Request What Services Do Original Web fiction Authors Need to Succeed

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by Wujigege, Sep 25, 2019.

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  1. mm38910

    mm38910 Well-Known Member

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    Not falling in the trap of frequent updates.
     
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  2. Kuro_0ni

    Kuro_0ni Cocooned in a Life transition

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    I also think constantly marketing ones work, will build up an audience.

    Or getting your book/story recognized by notable outlets.

    Success is dependent on what you believe. If you think that having 10 readers is a success, congratulations.

    Not being cynical, just pointing out, that having direction on where your story goes is entirely up to you.

    If you want to reach a wider audience, post your work, publish your work to as many platforms you feel comfortable with. Have other people share your work and it will be like a trickle effect.
     
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  3. Kadmos1

    Kadmos1 Well-Known Member

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    Anuther thing day ned two possibley suckced iz two hav propper Inglish grammer.

    Yes, I intentionally made the above grammatically incorrect for humorous reasons!
     
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  4. hongzu

    hongzu Well-Known Member

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    奈何笑忘川 is an online novelist I know, he started writing online novels at the beginning of 2018. At that time, he had been reading Internet novels for more than ten years and he was working on a very boring and poorly paid job. The novel 《我老婆是重生大BOSS》, average number of subscriptions was about 3K, made him feel that he could write full-time.
    But his second novel 《姐姐有妖气》 was forced to end early because of some "inappropriate plots", .
    After a period of rest, he began to write his third novel 《捡到个女帝》, this book almost completely reproduces the idea of his first book, in his own words, it was "making dirty money". Because he only wanted to copy the success of his first book, and he didn't have any passion when he wrote it.
    But he failed, average number of subscriptions was about 1.5K, he didn't even have the money to pay Social Security.
    With the help of a group of author friends, he began to try to create a new novel, 《我怎么就火了呢》. This is his last attempt, because he is an only child. His parents were only workers, and after two successive failures in supporting the family by writing books, he had difficulty bearing the strange eyes of relatives and friends.
    This time he thought that his passion in writing was no less than that in writing his first novel, and like his first novel, this novel is full of new ideas.
    His first day subscription was close to 15K, average number of subscriptions is about 13K. From all angles, he succeeded.
    I know it sounds like a fairy tale, but he really succeeded: A young man, relying on his own efforts and passion, did not give up easily after setbacks, and finally succeeded.
    But he's just an example, that's all.
    Some people work harder than him, some people are more passionate than him, some people are more amazing than him… But none of them succeeded.
    In fact, network novel creation, like any industry, you do not have a certain reason for success. But I know that if you don't make the most basic efforts, you will not succeed. (Unless your father is the CEO of Qidian)
    Oh, by the way, the above is what you need to consider after choosing a good website. Websites that are rarely pirated(Faloo, Hbooker, etc. ) are better suited for an author in some ways than Qidian, if you don't think about popularity and only care about income.
     
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  5. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Thank you very much. I would love to hear more from you since I am looking to provide services to help authors be successful eg proofreading and developmental editing.
    If you don't mind me picking your brain a bit.
    Cheers!
     
  6. hongzu

    hongzu Well-Known Member

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    If that would help.
    In fact, authors can predict the number of subscriptions to a book by data, but they can't predict why a book will be successful.
    Those closely involved cannot see clearly, maybe.
     
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  7. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Can you explain further? What data do you mean?
     
  8. hongzu

    hongzu Well-Known Member

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    http://www.qidianshuju.com/
    Qidian Data, this is what other people can see, authors can view their own data in the "Author Backstage".
    Generally speaking, the most important thing is the growth trend of the number of collection. Specifically, I am not very clear, different authors have different estimation methods.
    It's not very accurate, a book I know has a high collection and fans number, and the trend is normal, but the subscription number of the first day failed to exceed 10K. Nobody knows why, he didn't hire any “Online Water Army”, otherwise, the data will show an "Exception", but that's what happened.
     
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  9. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

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    Of course matching editors with authors would be a ton of work. Mostly because editing still requires a ton of effort and you don't get much out of it unless you are paid. So the ones generally who help edit are fans who want early access or the like.

    That said, even basic proof readers would be a huge step up for many authors.
     
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  10. draw2much

    draw2much Well-Known Member

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    I'm an amateur author who has over 100 chapters online. I'm not very popular but I'm hella persistent! I have no HTML or CSS knowledge, but I know what I dream about in a website for writers! :blob_sunglasses:

    1) The inability to upload documents is so annoying! Seriously, this is the most obvious thing but I've never seen a website that allows for it. Would it kill someone to make it possible to at least upload RTF? Do I really need to copy/paste all my text into an "custom text editor" and lose all my formatting? It's not that the custom text editor thing shouldn't be there, but it being the ONLY way to upload text is time consuming.

