How to roll out a multi-category series

[Publius68]

So I am getting ready to roll out a new series. It was not at all on my plans for stories to release but it just grabbed me, and in three weeks I had written eight chapters of 90,000 words. The issue is, I have eight chapters in five different categories, Romance, Erotic Coupling, Exibitionist-Voyeur, Group Sex, and First Time. How do I roll out such an eclectic series? Fast, or slower than usual? It feels hard to gauge?
I still can't figure out how readers look for new stories. Are most of them focused on the New Stories page, with all genres chronologically, or do most readers go to specific categories only?
And how do you position a series where all the chapters are different categories?

 

[Djmac1031]

You're gonna wanna hook as many readers right away with chapter 1.

This means not just getting them to read it, but spelling out clearly your plans, letting them know (in an Afterwards) what chapters are coming next, what categories they will cover and yes, a plan for how often you publish.

Because otherwise you'll lose a vast majority of them between 1 and 2.

And be prepared for that possibility anyway; it's the nature of series.

But if you inform your readers well you should retain a decent amount of them.

Good luck.

 

[RejectReality]

The one outlier there is Romance. It doesn't really mix with the rest. If that's chapter 1, you're going to lose a large part of the Romance readers when you start venturing into naughtier situations. Since the bulk of the readership the series will have will be the people you snare with chapter 1, that's hardly ideal.

Not as big of a deal if it's in the middle or at the end, but category hopping is risky because the readerships are quite tribal and hesitant to roam. That particular set of categories ( minus Romance ) is probably a better mesh than most category hopping stories. Nothing too edgy that might cause readers to nope out.

I would seriously look at the Romance chapter and ask myself if it's really romance. The readers there are more about the emotion and the chase than the sex. If you're certain about it, then go for it, but be prepared for potential drop-off more substantial than is typical for multi-submission stories. If it could fit in another category, I'd give that a serious look. Romance can play well in any number of categories.

 

[MajorRewrite]

I assume most readers only visit their favorite categories. Picking a category and sticking to it probably helps a series.

Anyway, I follow you so I’ll see the chapters no matter how much category skipping there is. Cheers.

 

[RejectReality]

After looking at your list, you've got a big advantage from an established pattern of category hopping. Your core group of followers are used to it, so it may not matter a lot. The post read like a first-timer inquiry, and you're hardly that.

I'd still think twice about romance if it's chapter 1.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

At 90K words total, I would suggest Novels/Novellas for all the chapters. You would likely retain more readers over the course of the story and they would be more accepting of the various kinks along the way.

By category hopping, you will bring people interested in a particular category into your story, but will they go backwards or forwards into other categories for more? It's a gamble.

 

[Altissimus]

There's a peak of new readers when something is 'new'. I would advocate keeping a min-3-day gap between new releases to take advantage of this.

 

[AchtungNight]

Remember that sometimes you can use an overarching “Tiffany category” (Tiffany is the first name of a hyper-organized multitasking expert I know and I don’t like the Trump family, so I don’t say “trump category”) to organize your series. Incest can cover hookups within a family. Celebrities covers you when you’re writing fanfics. Group Sex can cover swinging relationships and orgies among friends. Same for Lesbian or Gay if all your characters are a certain gender. Exhib, BDSM, and Fetish can cover relations based on shared interests. If they’re all on the same starship or exploring a fantasy dungeon, Sci-Fi & Fantasy is your Tiffany category. You take it from there.

To connect categories, make it fit the plot. I have a Lesbian story out right now where the couple is observed by three other characters, an incestuous couple and a serial masturbator who are their neighbors. Sequels concentrating on these observers are pending before the moderators. Maybe one character buys another a sex toy after they hook up in one chapter and then she uses it in the next. Then we get a romance as they grow closer. Etc.

 

[Publius68]

Thanks for all the replies. I felt from the beginning that I was rolling the dice with Romance as chapter one, but it really isn't an Erotic Coupling story either. Too bad there isn't a Romanchickawowow category! But that part is done. I do mention that the story will skip categories from the beginning, so I think I got that right.
I have deliberately avoided using Novel/Novella as a category because it just doesn't seem to get the views, and I am an attention whore.

