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A hell of a lot of stories.

Bramblethorn said:
Yeah, after about a month the growth rate becomes very steady (except that topmost story, which took about a year to level off, for some reason that I haven't figured out).

Here's a plot of the same data, but by calendar date instead of age. The green curve at the top is the first chapter of my "Stringed Instrument" series, and the lime-green one below it is chapter 2; you can see they get a bit of a bump every time a new chapter appears.

Some of them also made it onto the category toplist, which shows up as a sustained increase in view rate (steeper slope); for example, the light blue curve at about day 1200. This also gives a bit of a boost to earlier chapters, though it's not as obvious.

The dashed-blue-gray curve, which has gained views faster than any of my other stories, is also the lowest scoring. I suspect that's not a coincidence; I wrote a stroke-y blurb for something that wasn't really a stroke-y story, so I got a lot of eyeballs but not the right kind of eyeballs.
Click to expand...

Bramblethorn, I think the reason your top story didn't level off for a year is that you kept adding chapters to the series for about 450 days. You can see little steps up in the view curve corresponding to each additional chapter. In addition to that, the first story will indefinitely receive more daily views than every subsequent chapter over the long term, so its slope always will be steeper. The view gap between the first chapter and the second will always increase over time. That's true even when the first chapter is the lowest-rated chapter, as is the case with your Stringed Instrument series and as is the case with both my series.

If you look closely at your chart the rate of increase for the first chapter lessens a little after you finished adding chapters, even though it continues to be higher than subsequent chapters. This is true for my chapter stories as well.

It's interesting that your stand-alone gray-blue dotted line story (I assume this is Counting to Eleven) settled below your Stringed Instrument first chapter, because standalone stories usually get more views over time than chapter stories. In this case the significantly better score of Stringed Instrument may have made the difference to its superior performance over time.
 
HectorBidon said:
Still, the best advice is probably just to keep on writing.
Click to expand...

I agree this is the best advice, but it's not the only way to keep getting views.

I spent a little time tracking the performance of old stories that ranked high on all-time top lists. I was astonished. Some of the stories that rank near the top of the all-time "most read" toplist get over 2,000 views per day. And they're over 10 years old. Some of them don't score that high. Some of them aren't that good. But year after year they get a lot of views -- so many, in fact, that some of them get more views than the most-viewed stories of the current year.

Since there's no way for a new author now instantly to leap to the top of the all-time most-viewed story list, however, the best thing to do is to keep writing. That way you continually build your readership and following and introduce new people to your body of work.
 
SimonDoom said:
Bramblethorn, I think the reason your top story didn't level off for a year is that you kept adding chapters to the series for about 450 days. You can see little steps up in the view curve corresponding to each additional chapter. In addition to that, the first story will indefinitely receive more daily views than every subsequent chapter over the long term, so its slope always will be steeper. The view gap between the first chapter and the second will always increase over time. That's true even when the first chapter is the lowest-rated chapter, as is the case with your Stringed Instrument series and as is the case with both my series.

If you look closely at your chart the rate of increase for the first chapter lessens a little after you finished adding chapters, even though it continues to be higher than subsequent chapters. This is true for my chapter stories as well.

It's interesting that your stand-alone gray-blue dotted line story (I assume this is Counting to Eleven) settled below your Stringed Instrument first chapter, because standalone stories usually get more views over time than chapter stories. In this case the significantly better score of Stringed Instrument may have made the difference to its superior performance over time.
Click to expand...

Some misunderstanding here. The "top story" I referred to is Counting To Eleven - it shows up top in the first graph I posted (views vs. time since posting). I was referring to that graph, not the second one (views vs date).

Overall CT11 has fewer views than SI#1 but only because SI#1 had a long head start; if you compare then at the same age, CT11 is always ahead, despite the lower ratings. SI#1 does indeed show boosts from the later chapters in that series (both when they posted, and when some drifted onto toplists) but I don't know why CT11 behaves the way it did, slowing over about a year.
 
I would be very wary of trusting any statistics on views. The number of bots is absolutely immense and totally distorts any attempt to have meaningful analysis.

I admin a few sites and I can view the profile of visitors; I don't have filters so I don't know the effect on Lit, but I stopped giving feedback to my customers based on views a long time ago. If anyone wants figures I'll show them the background info so that they can see how useless it is to even try.

