Ministry Statistics!

[icarus]

A friend of mine was bemoaning the fact that she had rather few reviews. We tossed around theories why that would be, because she is a wonderful writer.

Welllll. I haven't worked in corporate America for 15 years for nothing.

I did some research. Hard, cold numbers.

There were three factors I could measure on chaptered stories:

1 - Exposure rate, or how many people clicked on the story in the first place.

2 - Reader loyalty, or how many of those who clicked on the story in the first place came back for the later chapters.

3 - Review rate, or what percentage of those who read a particular chapter reviewed.

Results:

Review rates for books are a consistent 2-3%. Whether it's Cassandra Claire or Joe Blow. There is a considerable jump in review rates for humour (one-shot) stories (to 50% of the readers responding), but for chaptered stories it's consistant from one writer to the next.

Exposure rates vary, but are in the four figures for first books, and five figures for trilogies. The increase for trilogies is exponential. The more books you write, the more exposure you have. I checked this with really lousy (but prolific) writers, and acclaimed writers. It's consistent. The difference may be 10,000 (for an average writer) and 40,000 (for an acclaimed writer) initial 'clicks.' But the jump is still pronounced.

Reader loyalty is where you see the difference. It seems to be the only figure that sets one writer apart from another. One writer may have only 10% of the people who click on their story returning. Another will have 35%. The average is about 20% people coming back.

Once again, the trilogy rule holds true. As soon as there are two or three books, reader loyalty jumps exponentially. And here the quality of the writer seems to be irrelevant. Even a very average author with only 13% reader loyalty in their first book will see a jump to 42% if they produce three.

Cassandra Claire had a 17% reader loyalty for Draco Dormiens. Her reader loyalty for Draco Veritas is 45%.

Barb had a very high reader loyalty to start 35%, which jumped to 40% for her second book, and 46% for her third.

There you have it folks. I see now why Tor Books demands trilogies from fantasy writers.

Comments

[dancingrain.livejournal.com]

Wow. Neat stuff. Intriguing.

Stats

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

It's great to learn, and be able to tell people, that reviews aren't the measure of the popularity of a story -- they are simply the measure of the exposure of the story. Everyone gets about the same percentage of reviews.

What really counts is how many people loyally follow the story as you post it.

~Icarus

[isiscolo.livejournal.com]

I guess it's like advertising. If you beat the readers' about the head with your name, eventually they pay attention.

Perhaps I should stop whining about lack of feedback and lack of recs, and start a marketing program for my stories. Fics by Isis: Now with 20% more words!

Thanks for these interesting numbers.

Trilogies, trilogies, trilogies

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

The key is writing trilogies. Once there's a lot of your stuff available, people are willing to commit to reading the earlier stuff. Then they get hooked, and they read everything of yours they can find. The measure isn't the number of reviews, because everyone gets the same percentage.

~Icarus

Marketing...

[dphearson.livejournal.com]

Damn.
So that is the key, isn't it? This may be something that all writers may pay attetion to... and why certain tv programs and movie series seems indstructible.

Re: Marketing...

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

"Wall-papering" helps, but it seems the real key is to write long trilogies. The reader loyalty jumps, from 20% coming back for more to 40% coming back for more, and the number of people who click on your story jumps from 1,000 to 10,000. The reviews only reflect the number of people reading.

~Icarus

[tinderblast.livejournal.com]

Noto to be pinhead-y, but some thoughts: I've noticed that some places have individual hits for each chapter of a series, and the first chapter is always a million times more popular than the others. Some of this might be due to people choosing not to read on, but I also think that some sites have it set up that the first chapter has to be clicked on in order to access the other stories. Hence, the first chapter gets lots more hits, including people who just want to catch the latest posted chapter and have already read the story.

Also, the no. of comments at a single site isn't really an effective measure of feedback, as it doesn't take into account the no. of sites/message lists that the story might be posted at, the option of private e-mail feedback, and that the quality of feedback might be really low, like 'u rawk! Ur story waz kewl!11'

I'm sure we've all had the experience of seeing really, really bad stories get glowing reviews, which is just bewildering. That's the next phenomenon that I'd like you to investigate ... ;)

brodie

Good thoughtful counterpoint!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I've noticed that some places have individual hits for each chapter of a series, and the first chapter is always a million times more popular than the others. Some of this might be due to people choosing not to read on..

I used Fiction Alley for my rough numbers. I do know how their counter works.

I posted chapters 1-3 on the same day. People clicked on chapter one, and that was counted, while their clicks through chapters two and three were not.

However, when I posted subsequent chapters, people who had already read the previous chapters click directly into that chapter. So the reader loyalty is not who finished the story, but a much tougher measure: who waited with bated breath for each chapter to come out.

Also, the no. of comments at a single site isn't really an effective measure of feedback..

