Parogar Wrote: Oh I don't plan on doing patreon. So then if that's the case, I guess it doesn't matter.

If you're writing out of passion (like me), or to just get a story out of your head (also like me), then I suggest to just keep on writing until you're satisfied.

Just treat it as a hobby. Making money off of writing has elements of gambling in it.

It's fun if you play with the purpose of having fun, but if you're overly conscious of winning(getting followers) or money(patreon/publishing) then you get sunk.

Of course, if you've got a story in your head that you're confident will make it big, then I say go for it. Life's too short to fuck around, hesitating about stuff.

Let's all keep pumping out the content! Whoo!

Lire Wrote:

Parogar Wrote: Oh I don't plan on doing patreon. So then if that's the case, I guess it doesn't matter.

If you're writing out of passion (like me), or to just get a story out of your head (also like me), then I suggest to just keep on writing until you're satisfied.

Just treat it as a hobby. Making money off of writing has elements of gambling in it.

It's fun if you play with the purpose of having fun, but if you're overly conscious of winning(getting followers) or money(patreon/publishing) then you get sunk.

Of course, if you've got a story in your head that you're confident will make it big, then I say go for it. Life's too short to fuck around, hesitating about stuff.

Let's all keep pumping out the content! Whoo!

Exactly. You never know what's going to take off. The book that made me the most money was not the one any of my readers cared about.

MisterVii Wrote:

Parogar Wrote: Oh I don't plan on doing patreon. So then if that's the case, I guess it doesn't matter. If you do patreon, then you owe something. Something more than what's been done already. I can't write under those conditions. I won't type a word if it doesn't feel right.

Then you are writing for a hobby/fun and can do whatever you want. If you want to take a week or month off you can. Still, people will tend to drop stories that aren't consistently updated or might not give as regular feedback. In my mind Patreon is a contract from writer to reader, to keep up their release schedule, which can be quite a burden if you aren't prepared. That is why most people going that route are suggested to build up a sizable back log beforehand.

I think making money off writing is great. And if this works for you, then that's what you should do. I could have written a lot more and made a lot more. I just cannot under any circumstance make something I don't "feel" in my heart was right just to make money from it. But that's only because, like I said, I can't write under those conditions.  If you're sure you can write no matter what your depression level and mental state, then you obviously are better suited for the Patreon route. If I had a Patreon and I wasn't feeling it, I wouldn't write.

Genre. There are not a lot of readers outside of the fantasy Genre or LitRPG where you can get a lot of readers.

The difficulties in writing vary depending on who you are, what fanbase you're writing for, and why you're writing.

No matter how good or bad an author gets, there will always be someone who doesn't like their story and posts something on it that could be considered extremely rude or even completely false. There will be trolls. And there will be nitpickers who like to poke and prod at every little detail in your story, even if some of those details are so tiny that 99% of the readers won't notice or care about them.

So you need to have the ability to ignore the bad, which is why a lot of people say that authors - and artists in general - need thick skin, and learn from the good.

As for getting your story out there?

On Royal Road, for a first story, it's just like a lot of people have already said. The Latest Updates section is your best friend before Rising Stars.
Uploading chapters frequently is a good way to get visibility, and so are having connections with other people who can get the word out about your story.

I hope at least some of this helped.
Assuming it wasn't already all said by other people here.

Have a nice day, and I wish you luck!

The impostor syndrome is real and crippling.

I also have to add that chronically pressing f5 and the rollercoaster of emotions that ensues after releasing a chapter can also be mentally exhausting.

DeclanBoon Wrote: I also have to add that chronically pressing f5 and the rollercoaster of emotions that ensues after releasing a chapter can also be mentally exhausting.

You didn't have to come for me like that! 

Turiya Wrote: It's easy to look at books on Rising Stars which have thousands of followers and hundreds of thousands of views after posting for a few weeks, then back to your own book which has 2 followers and a hundred views after much longer time and page count and wonder why you even bother.

This. Yes. This is a crushing feeling. But, I know the more I write and the more chapters I have, the more interesting the story becomes at least to me.

Hell, my characters sometimes do things I didn't plan for. Or I have new ones that pop in that I go, "Hey, I like this character."

I have endpoints and major beats for the stories. I hope someone somewhere will like what I put down on the pages. 

Catch-22 logic. Visibility is a success, and success is visibility. You need already be popular to be visible, but you need to be visible to be popular. Heavy dependence on numbers, a struggle to stay motivated when you don't have numbers, and cutthroat completion lead to downvotes and negativity. 