Google, Bing, Dogpile and the like are busy enough but don't compare to the number of Russian, Chinese and other countries that are sending thousands of queries across to a site that can't possibly interest them.
 
Mary and Alvin, Chapter Three: published on 1-26-18: as of this morning, 607 views.

Mary and Alvin, Chapter Four: published today: as of this writing, 641 views.

Go figure.
 
MelissaBaby said:
Mary and Alvin, Chapter Three: published on 1-26-18: as of this morning, 607 views.

Mary and Alvin, Chapter Four: published today: as of this writing, 641 views.

Go figure.
Click to expand...

I'll start reading a 'midway through the story' chapter on literotica to see if I like the author's style. When I'm buying a physical book, I do the same thing; flick to a page about a third in.

My reason is that opening chapters are usually either exceptionally well constructed, or a bit awkward as the author tries to set up the story. It's like the very first episode of a new TV show; it's often not indicative of the whole series. Chapter Three or Four is far more likely to give an accurate view of the author's writing style, talent, etc. If I like it, I'll go back and read from the beginning.
 
Way late to the party here, but wow, lots of good stuff that I'm just starting to digest. In particular I have been thinking about my own habits about which day I routinely submit on (which happens to be pretty consistent). Thanks HectorBidon!
 
ausfet said:
I'll start reading a 'midway through the story' chapter on literotica to see if I like the author's style. When I'm buying a physical book, I do the same thing; flick to a page about a third in.

My reason is that opening chapters are usually either exceptionally well constructed, or a bit awkward as the author tries to set up the story. It's like the very first episode of a new TV show; it's often not indicative of the whole series. Chapter Three or Four is far more likely to give an accurate view of the author's writing style, talent, etc. If I like it, I'll go back and read from the beginning.
Click to expand...

That makes sense, but it still seems that the low views for Chapter Three were some sort of anomaly. Now that Chapter Four is up, views on Three are rising quickly. We have talked about the various factors that can impact readership, but who knows? Maybe there were a lot of big games that weekend or something.
 
MelissaBaby said:
That makes sense, but it still seems that the low views for Chapter Three were some sort of anomaly. Now that Chapter Four is up, views on Three are rising quickly. We have talked about the various factors that can impact readership, but who knows? Maybe there were a lot of big games that weekend or something.
Click to expand...

Maybe people want to binge read, rather than just read one chapter at a time? I read 'my fall and rise' (which is amazing; you deserve all the credit you receive, although it's killing me not knowing what happened to Nicky) in one sitting and I don't think I could have beared waiting for each individual chapter to be uploaded.
 
ausfet said:
Maybe people want to binge read, rather than just read one chapter at a time? I read 'my fall and rise' (which is amazing; you deserve all the credit you receive, although it's killing me not knowing what happened to Nicky) in one sitting and I don't think I could have beared waiting for each individual chapter to be uploaded.
Click to expand...

That's an important point, for long multi-chapter pieces. A writer might think a chapter release every week or two is 'regular' - but I suspect most readers really wouldn't want to wait that long.

Two or three days between chapters, I would have thought - short enough gaps so readers don't wander off to the next shiny object, long enough gaps to tease and increase their excitement for the next chapter.
 
ausfet said:
I don't think I could have beared waiting for each individual chapter to be uploaded.
Click to expand...

As someone who read MFAR as it was released one chapter at a time, I can tell you, the waiting was pretty unbearable.
 
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ausfet said:
Maybe people want to binge read, rather than just read one chapter at a time? I read 'my fall and rise' (which is amazing; you deserve all the credit you receive, although it's killing me not knowing what happened to Nicky) in one sitting and I don't think I could have beared waiting for each individual chapter to be uploaded.
Click to expand...

Thank you very much. If Nicky behaves himself and stays out of trouble he should be eligible for parole in 2024.
 
electricblue66 said:
That's an important point, for long multi-chapter pieces. A writer might think a chapter release every week or two is 'regular' - but I suspect most readers really wouldn't want to wait that long.

Two or three days between chapters, I would have thought - short enough gaps so readers don't wander off to the next shiny object, long enough gaps to tease and increase their excitement for the next chapter.
Click to expand...

