the only bloke (yes, I'm deep in the closet) but several of the others have commented on how well I can write from the Women's POV. If they only knew eh!!!!!
Keep on trucking and don't give up. Writing like Life is a rocky road.
Samantha
PS,
Don't worry about writing Erotic Scenes. They aren't easy. I think I can count on the fingers of an armless man how many erotic scenes I've published here. You can tell a great story without having to get into sex scenes.
Successful or...?
"I think I can count on the fingers of an armless man how many erotic scenes I've published here."
Are you referring to the number of attempts at erotic scenes? Or the number of successful attempts, ones that were actually erotic?
-- Daphne Xu
How many?
both. I don't do erotic.
Samantha
Blogging
Blogging about what you are writing is a good way to attract like-minded people to your work. Blog about what topics interest you, as well as about the piece you just wrote or are intending to write or about the story you wish someone else would write.
There's really no way to find out what a kudos average is and that's a deliberate design choice on my part.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Kudos
If you are writing a series, the first stories generally have more kudos. That is probably more true if the installments are widely spaced. When you write another installment, the kudo count tends to go up slightly for the entire series. And you'll see comments like, "I don't know how I missed this story when it first came out."
100 Kudos is normal for a relatively well received story. When a story gets up to 200, pat yourself on the back. Some make it past 300, but I don't think I managed that yet.
Writing lots and lots of stories will get you more kudos. I'm sure that part of the reason is that practice makes perfect. Also, you will build up 'brand recognition.'
You can't rely on the "Total
You can't rely on the "Total Hits" because it also includes the hit by the web crawlers like Google.
The best way to see how your stories are received is with the kudos. But, to leave kudos the reader must be a member and logged in. Someone can be logged in as a "Guest Reader" and leave a kudo, but then anyone else signing in as a "Guest Reader" can't leave a kudo.
Unsure what to make of Kudos and such.
One thing definite: post a new story, and your other stories get a small boost in hits and (sometimes) kudos. (I also got a bit of a hit-boost, when a story of mine led the first "Ready Reads" post.)
That's pretty much all I can say for sure. None of my stories are near 200 Kudos -- and 300 Kudos might as well as be the Moon. Some have advocated the Kudo:hit ratio, but that makes the hit number a negative value. I prefer more hits over fewer hits. I definitely prefer around 160 Kudos and 5000 hits ("Our Daughter's Prom Date" and "BB: A Boy's Visit"), to 80 Kudos and 2500 hits (nothing specific). But then where does 160 Kudos and 2500 hits ("The Bridge" of all things!) fit in?
I still can't make head or tails of the hits on "John's Living Nightmare", a story posted on ASSM 20 years ago. At 12,400 hits, it's received more than twice any other story except my first post of "A Bikini Beach Summer". Kudos? Well, at 116, it has definitely pulled out in front of my second tier of Kudos.
On the other hand, it makes perfect sense that no story of mine since "Our Daughter's Prom Date" has received more than 2000 hits. (It was also paid the compliment of being slightly revised by someone else, and posted on Wattpad as her own. It has since been removed.) My writing needs upgrading, and I'm a horrid procrastinator. :(
-- Daphne Xu
Kudos, comments and the like
Going by my admittedly sometimes flawed memory, kudos came about as an alternative to comments. If for some reason you couldn't or wouldn't leave a comment, you could click on the kudos button to show your appreciation for the story. Other than that you get what you get.
I like comments, don't get me wrong. But the only time I cared about them was when I was posting a friend's story for them. I wanted them to feel good about the reaction they got for their hard work. Other than that I ignore kudos, hits, and comments. They are at best a popularity measure, not a measure of the quality of the story.
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king. The palace becomes a circus.” - Turkish Proverb
I get the feeling that
the level of comments a story gets is dependent upon two things
1) The quality of the writing
2) What other stories are posted the day before/on/after that also attract a high level of comments.
