How do you grow an audience?

[Sylver]

I've been working on trying to build up some views and gain more readers on here. I changed the synopsis, got a beautiful new cover for the novel, and shortened the title to make it easier to follow.

I got followers but very little to no response on my posts. Comments are scarce, readers are slowly growing but very slowly, and im thankful to finally receive one review after over 2 years. I'm grateful to have a steady 50-ish views following the new chapters so far but I fear that they'll decline soon and then what?

The favorites count picks up with new chapters but not on previous chapters. It's like I have a small crowd following my work, but I can't build a bigger audience somehow. I get views, but not much interest, most users drop it after reading the first chapter.

I've held this to myself because from the outside my stats look really good, but the average views are on the small scale and the page views chart marks the story between 50 - 300 and for Valid Reads meaning someone who's reading a chapter for more than 30 seconds, it's at the 40-80 count.

I know I sound ungrateful to want more, I get that. I'm not dropping my story soon, but gaining a bit of progress would help a lot.

 

[Macha]

Find someone to read, comment, and review your story (preferable a woman.) That's one more audience.

Make that woman pregnant. After 9 months, you will have a child and a potential audience. Teach that child how to read and write then you will have another audience.

Hope this helps.

 

[Eldoria]

Well, there's nothing I can do to "force" readers to read my fiction other than improving the quality of my content.

Besides, my fiction is quite niche... only a few readers will likely care and it suits their preferences.

So, my advice might not be helpful to you... stay focused on your fiction and let guests come and go; we are merely hosts to our fiction.

 

[Sylver]

Well, there's nothing I can do to "force" readers to read my fiction other than improving the quality of my content.

Besides, my fiction is quite niche... only a few readers will likely care and it suits their preferences.

So, my advice might not be helpful to you... stay focused on your fiction and let guests come and go; we are merely hosts to our fiction.

It's all I can do at this point, it's all I got left to do besides go on an advertising spree.

 

[Firestorm22345]

Well, just tell to someone you know like your friends to read your novel. Or...... post the news that you had published on social media like Telegram Channel, Facebook and Twitter which are the most used social apps.

 

[Eldoria]

It's all I can do at this point, it's all I got left to do besides go on an advertising spree.

Well, if your fiction is on RR, using paid promotion is indeed effective. New fiction can even quickly gain hundreds of followers in just a few days.

However, I'm not doing that at the moment, as I'm more focused on improving the quality of my content, which may not be worth reading yet.

Well, just tell to someone you know like your friends to read your novel. Or...... post the news that you had published on social media like Telegram Channel, Facebook and Twitter which are the most used social apps.

Social media maybe, but telling family and friends about the fiction is a last resort.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

First you till the soil. Then you buy only the finest of Audience Seeds, plant them carefully, provide some fertilizer and other nutrients, read them bedtime stories and maybe even sing to them if you have a decent voice, and they'll start growing like weeds.

 

[FleecedSheep]

Is this your first story? If so, the best you can do is just keep up consistent updates. Even when the story finishes, it'll keep generating views and readers as long as you post a new story, and as more people discover you. As you build a reputation, your base will increase. That's at least, how it should go. Though, there are outliers.

 

[Firestorm22345]

Is this your first story? If so, the best you can do is just keep up consistent updates. Even when the story finishes, it'll keep generating views and readers as long as you post a new story, and as more people discover you. As you build a reputation, your base will increase. That's at least, how it should go. Though, there are outliers.

Like a kingdom building strategy, we build more houses for residents to increase the population.

 

[Sylver]

Well, if your fiction is on RR, using paid promotion is indeed effective. New fiction can even quickly gain hundreds of followers in just a few days.

I don't think RR would allow my work on there aren't they strict toward stories that include smut? My work isn't all smut but it wouldn't hit the same if I remove those bedroom scenes haha cx

That's at least, how it should go. Though, there are outliers.

I wish I was an outlier my story has been there since 2023 and the favorites count is stagnant while the investment from new readers stops after the first chapter. It's got smut, romance, action, magic, monster girls, like what's the problem I thought by now I would finally receive a TFTC comment at least.

Is this your first story? If so, the best you can do is just keep up consistent updates.