I just can't write that fast, even if I could do it full time. The alternative, to periodically post chapters after completing the whole work, seems like it would be unbearable. Mary and Alvin, as I have outlined it, will run at least twenty chapters. If I were to finish it before I submitted the next chapter, I'd have to disappear for at least a year.
 
MelissaBaby said:
I just can't write that fast, even if I could do it full time. The alternative, to periodically post chapters after completing the whole work, seems like it would be unbearable. Mary and Alvin, as I have outlined it, will run at least twenty chapters. If I were to finish it before I submitted the next chapter, I'd have to disappear for at least a year.
Click to expand...

I'm eight chapters into a long mythic piece - started it last May, might finish this May if I'm lucky. I'm just coming up to the middle act (if you consider classic five-act play construction), then it's denouement and conclusion.

What you see in my story file for 2017 and this year is my "in betweener" pieces, keeping my profile ticking over.

I'm driving my beta readers nuts, a chapter a month; and now they're telliing me, go check out a publisher first. So I just keep writing when I can, and you know what, to be under zero pressure is bloody amazing. But it's not going live 'til it's done.
 
electricblue66 said:
That's an important point, for long multi-chapter pieces. A writer might think a chapter release every week or two is 'regular' - but I suspect most readers really wouldn't want to wait that long.

Two or three days between chapters, I would have thought - short enough gaps so readers don't wander off to the next shiny object, long enough gaps to tease and increase their excitement for the next chapter.
Click to expand...

My usual is four to six weeks between chapters, so I'm setting expectations low for the rest of y'all :)
 
MelissaBaby said:
Go figure.
Click to expand...

Grrr. OK. 95 stories went up on 2/17. They got a total of 672975 views over the first two days, which is considerably more than the other two dates we looked at earlier. The average number of views per story, though, was comparable.

[tr][td].[/td] [td]
_12/10​
[/td] [td]
_12/14​
[/td] [td]
_02/17​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Stories[/td] [td]
54​
[/td] [td]
107​
[/td] [td]
95​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Total views[/td] [td]
444205​
[/td] [td]
540736​
[/td] [td]
672975​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Avg views/story[/td] [td]
8076​
[/td] [td]
5054​
[/td] [td]
7084​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Highest views[/td] [td]
___44021​
[/td] [td]
___42464​
[/td] [td]
___52071​
[/td][/tr]


There were only 2 romance stories on 2/17. Melissa's story received 1548 views, which was the 17th highest view count. The other Romance story, also a chapter story but on chapter 11, got only half as many. On the other hand, there were 3 LW stories, and they got 5k, 11k, and 17k views. This supports the idea that there is a sizeable group of readers who are going to read whatever LW stories are up, but this is not the case for Romance. Romance readers probably browse across several categories to decide what they are going to read. Other categories that seem to have a dedicated new-list readership are NC/Reluctance (4 stories, 7k-13k views), Mature (6 stories, 6k-17k views), Incest/Taboo (11 stories, 4k-52k views), Interracial (5 stories, 5k-24k views), and Group Sex (3 stories, 5k-12k views).

In each category there were some stories that got only an average number of views and some that got a ton and a half. Why is that? One reason is the reputation of the author. In this batch there were a couple of good examples of this. There was an Incest story by silkstockingslover that got 52k views (!) and 228 votes (!) (in the first two days!); and one by Maria24 that got 43k views (!) and 277 votes (!!). On the other hand, there was an Interracial story by NOQuestionsAsked that got 24k vlews and 131 votes, even though this is a new author with only one other story out. Maybe it made quite an impression, or maybe there was just something about the title and description of the new story that grabbed a lot of eyeballs.

Most stories receive only an average number of views when they first appear. But as several people have mentioned, they continue to be read and appreciated even after they leave the New List.
 
HectorBidon said:
Grrr. OK. 95 stories went up on 2/17. They got a total of 672975 views over the first two days, which is considerably more than the other two dates we looked at earlier. The average number of views per story, though, was comparable.