These are percentages taken at a very high-traffic archive. Because most stories are posted in multiple places, it would be reasonable to count the traffic from a different posting (such as ff.net or a yahoo group) seperately. Also, if we counted the author's other postings as response for 'one' story, the numbers would suddenly slant in the direction of those who 'wall-paper' their stories everywhere. While some feedback may go to the author's email, the way Fiction Alley is set up, it is far more convenient to use their system than to scroll to the top of the page and email the author. So it is a fairly controlled environment (as these things go).

Even when an author has added a link at the bottom of their story to a personal Yahoo group or email (Barb has done this), the drop in reviews is only 1%.


that the quality of feedback might be really low, like 'u rawk! Ur story waz kewl!11'

Since quality is purely subjective, I can't really measure it. For myself, while I prefer intelligent reviews, I perk up at the stupid ones, too. ;)

Actually, this is all good news. It seems that it's not poor writing that is being rewarded, but rather that any story can expect a certain amount of attention. Certain types of stories, light humour fics, tend to encourage more reviews. This may mostly be due to the mood the reader is in by the time they finish the story. A thought-provoking character death story that touches on the morality of the wizarding world may leave the reader awed, but they may need time to process what's been said an might not review at all.

My intention is present a slightly more realistic attitude towards reviews. Everyone gets about the percentage (for long chaptered stories), but the number goes up with the more exposure you have. The critical mass for exposure is hit when you are a solid writer with an established record for finishing your stories. Which is a darn good reason for people to read your stories -- if they like them, there's likely to be more for them to read. Yum.

The real measure is the loyalty rate. That does seem to be higher for the better writers from the get-go.

Interesting points, thank you, Brodi.

~Icarus

[tinderblast.livejournal.com]

http://www.datalounge.com/datalounge/forums/index.html?thread=1716924&stack=2,5:thread,1:thread

Hello babycakes, I just wanted to show you proof that other people indeed see Ron as not just amenable to a grope or two, but as flaaaming.

And to drop my jaw in awe that someone came up with a *new* OTP: Giant Squid and Whomping Willow! So bizarre.

brodie

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

LOL! Loved it. :)

~Icarus

[loup_noir]

Our mutual beta, CLS, sent me the write up. Fascinating. Does it take into account that the counter is only incremented for the chapter entered and all chapters linked to are not counted?

You should post this to FAP. I'm sure a lot of writers agonizing over their lack of reviews would be interested in your stats.

Statistically speaking...

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Sure. It's a very tough measure that only works for WIPs. Shows how many people are leaping onto each chapter as it is uploaded, the average number of people are clicking onto chapter, etc. Those are the Loyal Readers. Everyone else clicks into chapter one and reads from there.

I'm not in the FA Forum much, if at all. Where would I post this topic?

Oh, and by the way, I checked out your Livejournal *hands over handkerchief - you can keep that by the way* and your website. You have one of the best summaries I've ever seen: 'Revenge is an expensive luxury. Make certain to hire a professional for best results.' Wonderful.

Do you mind terribly if I 'friend' you?

I'll have your stats in a moment. The phones are down at the office, so I have a spare moment.

~ Icarus

No Minstry statistics

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Well, I couldn't find your stories on Schnoogle. Are they not there?

~Icarus

Re: No Minstry statistics

[loup_noir]

Currently, all of my works are housed only at my gray site. It's a long story. They were all housed on TDA until last October when I pulled them. CLS is trying to talk me into putting them back up and I must admit that I need the occasional ego stroke to tell me that I don't suck as badly as I think I do.

Re: No Minstry statistics

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

??!

MartianHouseCat is doing the same thing with 'Arithmancy & Flowers' and it mystifies me still. Even published authors, even great ones, have things about their stories they don't like. Shakespeare dismissed all of his plays as dreck -- his Sonnets were all he cared for... But that's just how it is as a writer. You are never happy with your own work, you will never be happy with it. It's very, very rare to be satisfied.

People like stories of mine that I don't think much of.

I wrote a flip 3-pager that is cute, but nothing special. It's the favourite story of one person who runs a website.: "yeah, I like this much better than 'Primer to the Dark Arts'...

I wrote another story as pure sleaze, I don't feel it's all that great, I was just trying to pull off a three-way with Harry/Severus/Ron. I used a cheap plot device to make it (barely) probable. Just heard from a reader that they've read it over and over again.

There's another story that a Beta of mine ripped to shreds, and I could see that part II doesn't really have much of a plot -- I just liked the collection of one-liners. Heard from two people who have it in their 'cream of the crop' list, and it's been recommended all over the place.

Go figure.

So you just don't know what people will enjoy. As a writer you are too close to your own work to really see it well.

I'll read your Durstrang stories and tell you honestly what I think, but, unless they really aren't very good, pulling your stories is counter to the whole spirit of writing.

*mumbles and shakes head*

~Icarus