It is my first but after 150 chapters and a consistent upload schedule, I was hoping it would have gained interest from new readers. But I've kept a watchful eye on the stats and the first 10 chapters and it just doesn't look like new people are interested. Idk I'm going to keep uploading after a small break because I just finished Act 2, and in the meantime I'm rereading act 1 to see where I'm going wrong here.

 

[Lookbehindyou]

When you crack the code let us know

 

[FleecedSheep]

I don't think RR would allow my work on there aren't they strict toward stories that include smut? My work isn't all smut but it wouldn't hit the same if I remove those bedroom scenes haha cx

I wish I was an outlier my story has been there since 2023 and the favorites count is stagnant while the investment from new readers stops after the first chapter. It's got smut, romance, action, magic, monster girls, like what's the problem I thought by now I would finally receive a TFTC comment at least.

It is my first but after 150 chapters and a consistent upload schedule, I was hoping it would have gained interest from new readers. But I've kept a watchful eye on the stats and the first 10 chapters and it just doesn't look like new people are interested. Idk I'm going to keep uploading after a small break because I just finished Act 2, and in the meantime I'm rereading act 1 to see where I'm going wrong here.

It might be because you have a smut story. I'm a lurker myself, so, I can't say much, but I'd imagine people wouldn't want to engage too much with that kind of material, publicly at least. I'm also not entirely sure how the analytics work on views and such, so, yeah, I don't have much more to offer. Other than well wishes.

 

[tantrayaan]

I've been working on trying to build up some views and gain more readers on here. I changed the synopsis, got a beautiful new cover for the novel, and shortened the title to make it easier to follow.

I got followers but very little to no response on my posts. Comments are scarce, readers are slowly growing but very slowly, and im thankful to finally receive one review after over 2 years. I'm grateful to have a steady 50-ish views following the new chapters so far but I fear that they'll decline soon and then what?

The favorites count picks up with new chapters but not on previous chapters. It's like I have a small crowd following my work, but I can't build a bigger audience somehow. I get views, but not much interest, most users drop it after reading the first chapter.

I've held this to myself because from the outside my stats look really good, but the average views are on the small scale and the page views chart marks the story between 50 - 300 and for Valid Reads meaning someone who's reading a chapter for more than 30 seconds, it's at the 40-80 count.

I know I sound ungrateful to want more, I get that. I'm not dropping my story soon, but gaining a bit of progress would help a lot.

I posted my first story here last year. I gave up after about 5 chapters because of what you faced. I went away and tried on other sites and got some success. I'm not saying I am successful or anything. Just a few reflections.

Here are some things I learned in the past year.
1. Perhaps this may not be the best site for your content at the moment. There are plenty of other options (where you can be a bigger fish in a smaller pond). I went away to publish my stories elsewhere and got feedback and committed readers there to complete my content first. This really helps. I understand what you are going through. Not getting reads or clicks is terrible.

2. I wrote a complete story and am now posting regularly on the site. Since I have a lot of content, I can schedule releases in short bursts. This seems to be working well (or at least better than before) so far. This way, my story keeps showing up on the latest updates page as often as possible (although people post here every few minutes and I get kicked out fast ). I am yet to figure out what times allow one to be on the latest updates page for a while. However, thanks to this the number of views seems to be picking up. I got ~23 readers in 5 days. Yesterday I almost got 1k views for the first time. I have 3 reviews. This never happened to me the first time around.

3. I realized that having a lot of backlog first helps with #2. It would be hard to keep up with creating content and doing what I mentioned above. So perhaps you need to write first and then post on ScribbleHub. It certainly worked a lot better than my previous story.

Since you say that you have optimized your image and profile. Perhaps you just need to do what I talked about earlier. I'm just sharing my thoughts. There are of course very popular writers here who may be able to help you out more.

I've been working on trying to build up some views and gain more readers on here. I changed the synopsis, got a beautiful new cover for the novel, and shortened the title to make it easier to follow.

I got followers but very little to no response on my posts. Comments are scarce, readers are slowly growing but very slowly, and im thankful to finally receive one review after over 2 years. I'm grateful to have a steady 50-ish views following the new chapters so far but I fear that they'll decline soon and then what?

The favorites count picks up with new chapters but not on previous chapters. It's like I have a small crowd following my work, but I can't build a bigger audience somehow. I get views, but not much interest, most users drop it after reading the first chapter.