The number of reads a piece gets will increase over time. Some get proportionately more than others published about the same time. This is IMHO down to the Title.
The title of a piece is all part of the 'hook' that a piece needs to not only get the reader interested in the first place but keeps them interested for the long run.
Samantha
Kudos
Kudos replaced Amazon-like star ratings which were being abused, much as they are at Amazon. Neither was intended as a replacement for comments, just an adjunct.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Reads, Kudos, and You
I've posted maybe 150 stories. But they fall into three distinct types.
Castle The Series is a large work, mostly already written. I've been writing it for many years and and posting it in bits of about 5000 words on average. It's a major pastime of mine that seems to get about 100 reads and 10 kudos per posting. It clearly has a small interested readership, but I'm happy with that. I wrote it initially to help me deal with the world.
The Grumpy Old Man series (up to its 12th episode now) which I write as the ideas (memories) hit me has settled down to about 300 reads and maybe 30 kudos. I write it because it amuses me.
The rest of my tales are possibly 50/50 Transgender/Non-transgender and get a lot more reads and a lot more kudos, but I've only written half a dozen tales that hit a hundred kudos. I write these tales for as wide a variety of reasons as there are types of tales.
Most of my tales do not contain heavy sex or abuse, some do, but not many. Realistic sex scenes that are an integral part of a tale are difficult to write without becoming taudry porn grafted on to an otherwise non erotic work. Alan Titchmarsh of UK TV gardening fame is a published author who was once awarded the Bad Sex in Fiction Award. Morrissey, usually assiciated with the pop music industry has just become the latest winner for his debut novel.
I don't give advice on writing or critique the works of others, but I will ask, 'Do you really believe that kudos are a true reflection of the quality of your work?' I write what I like to read, which remarkably does ring a chord with some others. I believe one writes best what one is enjoying writing and BCTS seems to be a broad enough church for just about any genre to find a readership.
Regards,
Eolwaen
Eolwaen
Kudos my way...
Not speaking for anyone else here. When I read a story and like it (or chapter) I hit the kudo button. Most of my comments happen like this one. Responding to other comments. Rarely I try to share data with the author from my personal experience or knowledge. Just once I bantered back and forth with an author about a work. (That was a good experience because our disagreement held no rancor.) so...a question...does the hit counter go up one each time I re-read a story?
BAK 0.25tspgirl
Seasonal and over the years
Hit rates and Kudos change by season and over the years. The Kudos rates now are much higher than say ten years ago since there are more people hera now (however, looking at same authors' recent stories and what they used to get one or two years ago I get the impression that there's a small recent decrease).
Some general patterns can be discerned as has been mentioned.
- Series lose readers and kudos count after the firs chapter(s).
- New posts give old stories a (small) boost
- Solos get exposure through the random solo function. If you have written many solos you get a steady stream of readers, and a few kudos.
- Some topics are more popular than others. My impression is that erotic stories are not the most popular on this site.
Popularity...
NEUrotic stories aren't popular at all...
Love, Andrea Lena
Ten Years Back
Actually, the kudos system goes back just nine years, to mid-to-late 2010. Stories older than that only have kudos that were given by people going back and reading them later.
Bru's certainly correct, though, about the counts for new stories increasing as time has gone on. Stories with 100 kudos used to be rare; a blog entry in 2012 by one regular writer here wondered if anyone had reached 100 on a single post -- and no one replied saying that they had.
By the mid-teens, it seemed to me that 100 kudos had become the benchmark for a popular new story. Now that number is pretty common.
Eric
Agree with SamanthaMD
Same experience and same views. My tip is to target 1000 hits for a chapter and if you get 100 Kudos then that's better than average. Some writers do far better than this and have built up a fan base over time. You will find it's a good idea to sprinkle a few solo's in amongst multi chapter if you decide to post frequently.
I started much like SamanthaMD did with no expectation or intention of posting more than 1 story. There are always stories to tell.