MisterVii Wrote: The rule of thumb is 2,000 followers after 2 months if you want your story to be a commercial success. The range of flow through from followers to Patreon ranges from 0.023 up to +0.1 for established stories from what I have seen. The rule of thumb is 0.03 which translates to 60 patrons from 2,000 followers, which at $10 is enough to start making it a career on an upwards trajectory. Views to followers is more complicated since you get one view per reader per chapter. So, a story with a lot of chapters, will need to have higher view counts to equal the same number of readers as a story with fewer chapters and fewer view counts.

I would hesitate to draw any conclusions before 2 months and I personally don't plan to. It is too much stress to focus on every single change of every single number and there is too much luck/variance involved. I can only try and focus on the big picture to drive things long term. Hopefully my reddit posting at the start of the month and advertising campaign on RR at the start of the month pay off, fingers crossed. It is pass/fail in my mind when the date hits October 1st for my story and if I hit the target number of followers. If I don't then I will wrap up the story and try another one. Urg, I don't even want to think that, but a failed story is like a box of bricks in the middle of the ocean, extra weight that will just pull you down.

That is one STRICT rule of thumb that I never heard of. I think you meant 200 after 2 months. 20-200. To get a whopping 2,000 in just two months isn't impossible, but you'd have to:  1. Post daily (1-3 chapters.)   2. Have a really good cover.  3. Activate all of your Lucky charms and keep them running 24/7 in max overdrive  4. Write in a very popular genre: However, the dangers of writing in these genres = people will tire of them and the next trend will start right in the middle of your writing. The current trend is System apocalypse novels (I just found Defiance 1 on Amazon) but I can say I will not be reading another System Apoc novel anytime soon xD. They're not bad, but the all kind of do the same thing. System comes to earth, integrates planet, boom, people are in a messed up hell world or fantasy world. Time for Jack's adventure. Rinse and repeat.  5. Hope you don't get drive-by half-star hit too many times. (There are a lot of teenagers and scrubs that do this. But if you're an Amazon writer, this means nothing. They'll eventually learn.)
It could take an entire year to get over 1k depending on what you're writing.
Meanwhile Lucky Jack Blow or Janice Lady Luck seemingly gets on Rising starts within two days xD  after asking about the site on discord. 

I'm still very new and I've only been posting for the last few days, but I can see why many people feel visibility is the biggest hurdle. I'm coming in from Ao3 so honestly I've gotten more eyeballs on my stuff in less than a week on here than I did in months on Ao3, which is a bit headspinning for me but in a good way. What's really important for me right now is just getting the story out, not climbing up to the Rising Stars,  but I worry that as I get more used to this place views might matter more and more to me. 

I just hope I'll remember that as long as at least one person enjoys it, then I've succeeded in my goal. 

Syr456 Wrote:

MisterVii Wrote: The rule of thumb is 2,000 followers after 2 months if you want your story to be a commercial success. The range of flow through from followers to Patreon ranges from 0.023 up to +0.1 for established stories from what I have seen. The rule of thumb is 0.03 which translates to 60 patrons from 2,000 followers, which at $10 is enough to start making it a career on an upwards trajectory. Views to followers is more complicated since you get one view per reader per chapter. So, a story with a lot of chapters, will need to have higher view counts to equal the same number of readers as a story with fewer chapters and fewer view counts.

I would hesitate to draw any conclusions before 2 months and I personally don't plan to. It is too much stress to focus on every single change of every single number and there is too much luck/variance involved. I can only try and focus on the big picture to drive things long term. Hopefully my reddit posting at the start of the month and advertising campaign on RR at the start of the month pay off, fingers crossed. It is pass/fail in my mind when the date hits October 1st for my story and if I hit the target number of followers. If I don't then I will wrap up the story and try another one. Urg, I don't even want to think that, but a failed story is like a box of bricks in the middle of the ocean, extra weight that will just pull you down.

That is one STRICT rule of thumb that I never heard of. I think you meant 200 after 2 months. 20-200. To get a whopping 2,000 in just two months isn't impossible, but you'd have to:  1. Post daily (1-3 chapters.)   2. Have a really good cover.  3. Activate all of your Lucky charms and keep them running 24/7 in max overdrive  4. Write in a very popular genre: However, the dangers of writing in these genres = people will tire of them and the next trend will start right in the middle of your writing. The current trend is System apocalypse novels (I just found Defiance 1 on Amazon) but I can say I will not be reading another System Apoc novel anytime soon xD. They're not bad, but the all kind of do the same thing. System comes to earth, integrates planet, boom, people are in a messed up hell world or fantasy world. Time for Jack's adventure. Rinse and repeat.  5. Hope you don't get drive-by half-star hit too many times. (There are a lot of teenagers and scrubs that do this. But if you're an Amazon writer, this means nothing. They'll eventually learn.)
It could take an entire year to get over 1k depending on what you're writing.
Meanwhile Lucky Jack Blow or Janice Lady Luck seemingly gets on Rising starts within two days xD  after asking about the site on discord.