[tr][td].[/td] [td]
_12/10​
[/td] [td]
_12/14​
[/td] [td]
_02/17​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Stories[/td] [td]
54​
[/td] [td]
107​
[/td] [td]
95​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Total views[/td] [td]
444205​
[/td] [td]
540736​
[/td] [td]
672975​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Avg views/story[/td] [td]
8076​
[/td] [td]
5054​
[/td] [td]
7084​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Highest views[/td] [td]
___44021​
[/td] [td]
___42464​
[/td] [td]
___52071​
[/td][/tr]


There were only 2 romance stories on 2/17. Melissa's story received 1548 views, which was the 17th highest view count. The other Romance story, also a chapter story but on chapter 11, got only half as many. On the other hand, there were 3 LW stories, and they got 5k, 11k, and 17k views. This supports the idea that there is a sizeable group of readers who are going to read whatever LW stories are up, but this is not the case for Romance. Romance readers probably browse across several categories to decide what they are going to read. Other categories that seem to have a dedicated new-list readership are NC/Reluctance (4 stories, 7k-13k views), Mature (6 stories, 6k-17k views), Incest/Taboo (11 stories, 4k-52k views), Interracial (5 stories, 5k-24k views), and Group Sex (3 stories, 5k-12k views).

In each category there were some stories that got only an average number of views and some that got a ton and a half. Why is that? One reason is the reputation of the author. In this batch there were a couple of good examples of this. There was an Incest story by silkstockingslover that got 52k views (!) and 228 votes (!) (in the first two days!); and one by Maria24 that got 43k views (!) and 277 votes (!!). On the other hand, there was an Interracial story by NOQuestionsAsked that got 24k vlews and 131 votes, even though this is a new author with only one other story out. Maybe it made quite an impression, or maybe there was just something about the title and description of the new story that grabbed a lot of eyeballs.

Most stories receive only an average number of views when they first appear. But as several people have mentioned, they continue to be read and appreciated even after they leave the New List.
Click to expand...

Good work! Interesting stuff. I just published a story in Incest/Taboo yesterday, and it's interesting to see how many views stories in that category get -- a lot more than in other categories. But within a category it can be a puzzle to figure out what determines the votes, comments, and favorites that the different stories get.
 
The numbers behind non-con are just surprising to me, I've known that incest & loving wives are popular but I didn't know that NC was so popular.
 
Last edited:
HectorBidon said:
Grrr. OK. 95 stories went up on 2/17. They got a total of 672975 views over the first two days, which is considerably more than the other two dates we looked at earlier. The average number of views per story, though, was comparable.

[tr][td].[/td] [td]
_12/10​
[/td] [td]
_12/14​
[/td] [td]
_02/17​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Stories[/td] [td]
54​
[/td] [td]
107​
[/td] [td]
95​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Total views[/td] [td]
444205​
[/td] [td]
540736​
[/td] [td]
672975​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Avg views/story[/td] [td]
8076​
[/td] [td]
5054​
[/td] [td]
7084​
[/td][/tr] [tr][td]Highest views[/td] [td]
___44021​
[/td] [td]
___42464​
[/td] [td]
___52071​
[/td][/tr]


There were only 2 romance stories on 2/17. Melissa's story received 1548 views, which was the 17th highest view count. The other Romance story, also a chapter story but on chapter 11, got only half as many. On the other hand, there were 3 LW stories, and they got 5k, 11k, and 17k views. This supports the idea that there is a sizeable group of readers who are going to read whatever LW stories are up, but this is not the case for Romance. Romance readers probably browse across several categories to decide what they are going to read. Other categories that seem to have a dedicated new-list readership are NC/Reluctance (4 stories, 7k-13k views), Mature (6 stories, 6k-17k views), Incest/Taboo (11 stories, 4k-52k views), Interracial (5 stories, 5k-24k views), and Group Sex (3 stories, 5k-12k views).

In each category there were some stories that got only an average number of views and some that got a ton and a half. Why is that? One reason is the reputation of the author. In this batch there were a couple of good examples of this. There was an Incest story by silkstockingslover that got 52k views (!) and 228 votes (!) (in the first two days!); and one by Maria24 that got 43k views (!) and 277 votes (!!). On the other hand, there was an Interracial story by NOQuestionsAsked that got 24k vlews and 131 votes, even though this is a new author with only one other story out. Maybe it made quite an impression, or maybe there was just something about the title and description of the new story that grabbed a lot of eyeballs.

Most stories receive only an average number of views when they first appear. But as several people have mentioned, they continue to be read and appreciated even after they leave the New List.
Click to expand...

I didn't think anyone would actually "go figure", but thank you. ;)
 
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