Dumb newb questions I could not find an answer to

[Syra_pan]

So I posted my first few stories, and I cannot seem to get some clear answers on a few things. I am sure they have been answered many a time, but I just have not found it:

1. The ratings per view is about 1% for me. My stories tend longer, which is likely to lower the percentage who leave a rating. Is that a normal rate or is it low?

2. It seems rude not to reply to comments, but the fact that the comment thread does not have a reply option seems to imply one should not, and from the browsing and limited commenting I have done, most authors seem not to comment back. Is there any norm or expected protocol? I want to encourage comments, but I also do not want to spam people or my comment section. The other option would be a private message, but that seems intrusive.

3. I am guessing there is no way to dig deeper into the data on the ratings. For example, getting a lot of fives and ones means something very different than getting a lot of threes and fours.

Thanks for any help or thoughts.

 

[alohadave]

Is that a normal rate or is it low?

Normal.

Is there any norm or expected protocol?

Whatever you are comfortable with. Comments are kind of weird because they can be left anonymously, and most people aren't going to check back to see if there is a reply.

I am guessing there is no way to dig deeper into the data on the ratings. For example, getting a lot of fives and ones means something very different than getting a lot of threes and fours.

You can download the current stats at any time, but there is no history unless you track them yourself. I personally do a weekly snapshot. I wouldn't worry too much about what any particular vote means.

 

[Differentendeavours]

Very few people will rate you story, though if a lot do, whether they love it or hate it, means you inspired a reaction.
There is no need to respond to comments, but you can. It won't help your ratings much.
Fives and ones are good. It means people have definite opinions on your work.

 

[SimonDoom]

1. Your view:vote ratio is normal. Mine is about 92:1. I've published 54 stories over 6 years and done pretty well.

2. Authors have all kinds of opinions about replying to comments. I don't think it's necessary. I reply sometimes to comments that I think are particularly positive or thoughtful, but I don't reply to all.

3. The only way to get a clear read on your ratings is to hang on your numbers on 10 minute intervals (which seems to be the rate at which stats are updated on one's control page) and do the calculations. I've done that on a few occasions so I can figure out what each successive view is. And . . . I'm no more enlightened as a result. Votes trend high. 5 is the most common vote. Unless you are being zealous about paying attention it's hard to know how many 1 votes you are getting, and it's not clear how valuable it is to know. Some readers are crazy or nasty. The less time worrying about the trolls under the bridge, the better.

 

[Euphony]

1 & 3, I would only be poorly parroting what those who have enough of a catalog to make a deep dive into the data meaningful so I'll allow them to share their thoughts themselves.

As to

2. It seems rude not to reply to comments, but the fact that the comment thread does not have a reply option seems to imply one should not, and from the browsing and limited commenting I have done, most authors seem not to comment back. Is there any norm or expected protocol? I want to encourage comments, but I also do not want to spam people or my comment section. The other option would be a private message, but that seems intrusive.

Set your own level of fanservice from zero to gushing interactions like friends. It should be all up to you as it's your time and your story.

That I'm aware there's no protocol nor should there ever be one implied. It's already an act of sharing to post the story efforts of toil and time. Give of yourself what works for you.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Yep, what they say. Votes, about 1:100 Views, Comments (for me) 1:1000 Views, Favourites, so far down in the noise to be meaningless.

Responding to comments - occasionally, if unusually thoughtful, or if an actual question has been asked.

 

[Syra_pan]

Thanks everyone for the feedback; much appreciated!!

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Welcome to the Monkey House!

WRT replying to comments, if they weren’t Anon you can send them a PM or comment yourself.

 

[Djmac1031]

Nothing wrong with responding to comments; I've done it from time to time. Although usually I'll only do it to answer a direct question or clear up some misconception about the story.

Just don't expect readers to check back on them. They probably wont.

 

[gunhilltrain]

Maybe this wasn't clear, but you can respond to a comment by using the same submission box that everyone else uses. Just make sure it's a "public comment" so that your user name will appear on it. You can use the title box if you wish too. You would want to make it clear who you are responding to, unless there is only one comment to be concerned with. But as mentioned above, it's very rare to get another response to what you said. (I have seen it occasionally.) Readers seem to have very short attention spans here.

 

[PennameWombat]

So I posted my first few stories, and I cannot seem to get some clear answers on a few things. I am sure they have been answered many a time, but I just have not found it:

1. The ratings per view is about 1% for me. My stories tend longer, which is likely to lower the percentage who leave a rating. Is that a normal rate or is it low

You might already know, but “views“ do not equal “readers”. A ‘view’ is anyone who clicked on the first page. So, as you do surmise, how many finish to rate is some number less than that. The willingness to leave ratings, etc., also varies by category. Some tend to attract more voluble readers than others.

2. It seems rude not to reply to comments, but the fact that the comment thread does not have a reply option seems to imply one should not, and from the browsing and limited commenting I have done, most authors seem not to comment back. Is there any norm or expected protocol? I want to encourage comments, but I also do not want to spam people or my comment section. The other option would be a private message, but that seems intrusive.

It’s not rude here. This isn’t like Facebook or other platforms. Comments are NOT threaded and you can’t spam anyone except yourself via your comment section. So even if you post reply comments, only a story’s author (you) gets notified when a comment is posted. No one else will even know a new comment was posted, unless they navigate manually back to the comment page to see it. Story comments here aren’t really conducive to conversations. Also, outside of certain categories like LW, readers tend to not be heavy commenters around here.

If the poster isn’t anonymous, you can attempt to send them a PM. But, most of the time when I’ve tried this, they didn’t allow PMs. So no way to contact them.

As a rule, the rare cases when someone wanted to ‘contact‘ me rather than simply leave an opinion, instead of a comment they used the ‘send private feedback’ option.

3. I am guessing there is no way to dig deeper into the data on the ratings. For example, getting a lot of fives and ones means something very different than getting a lot of threes and fours.

Thanks for any help or thoughts.

Not on the site. You get what you get. From your control panel page you can download a CSV file of your stats as a snapshot. If you want to track over time, you’ll have to save or load into a spreadsheet of database or whatever.

As to getting ’one’ votes, many of those are our “one bombers.” They simply troll via dropping ’one’ votes. The site runs sweeps that attempt to clean up ’trolling’ votes, but the algorithms used are not publicized and we don’t try to guess. Just accept that some number of such votes (but also votes of other values, including “five” votes sometimes) will get cleaned out.

There is no support for you to download a ‘map‘ of votes, only the number of votes and the rating (the total value divided by the number). So once a story has a non-trivial number of votes, unless you happened to capture your stats in between every vote arriving, you largely won’t be able to know what the individual votes are.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Fives and ones are good. It means people have definite opinions on your work.

Seems to me that all I get is 5s and 1s. I guess I’m polarizing.

Em

 

[Differentendeavours]

Seems to me that all I get is 5s and 1s. I guess I’m polarizing.

Em

Wear it as a badge of honor, then.

 

[Duleigh]

3. I am guessing there is no way to dig deeper into the data on the ratings. For example, getting a lot of fives and ones means something very different than getting a lot of threes and fours.

Thanks for any help or thoughts.

You need to track your own stats, they can be downloaded in a .csv file then it's up to you what to do with them. I like graphs