Impossible for Niche Category Illustrated Story to Get High Rating

[comegently]

The problem is that "Illustrated Stories" is a category in its own right.
In my opinion it should not be, because the fact it is illustrated is entirely separate from its (sexual) category.
This puts niche categories at a disadvantage because most who simply browse Illustrated Stories will presumably vote up stories in the most popular (sexual) categories.
Being an illustrated story means it cannot be primarily categorised in the way a non-illustrated story can.
Surely being illustrated is simply an attribute that a story either does or does not possess.
It would still be possible to search for stories with that attribute if one wished.

Authors select the category but selecting "illustrated" as the category also presumably flags to reviewers that the story is illustrated. These switches could be split into separately setting the category and flagging that the story contains illustrations. So "Illustrated" could remain as a category for legacy site content and anyone who wished to select it as the category for their story.

 

[purplishy]

I commissioned two artworks for a story, and as a result I felt obligated to post that story in the Illustrated category.

It’s by far my lowest-rated story, and although I don’t have any concrete evidence, I suspect it’s related to the reasons you mentioned. If I could do it all over again, I would try submitting it to a different category closer to the story’s main themes.

It is fun seeing illustrations in stories, though, and I’d like to encourage more of them. I agree that a way to search for stories with illustrations independent of the category would be very neat

 

[SimonDoom]

This is a good illustration of the views v. scores debate, in which I come down soundly on the "views" side. I don't know if Illustrated stories get high scores or not, but some of them get spectacular numbers of views, and that means by publishing the story in Illustrated you will gain favorites and followers. That, to me, is the whole point of publishing. Scores are incidental. They are perhaps instrumental to achieving other, primary goals, but they are secondary to other things.

Let's suppose the following hypothetical choice:

A. You publish a story with illustrations in the Exhibitionist Category, and you have a score of 4.8 and 5000 views and 30 favorites.

B. You publish exactly the same story with illustrations in the Illustrated Category, and you have a score of 4.5 and 100,000 views and 600 favorites.

To me, B is the obvious choice for an author. Number scores aren't the point. The point is to connect with readers. If others feel differently, that's their right, but I don't get it. It seems like a misplaced pursuit for what is, basically, a meaningless number trophy, instead of actually connecting with real readers.

It's an old debate and I've weighed in before and I'm sure it's tedious to hear, but to me there's a weird emphasis among authors at Literotica on scores, as opposed to other things, as being the measure of whether a story "does well." The point is to get your story read, and especially to have it read by as many readers as possible who appreciate it, not to have a shiny little high number next to it.

But to each his own.

 

[RejectReality]

Just like scores, views are useless as a metric on their own.

If you put "Mom" in the title and post it in Incest/Taboo, you'll likely get 40k views even if the text is nothing but transcribing the instruction manual for a hair dryer.

A combination of views and favorites? That translates into something a little more concrete. Score give you another angle. So do comments, and author follows, and increased activity of your existing catalog.

Unhealthy obsession with the scoring metric in the broad sense isn't going away. On an individual basis, it most certainly does. Either you learn to accept that it's an internet poll and all that goes with that, or you likely quit posting.

Obsession is counter-productive, but ignoring or devaluing score is foolish from the standpoint of acquiring new readers. It matters, because it's a primary selection criteria, and more avenues of discovery are available for scores than any other metric.

================

That aside, I have to agree with the OP. Dumping all genres into the category hurts it and every story in it. Authors and readers alike would be better served by a prominent "illustrated" marker and stories sorted into the categories that reflect the content.

This is a good illustration of the views v. scores debate, in which I come down soundly on the "views" side. I don't know if Illustrated stories get high scores or not, but some of them get spectacular numbers of views, and that means by publishing the story in Illustrated you will gain favorites and followers. That, to me, is the whole point of publishing. Scores are incidental. They are perhaps instrumental to achieving other, primary goals, but they are secondary to other things.

Let's suppose the following hypothetical choice:

A. You publish a story with illustrations in the Exhibitionist Category, and you have a score of 4.8 and 5000 views and 30 favorites.

B. You publish exactly the same story with illustrations in the Illustrated Category, and you have a score of 4.5 and 100,000 views and 600 favorites.

To me, B is the obvious choice for an author. Number scores aren't the point. The point is to connect with readers. If others feel differently, that's their right, but I don't get it. It seems like a misplaced pursuit for what is, basically, a meaningless number trophy, instead of actually connecting with real readers.

