How are monthly award winners picked?

[JuanSeiszFitzHall]

Just sayin' (passive-aggressively): If you really need a contest's $150, $100, or $75, you have much bigger problems in your life than trollery. If I were ever to land a story in a contest's win, place, or show, I wouldn't fret at all about the score dropping from 4.95 to whatever. The Blue W is forever, and troll-proof.

 

[MelissaBaby]

A few thoughts and pieces of random advice.

The winner of a contest is whoever has the highest score at the point when the contest ends and who has enough qualifying votes. The score represents a moment in time. Scores can shift dramatically after a contest ends.

It is totally counterproductive and pointless to fret about whether one wins a contest. It's nice if it happens. I haven't won one yet, and I'd be tickled to do so. But I spend zero time fretting about it. It's not worth thinking about. Contests and scores are useful to me for one thing: garnering more readers.

Chaptered stories do well for the obvious reason of self-selection and attrition. By Chapter 20, the only people continuing to read the story are those that like it. It stands to reason that scores go up as chapters progress.

My recommendation is not to focus on scores. In my view, too many people are way too obsessed with scores. Focus instead on, number 1, writing your stories and enjoying writing them, and, number 2, connecting with readers that appreciate what you write. Think about it. It's better to have 200 followers and an average story score of 4.5 than to have 20 followers and an average story score of 4.8, right? Why would anyone choose the latter? Just do your thing, do the best you can, and have fun.

I have won a couple and here is what I got: a nice little Amazon gift certificate, a bunch of one bombs and some people telling me that it shouldn't count because they were chapters, not stand alones.

I did not notice any particular uptick in readership. I don't think readers pay much attention to the monthly winners. A Blue W doesn't seem to be worth much more in that regard than a Red H.

On the issue of standalone vs. chapters, there is only one fair solution, and that is separate prized. Yes, it's not fair that series acquire loyal readers, but it's also not fair to treat gaining a loyal following as a negative.

 

[lovecraft68]

I have won a couple and here is what I got: a nice little Amazon gift certificate, a bunch of one bombs and some people telling me that it shouldn't count because they were chapters, not stand alones.

I did not notice any particular uptick in readership. I don't think readers pay much attention to the monthly winners. A Blue W doesn't seem to be worth much more in that regard than a Red H.

On the issue of standalone vs. chapters, there is only one fair solution, and that is separate prized. Yes, it's not fair that series acquire loyal readers, but it's also not fair to treat gaining a loyal following as a negative.

Unfortunately, lit is stat based and that's how they 'judge' the contests, and series get an edge in high scores, and on less votes than stand alone in most cases as the higher the chapter the more the odds are the only voters are die hards who will never give less than a five.

That makes them unfair in comparison to stand alone stories so the negative is not undue.

Separate awards is not a bad idea, but I doubt the site is going to pony up more money, doubt the site will do anything at all on this topic.

What would also be fair is a series is qualified for nothing until the words the end are typed.

Bet in some cases that would cut down on chapters as there's a few people here who keep their series going because they're winning multiple contests a year.

Try writing more than one story, many people here have built loyal fan bases doing that as well.

 

[thanagar]

Two more things:

1. I'm really not in it for the small financial awards that they give out nor do I think it's going to lead to a sudden spike in the people who will follow me. But if I won one of these monthly awards, I can call myself an award winning porn writer. Or an award-winning writer of erotic fiction (in the Mature category. For one particular month). And it will make me smile for years. That will always be amazing to me. So there's that.

2. They're doing a sweep right now. Chapter 9 jumped 5 points 4.87. And they only had to cut three votes to do that. I can only shake my head at this point....

 

[MillieDynamite]

Two more things:

1. I'm really not in it for the small financial awards that they give out nor do I think it's going to lead to a sudden spike in the people who will follow me. But if I won one of these monthly awards, I can call myself an award winning porn writer. Or an award-winning writer of erotic fiction (in the Mature category. For one particular month). And it will make me smile for years. That will always be amazing to me. So there's that.

2. They're doing a sweep right now. Chapter 9 jumped 5 points 4.87. And they only had to cut three votes to do that. I can only shake my head at this point....

They did a sweep early in the week. My score had fallen to 4.1 from 4.63 over the course of two votes. After the sweep the count went from 25 votes to 23 votes and a 4.53. With next vote (24) to a 4.51. The 25th vote has me at a 4.52. So, not sure I'll even have enough votes to qualify as competitor in the Halloween contest if we do many more sweeps.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

My very first submission won a monthly award, and remains my highest rated story. It was a stand alone story that was the foundation for three subsequent stories, which were all submitted in parts or chapters. While each of these scored well (red H), none of the parts or chapters received awards.

I question whether they would have done so if submitted as stand alone stories as well since those readers who liked the stories would have had a single vote that would have likely been higher than any of their individual chapter/part votes. I guess we'll never know.

 

[Djmac1031]

I've been at this only since August 2021.

I currently have 37 stories published.

Out of that 37, 30 have the coveted red H.

None of mine have ever won a Montly contest, although I vaguely remember one got nominated once. I totally forget which one .

I say this to say: I have no clue how stories are chosen as category winners.

While my ratings are good, my audience is vastly smaller than many I see. So maybe I'm just not getting noticed. Still too new, and too amateur.

There are far, FAR better writers here than me.

Winning a contest is a fun goal to strive for, absolutely. But I don't stress myself out over it, because I know it's a long shot.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Certain categories easily mass the 50 votes to be considered in a monthly contest. Others, only certain types of story or established authors are likely to get the 50 votes in time. So for Gay Male, Lesbian Sex or Anal, it's likely to be a first-time story because they get 3x as many readers, for BDSM it's likely to be an OTT Twue Dom and rubber-bodied Twue Submissive woman and definitely not a sub male or a switch involved!

I've placed in one themed contest with 26 votes (BDSM), but only two of my 35 stories have ever got 50 votes in the first couple months - I even had one which took two years to get to 10 votes and only got that after I complained in this forum I'd prefer a downvote to having 9 votes of 5 (someone obliged, it's now got 11 votes and a score of 4.93...)

I write what I want to read, and appreciate the people who like reading my stories too, but I will confess to being slightly miffed when a high-rated story of mine racked up high votes then tailed off at 49 of them...