    2) Scheduling chapters from the same window you see unpublished files. Instead of having to go all the way into the "custom text editor" to schedule an update, I'd like to right-click or have a little button on the list of chapters (where ever that may be) that lets me insta-schedule my chapters.

    3) "Suggestion" feature that allow readers to identify spelling errors and grammar mistakes, even plot holes, without leaving a comment with a list of them at the bottom. The suggestion feature could be by paragraph, though by sentence would be better.

    4) "Editor mode" feature for readers. It turns the text editable. Reader edited texts wouldn't "go live" without the author's approval. Once edits were accepted, the editor who helped would have their username added to the bottom of the chapter automatically.

    5) Reward people who finished their novels, who are consistently updating, or those who have a high word count by giving their works preference on the front page. Getting on the front page is guaranteed views. If the story is half-way decent, that translates into views and reviews and more popularity. Even if that story never becomes the super-star of the website, it will encourage the author to keep going when they get a spike in views, likes, favorites or whatever.

    6) Easy monetization... a lot of websites have this already, but you know what... in the real world, the biggest money is always in the merchandise. It'd be nice if there was a way to monetize through merch rather ko-fi or patreon and what not. That way the author gets money and the reader gets a physical object to keep.

    7) If you want to encourage new writers and help them improve their craft, give them a one-stop-shop to improve their craft. Links to different programs they can use (preferably for free) and articles to help them with writing. Stuff like that.

    I can't think of anything else. I'm not sure how practical any of this would be to implement. Maybe not at all. But I can dream.
     
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  11. Wujigege

    Wujigege *Christian*SIMP*Comedian

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    Thanks a bunch.
    From all the feedback I have gotten, it will be a monumental task since using volunteers for such a thing wont work
    Instead I will simply offer a la carte book publishing service. Basically, your unedited web novel becomes a light novel or an edited published ebook or comic
     
  12. EnuoFH

    EnuoFH Well-Known Member

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    I will speak with the idea that you want the author wants to suceed in writing something good and having better stories,that should also bring money with time sometimes

    I have some dyslexic problems if something doesnt seem to make sense you can just ask i will try to answer better

    If anything i think people should try to rewarding the authors that seem to bring a better story,it doestn need to be inovative but something that you know they are trying to build a good story, like get people that could have a constructive cristicism and with it be able to select this kind of work, even to the point of selecting readers to do it by doing some sort of selection, that would sure bring both reader and author closer one would be able to understand points that could make the history better and readers would have the chance to voice the things that such authors could do better,its easy for people to complain but how many comments do you actually read that have something constructive and that tries to help the author? You can point all the errors but do you help with the solution ? If the author are left in the dark on how he could get better he would also have less chance to get better not mention if the people that try to critic his work dont point where he is good at he might change what is good on his work

    I think it would be a risky move but i also believe that people that have passion for the hobby of reading and dont want to keep reading fast-food tier works to have this kind of chance of interaction together with the author having the chance of feeling rewarded to not copying the work from everyone else, i don't think it would be easy but i still believe that would be something to try, not to mention when you bring reader and author closer you have a better chance of having people coming back to chek his works since they know that there is the chance of trying to help the author getting better or just to try having this kind of contact i think it does bring more people into the community and therefore more people to try the work out

    Some sort of punishment of works that try to milk chapters or to make their work endless and have no future insight to where the story is going, you cant expect writers to be motivated into bringing better works if this kind of authors are getting the best from them, they write with the idea of miling to get more money and to fill word count instead of developing a better story

    When you are able to have the community be more interactive with the author works, and you also have the authors being more incetived to write better stories while the ones that try to go the easy route of copying,only filling word count,not having insight of what they want with the work i believe that you would attract much more interest in the people that desire to get something of better quality or at least people that can read and have the chance of voicing something constructive and since you would end be ending trying to bring the best for both writer and reader i think people would surely be motivated to try to support this kind of thing, it might fail but at least you could try
     
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  13. KOALAKOALA

    KOALAKOALA Active Member

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    Try to write a complete short story first.
     
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  14. fuyuuri

    fuyuuri 『 冬瓜 』『 ☀ and ☾ 』『 hibiscus 茶 tea 』

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    A good tagging system -- the more detailed the tagging system is, the more exposure it brings to smaller authors I think
     
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