Why webnovel tiles are long and optimized? Should I do the same?

[Shard]

I heard that some sites don't allow a synopsis, so people use one as the title due to that. No idea if it is true though. It annoys the hell out of me though, especially when you can write a synopsis and don't, but have a mile-long title instead.

 

[TheMonotonePuppet]

So I noticed that webnovels/mangas have long titles and optimized. Optimized in the sense that it reminds me SEO (search engine optimization) where the keywords are present in the title. Take this manga for instance: Backstabbed in a Backwater Dungeon: My Party Tried to Kill Me, But Thanks to an Infinite Gacha I Got LVL 9999 Friends and Am Out For Revenge

I haven't read it though but the title is epic... Should I do the same? Why this long title trend? What's the pros and cons of long titles?

I don't know anything more than what anyone else has already said, but what I do know is that by going the reverse direction, I set myself apart from those people. Most do 2 words minimum, often crazy huge like your example, but mine is one word "Charisma". Short, sweet, and heavily important to the story, while also slightly deceptive.

If I see a long title like that, I generally assume that its trash, and don't even bother looking at it. If youre not even creative enough to create a catchy title, then youre probably not creative enough to write a good novel.

Agreed. That's normally my assumption.

 

[Missivist]

Backstabbed in a Backwater Dungeon: My Party Tried to Kill Me, But Thanks to an Infinite Gacha I Got LVL 9999 Friends and Am Out For Revenge

Old-style book titles like "Bleak House" are worthless except as a label: they tell you nothing. A title like "Saving Private Ryan" is more useful. "That Time I Reincarnated as a Slime" is good, but getting too wordy. Your example feels far too long to be useful as a title, but not bad as a synopsis. It makes me feel like there is not much of the story left to tell.

A better traditional approach is to add an informative subtititle to a simple title, like "Dr Strangelove (Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)".

I found some SH examples like that...

Scathing Reviewer: Isekai’d into my Trashy Webnovel!

Miss Fortune: I don’t want to be a magical girl!

 

[AliceShiki]

For the record, the gigantic titles trend started on Japanese Webnovels for a very simple reason.

Syosetu (the site where they publish their webnovels) doesn't have covers in it.

Without covers, the only option you have available to pull the attention of readers is the title. Nobody will read your synopsis if your title/cover doesn't pull their attention, and Syosetu doesn't have the cover option, so the authors have to rely on the title alone.

That's basically the origin of the trend and how it started... Then those webnovels started getting translated and some people became fond of them.

Then, when writing their own webnovels, people were inspired in the webnovels they liked and started making longer titles too, which leads to longer webnovel titles appearing on western novels too, even though they aren't necessary here.

That's basically the gist of it.

As for how effective it is as a marketing tool within Scribblehub... I think it's neutral. I don't think long titles draw more or less attention than short titles... Shorter titles tend to feel more professional, but longer titles have their fans, so I think it evens out in the end.

So, just do what you prefer, really.

 

[owotrucked]

Very important: your title can get cropped beyond the 3 first words (at least on mobile) so dont go full ham