It's an old debate and I've weighed in before and I'm sure it's tedious to hear, but to me there's a weird emphasis among authors at Literotica on scores, as opposed to other things, as being the measure of whether a story "does well." The point is to get your story read, and especially to have it read by as many readers as possible who appreciate it, not to have a shiny little high number next to it.

But to each his own.

 

[SimonDoom]

Just like scores, views are useless as a metric on their own.

.

Agreed. HOWEVER, views correlate strongly with getting favorites. The more views you get, the more favorites you get. I've monitored my stories enough to know there is a very clear relationship.

Some have rightly pointed out we don't know what a "favorite" or a "follower" means. It could just mean "I might read this story later" or "I might read this author later." All true. But it's reasonable to suppose that the more favorites you have the more you've earned readers who like your work.

All numbers at this Site are proxies for something else that's meaningful. That doesn't make them meaningless. They're imperfectly meaningful. I don't know for sure, based on that data I see, how many people actually have read my stories and enjoyed them. I'll never know. But I can make some logical inferences about my stories in comparison with my former stories or with the stories of others.

 

[Bramblethorn]

The problem is that "Illustrated Stories" is a category in its own right.
In my opinion it should not be, because the fact it is illustrated is entirely separate from its (sexual) category.
This puts niche categories at a disadvantage because most who simply browse Illustrated Stories will presumably vote up stories in the most popular (sexual) categories.

Similar things happen in Fetish, where a bunch of quite different fetishes get lumped together, and in Novels/Novellas.

Being an illustrated story means it cannot be primarily categorised in the way a non-illustrated story can.

It doesn't work very well for non-illustrated stories either. Many stories fit in multiple categories and trying to pigeonhole them creates problems. Many of the readers who enjoy my lesbian romance stories when they're in Lesbian won't see the ones I posted in Romance or SFF.

I don't think comparability of votes is achievable. Even if we had a category system that fit everything, some readerships are just more generous with their votes than others. But it'd be nice to improve navigation, at least.

A. You publish a story with illustrations in the Exhibitionist Category, and you have a score of 4.8 and 5000 views and 30 favorites.

B. You publish exactly the same story with illustrations in the Illustrated Category, and you have a score of 4.5 and 100,000 views and 600 favorites.

Assuming the usual ratio of 1 vote/100 views, the Exhibitionist scenario means that about 40 delighted readers gave it a 5* rating, and the Illustrated scenario means about 500 people gave it 5*. So the second version is delighting more than 10x as many readers, even if the percentage delighted is a little lower. That's a big consideration, to be sure...

To me, B is the obvious choice for an author. Number scores aren't the point. The point is to connect with readers. If others feel differently, that's their right, but I don't get it. It seems like a misplaced pursuit for what is, basically, a meaningless number trophy, instead of actually connecting with real readers.

Not all connection is the same, though.

Sometimes a 5* vote means "I had a great orgasm from reading this", and sometimes it means "it's so hard to find the kind of story I enjoy", and sometimes it's "this story helped me make sense of some things and feel less alone". Any of those is nice to get, but some of those mean far more than others, and the stats can't tell them apart.

 

[RejectReality]

Same category. 4 days apart. About the same length at a shade over 2k words. Older woman, younger man. The primary difference is POV. IHOP from him, Breakfast Nook from her.

The favorites don't remotely scale with views, vote total, or comments. If anything, they're more in line with the score difference.

Sure, the more times a story gets opened, the more likely someone is going to mark it for one reason or another. That's just the law of averages. When you get down to a more focused comparison, things aren't nearly that neat and clean.

Let's broaden the comparison.

Becalmed is right there in the same time and wordcount range. Falls between the two in vote count, score, and views, but has quite a few more favorites than either of them. Also ties in comments with the one that has lower views.

Take Pole Skills. It seems to scale more with vote totals than views with Breakfast Nook, which has relatively similar numbers otherwise.

What Ails and Microfiction. Same number of favorites, but wildly different in every other statistic.

Sort by Favs:

Obviously, they're farther apart in date, which will skew the views, but still... Where's the strong correlation between views and favorites in those?

I just don't see that in my numbers.

Agreed. HOWEVER, views correlate strongly with getting favorites. The more views you get, the more favorites you get. I've monitored my stories enough to know there is a very clear relationship.

Some have rightly pointed out we don't know what a "favorite" or a "follower" means. It could just mean "I might read this story later" or "I might read this author later." All true. But it's reasonable to suppose that the more favorites you have the more you've earned readers who like your work.