I've held this to myself because from the outside my stats look really good, but the average views are on the small scale and the page views chart marks the story between 50 - 300 and for Valid Reads meaning someone who's reading a chapter for more than 30 seconds, it's at the 40-80 count.

I know I sound ungrateful to want more, I get that. I'm not dropping my story soon, but gaining a bit of progress would help a lot.

I just noticed you have way more views and readers etc than me. As I said earlier, please feel free to discount everything I've said. You surely know more than I do about scribblehub. Regardless - just my 2 cents :)

 

[Sylver]

When you crack the code let us know

 

[SouthernMaiden]

I feel like it's gotta be social media, but is there a way to link your X account your scribblehub I wonder.

 

[Sylver]

It might be because you have a smut story. I'm a lurker myself, so, I can't say much, but I'd imagine people wouldn't want to engage too much with that kind of material, publicly at least. I'm also not entirely sure how the analytics work on views and such, so, yeah, I don't have much more to offer. Other than well wishes.

Idk, I follow other smut stories and they get plenty of comments even on recent chapters. And they have less views with a higher count of Favorites or Hearts.

 

[CinnaSloth]

Idk, I follow other smut stories and they get plenty of comments even on recent chapters. And they have less views with a higher count of Favorites or Hearts.

My story is pretty smutty. It has high views on the dirty pages, but the normal pages only get a few views.
I also noticed during winter break views went up, most likely from students being on vacation.
The next break would be spring break, then kids are off in June. From here till then, there's valentines day, and a few other holidays for 3 day weekends, or minimum days. But I would expect views to stay mostly stagnant until summer time when everyone is home, or working summer jobs just to get home relax, play games, or maybe read here on SH.

For the most part, people here are writers, and authors, writing their next chapters, not reading. So you'll see more updates to books already being read, and if you aren't uploading then you aren't being seen. Most people want to finish what they've already picked up rather than pick up something new. More often seeing your "plan on reading" going up rather than actual views.

Engagement on the other hand.. that's a whole other beast. Most people don't want to interact, especially with smut. often times they just want to turn the page, get their funsies, and bail out to do something else, or go to bed. Smut is smut after all.. there are few and far between that read smut for the story. like a good hentai on manga sites. I'd recommend writing outside of smut if you want real interaction.

but even my wholesome stories pretty much revolve around "tfc", or "" comments. That's just SH.

 

[Sylver]

I also noticed during winter break views went up, most likely from students being on vacation.

What!? My views went down during the break like from 600 to 300 when I upload a new chapter. That's not good.

Most people don't want to interact, especially with smut.

darn shame. It sucks not getting much feedback.

but even my wholesome stories pretty much revolve around "tfc", or "" comments.

I think in my 2 years writing the story so far, I have either received one TFC comment, or possibly none x)

 

[Puji-Maki]

Posts in other platforms, I guess.

 

[CinnaSloth]

What!? My views went down during the break like from 600 to 300 when I upload a new chapter. That's not good.

I'm not speaking from chapter 1 view compared to chapter 2 or chapter 3 etc etc
I mean, like chapter 14 in november vs chapter 14 at the end of december.

If you're expecting chapter 1 to be 1k views and continue to be 1k views until chapter 50 you will be unquestionably, and sorely disappointed to the point you'll quit outright. The more chapters you have, you'll notice that views will start strong (after getting that far) at a few hundred, or a few thousand if you're lucky, and as you go to deeper chapters they'll fall to less than a hundred, if not to single, or double digits. and it's not to say because your story is bad, it's just that people have lives and will pretty much return to read another few chapters, before leaving it on plan to read for another few months, and return again to only read another few chapters without finishing it.
your later chapters will never look anything like your early chapters in comparison to view count. they just won't unless you have a god-like book on your hands.

It is the EXACT reason why most people here will tell you to just write, and continue writing until you finish/ complete your book, then move on with your next book. views and interaction will continue after your done with it. it's just a time thing. not an immediate gratification thing.

if you want immediate gratification, take out a bank loan of 3 million, and buy a couple hundred thousand copies of your own book. you'll get on new york times bestseller. and once you ride the hype train of news coverage, and interviews, you'll either wind up a popular author or end up in so much debt you'd delete your minecraft server.

My advice on threads like these is always the same as everyone elses, "Just write."