I got 27 on my new story but I started 10 days ago. Is that an okay rate?

[Account Deleted]

Syr456 Wrote: That is one STRICT rule of thumb that I never heard of. I think you meant 200 after 2 months. 20-200. To get a whopping 2,000 in just two months isn't impossible, but you'd have to:  1. Post daily (1-3 chapters.)   2. Have a really good cover.  3. Activate all of your Lucky charms and keep them running 24/7 in max overdrive  4. Write in a very popular genre: However, the dangers of writing in these genres = people will tire of them and the next trend will start right in the middle of your writing. The current trend is System apocalypse novels (I just found Defiance 1 on Amazon) but I can say I will not be reading another System Apoc novel anytime soon xD. They're not bad, but the all kind of do the same thing. System comes to earth, integrates planet, boom, people are in a messed up hell world or fantasy world. Time for Jack's adventure. Rinse and repeat.  5. Hope you don't get drive-by half-star hit too many times. (There are a lot of teenagers and scrubs that do this. But if you're an Amazon writer, this means nothing. They'll eventually learn.)
It could take an entire year to get over 1k depending on what you're writing.
Meanwhile Lucky Jack Blow or Janice Lady Luck seemingly gets on Rising starts within two days xD  after asking about the site on discord.

Well I guess I will find out. I honestly don't think it is that impossible. Already have the 1 chapter a day down. The key in my mind is to hit the Rising Star's front page, which takes 500+ followers, after which things should take off based on observing that list for the past couple of months. Stories mostly hit 2,000 followers once they reach that visibility, and stories pop up after a month to two months. The tricky part is getting on there in the first place, which is why my plan is a reddit blitz on the 1st and an advertising campaign to push me onto it, fingers crossed. Time to see if internal ads carry the day.

If it doesn't happen, well then it wasn't meant to be and at least I know that. Still, I am going to remain optimistic and have patience to avoid spamming F5 on the dashboard.

Syr456 Wrote:

MisterVii Wrote: The rule of thumb is 2,000 followers after 2 months if you want your story to be a commercial success. The range of flow through from followers to Patreon ranges from 0.023 up to +0.1 for established stories from what I have seen. The rule of thumb is 0.03 which translates to 60 patrons from 2,000 followers, which at $10 is enough to start making it a career on an upwards trajectory. Views to followers is more complicated since you get one view per reader per chapter. So, a story with a lot of chapters, will need to have higher view counts to equal the same number of readers as a story with fewer chapters and fewer view counts.

I would hesitate to draw any conclusions before 2 months and I personally don't plan to. It is too much stress to focus on every single change of every single number and there is too much luck/variance involved. I can only try and focus on the big picture to drive things long term. Hopefully my reddit posting at the start of the month and advertising campaign on RR at the start of the month pay off, fingers crossed. It is pass/fail in my mind when the date hits October 1st for my story and if I hit the target number of followers. If I don't then I will wrap up the story and try another one. Urg, I don't even want to think that, but a failed story is like a box of bricks in the middle of the ocean, extra weight that will just pull you down.

That is one STRICT rule of thumb that I never heard of. I think you meant 200 after 2 months. 20-200. To get a whopping 2,000 in just two months isn't impossible, but you'd have to:  1. Post daily (1-3 chapters.)   2. Have a really good cover.  3. Activate all of your Lucky charms and keep them running 24/7 in max overdrive  4. Write in a very popular genre: However, the dangers of writing in these genres = people will tire of them and the next trend will start right in the middle of your writing. The current trend is System apocalypse novels (I just found Defiance 1 on Amazon) but I can say I will not be reading another System Apoc novel anytime soon xD. They're not bad, but the all kind of do the same thing. System comes to earth, integrates planet, boom, people are in a messed up hell world or fantasy world. Time for Jack's adventure. Rinse and repeat.  5. Hope you don't get drive-by half-star hit too many times. (There are a lot of teenagers and scrubs that do this. But if you're an Amazon writer, this means nothing. They'll eventually learn.)
It could take an entire year to get over 1k depending on what you're writing.
Meanwhile Lucky Jack Blow or Janice Lady Luck seemingly gets on Rising starts within two days xD  after asking about the site on discord.

If you're planning on making writing a career, 2,000 in after 2 months makes a lot more sense than 200.

Also, no one cares about if a story is "generic" or playing to the "current trend," execution is everything.

Beware Of Chicken is as simple and basic of a premise slice of life xianxia as you can possibly get, and yet it stands at the peak of RR.

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