All numbers at this Site are proxies for something else that's meaningful. That doesn't make them meaningless. They're imperfectly meaningful. I don't know for sure, based on that data I see, how many people actually have read my stories and enjoyed them. I'll never know. But I can make some logical inferences about my stories in comparison with my former stories or with the stories of others.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Obviously, they're farther apart in date, which will skew the views, but still... Where's the strong correlation between views and favorites in those?

I just don't see that in my numbers.

I'm with you. Faves are so far down in the noise, count wise, as to be an indicator of not very much.

Votes per View, using my rule of thumb 1 per 100, is a low enough indicator, but it's all I've really got. Faves are only a tiny fraction of that, so as we say here in Oz, that's five fifths of fuck all, which isn't much.

 

[windar]

Many of my stories have been illustrated and I have never felt that that put them in a separate category from the ones that weren't.

As for all the numbers stuff, I enjoy writing, particularly working out complex plots. It's like doing puzzles, which I also enjoy. If other people like what I write that's great, but the numbers don't mean much to me. Except on a pay site, but even there, I write what pleases me first and foremost...

 

[HeyAll]

1) It's the same as other catagories. If you put certain fetish stuff in Anal, you'll get a low score. If you put noncon in Incest, you'll get a low score. If you put a cheating wife anywhere you might get a lower score.

2) As mentioned above regarding views, Illustrated gets higher views partly because there are so few stories. Right now on the Hub, there are still stories from early January and they'll remain there until March. So it's a lot of good promotion when people browse.

 

[comegently]

My basic point of view is that making "Illustrated" a category that replaces the primary genre category creates a mixed "Apples and Oranges" situation.

"Illustrated" is a format category.
"Group Sex", "Lesbian Sex", etc. are categories that describe what stories are about.

Although it's useful to be able to search by format, I feel that the first key should be what the stories are about.

I suppose graphic novels might be cited as a counter-case, but many illustrated stories here include pictures as an adjunct to the text rather than presenting the entire story in the form of a comic strip.

 

[SimonDoom]

My basic point of view is that making "Illustrated" a category that replaces the primary genre category creates a mixed "Apples and Oranges" situation.

"Illustrated" is a format category.
"Group Sex", "Lesbian Sex", etc. are categories that describe what stories are about.

Although it's useful to be able to search by format, I feel that the first key should be what the stories are about.

I suppose graphic novels might be cited as a counter-case, but many illustrated stories here include pictures as an adjunct to the text rather than presenting the entire story in the form of a comic strip.

The main question is whether there is a discrete and large enough reader group that reads stories BECAUSE they are illustrated. If so, then it makes sense to have a separate category, despite its oddness. I think it probably does, given the extremely high number of views that Illustrated stories sometimes get.

 

[comegently]

The main question is whether there is a discrete and large enough reader group that reads stories BECAUSE they are illustrated. If so, then it makes sense to have a separate category, despite its oddness. I think it probably does, given the extremely high number of views that Illustrated stories sometimes get.

That makes sense, but right now, categorizing a story that has pictures as "Illustrated" is mandatory, and precludes categorizing it as anything else.

 

[SimonDoom]

That makes sense, but right now, categorizing a story that has pictures as "Illustrated" is mandatory, and precludes categorizing it as anything else.

That's true. It's treated as a "trump" category according to Tx Tall Tales's article Love Your Readers:Categories. I presume this is because the Site owners have decided this treatment is most responsive to reader preferences.

 

[windar]

The main question is whether there is a discrete and large enough reader group that reads stories BECAUSE they are illustrated. If so, then it makes sense to have a separate category, despite its oddness. I think it probably does, given the extremely high number of views that Illustrated stories sometimes get.

On every site I've been on that has both art and stories, the art tends to get more views. One, if a picture is worth a thousand words, it takes far less time to look at 5 pictures than to read 5000 words; and, two, they are accesible to people regardless of what languages they speak.

 

[RejectReality]

That's true. It's treated as a "trump" category according to Tx Tall Tales's article Love Your Readers:Categories. I presume this is because the Site owners have decided this treatment is most responsive to reader preferences.

The numbers don't really agree with that, though. Better than anywhere else, the illustrated category demonstrates that simple hits do not equal increases elsewhere. The view ratio with any other stat is abysmal. The category generates hits, but no corresponding increase in any other stat.

Both I/T, about the same length, around the same time, and yet the only real difference is the view number. Even if those numbers are real people and not bots scraping the images, those additional people aren't producing any additional response.