And of course, I have plenty of experience of the Chapter Two Dropoff, along with the less well-known Chapter Three Descent to the Norm... I am ready for that drop. If I manage only a 33% drop for Chapter Two, I'm ecstatic. We will see if going from Romance to EC makes that worse or better. (Of course, the quality of the story might also affect things...)

 

[Publius68]

Well, while I think I've stumbled across some very interesting results with this series so far that confirm and twist some conventional wisdom around here.
I've never had or seen a series where chapter three, after only two days, had 50% more views than chapter one. And chapter two had as many views as chapter one. Furthermore, chapter one's views have accelerated with each release of the other chapters.
I think it can be explained by this table.
Ch 1 Courtship (Rom) 7days

[TR]
[TD]Ch 1 Courtship[/TD]
[TD]Romance[/TD]
[TD]6 Days[/TD]
[TD]4,900 views[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]Ch 2 Bachelor Party[/TD]
[TD]Erotic Coupling[/TD]
[TD]4 Days[/TD]
[TD]4,300 views[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]Ch 3 Bachelorette Party Day 1[/TD]
[TD]Exhibitionist/Voyeur[/TD]
[TD]2 Days[/TD]
[TD]6,500 views!![/TD]
[/TR]


I go back to EC with the next chapter, we will see what will happen. Maybe category hopping is not going to be too bad. Also, not numbering the chapters may be helping, with views at least.

 

[ElectricBlue]

And how do you position a series where all the chapters are different categories?

I don't quite understand why you've asked the question. You've got a whole bunch of chaptered stories already, which you've rolled out across multiple categories. And they're all doing very well.

You'd have a better data set than most of us here, as to the pros and cons of category jumping. Am I missing something here?

 

[MillieDynamite]

The story can be romantic but don't post it in Romance as long as you cover other categories. Find away to stay away from there.

 

[RejectReality]

You can get a boost by jumping to a higher-read category, but retaining the people from that category when you jump again is an entirely different feat.

Not having anything numbered and not creating a series to chronologically order them probably has as much to do with the first part gaining views as anything. It's the 3rd story with that title listed on your works page. Unless each 'part' from beginning to end is a self-contained story, I think you're going to start taking serious damage from people who don't want to do a puzzle to find out where the story begins or ends.

 

[Publius68]

I don't quite understand why you've asked the question. You've got a whole bunch of chaptered stories already, which you've rolled out across multiple categories. And they're all doing very well.

You'd have a better data set than most of us here, as to the pros and cons of category jumping. Am I missing something here?

I guess I'm asking because when I did it before, I just sort of did it without thinking. This time, I planned it from the start, and had read some off-hand advice against it here since the last time I tried it. Therefore, I wondered if the forum had some specific conventional wisdom on the subject, even though it was too late to interrupt the release schedule...

 

[ElectricBlue]

I guess I'm asking because when I did it before, I just sort of did it without thinking. This time, I planned it from the start, and had read some off-hand advice against it here since the last time I tried it. Therefore, I wondered if the forum had some specific conventional wisdom on the subject, even though it was too late to interrupt the release schedule...

The conventional wisdom is mostly, don't category swap. But there are always exceptions.

As I said, your story file has more examples of lengthy chaptered stories, some of which category swap quite a bit, others less so, than most folk here. You should be able to analyse your own View numbers and establish some kind of a pattern.

 

[Britva415]

do most readers go to specific categories only?

I don't know about the "only" part, but I suspect that readers generally go to specific categories. It narrows more to what they're looking for, at a gross level anyway, than the entire mixed "new stories" list, and they still get "new story" lists, just with the filter applied.

If they like more than one category, they still have to look in more than one place, but they don't have to sift through stories from categories not of interest. Speaking for myself, there are two categories I look in all the time, and only once in a while will I look into a different category.

When I'm searching, that's a whole different matter. If a story matches tags of interest, it could be from any category. But coming up on searches isn't how you're going to get most of your views, especially in the first 30 days when those "new stories" lists still carry yours.