Readers have to sift through a grab-bag to find a kink that they enjoy.

Maybe there's some spillover, but if the bulk of that spillover is non-responsive readers...

Maybe that category drives more traffic to the cam/VOD sites than others because it contains a visual component. That would be a reason I could see for keeping them separate.

But I still believe authors and readers would be better served by the stories being categorized according to their kink content rather than dropped in one bucket.

The exception would probably be categories with high daily story counts, where the batch releases and low volume of incoming illustrated stories keeps it in front of a potential audience longer.

Perhaps echoing the illustrated releases in the appropriate ( if one exists ) category could serve everyone's interests. Likely a large investment in coding and database management, however.

 

[ElectricBlue]

That's true. It's treated as a "trump" category according to Tx Tall Tales's article Love Your Readers:Categories. I presume this is because the Site owners have decided this treatment is most responsive to reader preferences.

My guess is that, back in the day, illustrated stories, being much bigger data files, had a dedicated server with extra capacity, so they were all put in the same place. I always consider some technical constraint before I think of "good reasons to help readers."

 

[SimonDoom]

The numbers don't really agree with that, though. Better than anywhere else, the illustrated category demonstrates that simple hits do not equal increases elsewhere. The view ratio with any other stat is abysmal. The category generates hits, but no corresponding increase in any other stat.

Both I/T, about the same length, around the same time, and yet the only real difference is the view number. Even if those numbers are real people and not bots scraping the images, those additional people aren't producing any additional response.

Readers have to sift through a grab-bag to find a kink that they enjoy.

Maybe there's some spillover, but if the bulk of that spillover is non-responsive readers...

Maybe that category drives more traffic to the cam/VOD sites than others because it contains a visual component. That would be a reason I could see for keeping them separate.

But I still believe authors and readers would be better served by the stories being categorized according to their kink content rather than dropped in one bucket.

The exception would probably be categories with high daily story counts, where the batch releases and low volume of incoming illustrated stories keeps it in front of a potential audience longer.

Perhaps echoing the illustrated releases in the appropriate ( if one exists ) category could serve everyone's interests. Likely a large investment in coding and database management, however.

Interesting data. I'm not sure what to make of it, but I'm going to look at it and re-check some of those assumptions.

I hadn't paid attention to the Illustrated view:favorite ratios before, but at first blush they DO seem off-kilter from what I usually see.

 

[JGittes]

Interesting data. I'm not sure what to make of it, but I'm going to look at it and re-check some of those assumptions.

I hadn't paid attention to the Illustrated view:favorite ratios before, but at first blush they DO seem off-kilter from what I usually see.

I'm very closely following the entrants in the Valentine's Day contest and will fully report my findings when the contest is over.

I can speak to the Illustrated Story views v. other metrics observation. There is only one illustrated story entry, by a very popular author. It currently has the second-highest views of all entrants. (The top views go to an IT story.) The same author also has a Lesbian Sex story. The Illustrated story is also a lesbian sex story.

--------------- Views - Score - #Votes - #Hearts
Illustrated --- 71.3k - 4.31 - 410 - 16

Lesbian ---- 30.3k -- 4.84 -- 669 - 113

My interpretation is that readers go to illustrated for the illustrations and don't bother all that much with reading the actual story. Of course, I have only one data point for the Illustrated category in the contest, but it seems consistent with RR data above.

Lots of Lesbian Sex data points that I will discuss next week, but I can say that Lesbian Sex readers are very generous with their scoring and hearting (I'm not sure what the single heart means in practice, so I'll just call it heart and not favorite or whatever.) Silk (the author) has over 39k followers and actively promotes her postings through various social media, so her views, #votes, and #hearts are always high, higher than the average for Lesbian stories, which in my interpretation reinforces the point that the Illustrated category is primarily used by readers for the illustrations. About half of the top 10 all time Illustrated entries are comprised of only photos.

 

[Bramblethorn]

My basic point of view is that making "Illustrated" a category that replaces the primary genre category creates a mixed "Apples and Oranges" situation.

"Illustrated" is a format category.
"Group Sex", "Lesbian Sex", etc. are categories that describe what stories are about.

There's still an apples-and-oranges situation there though. Stories get categorised by the format/medium (Illustrated, Audio etc.), or by the nature of the participants (Lesbian, Gay Male, Mature), or by the setting (SF/F), or by the type of action (Romance, BDSM, etc. etc.) Any time you have a story that could be categorised by more than one of those things, similar problems emerge.