So, the main reason for having posted an old story, When Penguins Fly, was when I had done so, Alex said it was a shame it literally had only 1 favorite on SoFurry after 3 years. In fact, I've been on SF since it basically began and have a couple dozen stories there. Yep, about 12 or whatever the fuck years. I remember competing with WhyteYote and Jeeves before they really got set in stone as the de-facto faces of the site for front page popular stories... and after all that time and work, I have about 150 watchers.
You know, I'm lazy. But I am a good writer... I think, at least. Alex had told me Inkbunny actually has more users than SF, so there's a better chance to get some attention and exposure, potentially. Now, I'm not 100% convinced, but I posted to give it a chance. One of my concerns is that IB doesn't have the reputation for focusing on stories, SF does. So if I post on SF, anyone browsing the site can just be assumed that they want to read a story.
But I like writing... actual stories. Not just fap fictions, fetish fantasies. I've attempted just for views (and have done quite well when doing so), but I hated it, every time. I felt bored. I write humorous or dark themes. It's so much more satisfying actually having a point when I make crap. I remember me and a friend were reading a randomly-selected Jeeves story, and literally one of the sentences was something like, "And then they fucked." WOW. THAT'S GREAT SHIT. Jeeves pushes out stories like pawing away morning wood. I guess it's only natural they get a bit stale eventually.
People on SF tend to only want to read those kind of fap fantasy stories. I usually shove in a sex scene into my story that I feel has no place in the actual plot because I know I'll get more views if it has some sex tags. I hate it. And I'm concerned posting on IB basically will be a waste. Alex shouted me out, and I appreciate my friend doing so, but that doesn't mean posting on IB is worth the time.
I do want to write. I have a 4 day weekend from work coming up, and among other things, can consider writing a new story. I have a lot of ideas for a story called "Snowfall", which hopefully come to fruition. I've written the first couple pages multiple times, just wanting to get the idea physically down, but I always restart or just stop caring and move on... I guess, we'll see what happens after Saturday.
For now, here are my other stories on SF: https://spear.sofurry.com/ In the past, I had actually reposted these on another account on Inkbunny, and didn't get as much attention as I wanted, so I gave up. In fact, I actually posted a story on accident that broke the rules, hah... and got so little attention that the story stayed up. (Saved By the Fang, btw. Had human/furry, which if I recall, violates IB rules. It's somehow my most popular story on SF.)
I think generally a problem when you post stories online is, getting people to read it in the first place (unless you're really really famous, so the fact that its YOUR story is reason enough for everyone)
On an art-piece, you can look at the thumbnail, and think "oooh, that's pretty" - Then click on it and watch it in detail.
Time needed ... 2 seconds to get interested, 10 seconds to decide you like it. That works really well with the way FA, IB and others display works on the front-page.
But on a story, all you have is a title and (if you have someone to make cover art for you) an icon which - unlike with art - is no quality indicator for the story at all to draw peoples attention.
So basically forget about "drive by readers" -- way too rare.
There's four ways how people actually read your story:
1. Exposure on Upload -- for a brief time your story is on the front page. Maybe someone clicks on it. I'd expect about 10 or 20 page visits depending on the time of day you upload. Maybe a bit more if an artist sponsors a nice icon. Most of them only read description and keywords. 2. Searches - your story comes up in searches for stuff people search for (Keywords!!!!) 3. Links and suggestions from other Artists/Authors/Users. Like what @AlexReynards did for yours. 4. Watchers - People who read your stuff in the past come back.
1 You have for free, but its virtually nothing. 3 and 4 becomes important when you start getting famous.
In between there's only 2.
Now -- what do people that do have the time and inclination to read a longer story put as search terms?
Let's face it, mostly porn. Not just any porn, but their fetishes, their kinks. Sometimes they also search for stuff that intrigues them, that they stumbled over and just wanna see what else comes up.
Either way, your best chance of getting hits is if you cover a niche where there's not much competition, where your stuff doesn't show up on page 42 of the search result but on page 1 on the top, because there's only 10 hits anyway. That's when you get readers because chances are, they have already read the other 9.
If your story is good AND covers the fetish/kink in a good way -- maybe even impresses people who aren't even INTO that sort of thing and just clicked on it out of curiosity, then you get favs and watches, which in turn draws in more other readers.
The crux. It draws in other readers who kinda like similar things, that's why they checked out that person's favs.
So while you can broaden that niche, you can't ever really get out of it, as the majority of your reader base is interested in their "thing"
So what to do as an author? Well, I'd say, find a niche that you really like yourself, that you can excel in writing about, and that is not covered by too many others.
Then make awesome stories that have this as a main theme and still manage to have a storyline, a message, a dramatic plot.
Theres cheap fap fiction. There's too much of it, and its boring to write. Porn for its own sake.
Then there's awesome stories, which got a distracting fap scene forced into it, just to be able to put the keywords in to lure in readers. It sounds that's what you have been trying.
I'd say thats both not the right thing to do. I try to make fap stories that actually have something like a deeper meaning. Use the fetish itself to tell a story instead of forcing it in where it doesn't fit. If your audience is sex crazy furries, then have those in your story too. They can act without inhibition and explicitly, and yet not have that the sole purpose of the story you tell, only the medium.
If you don't do that and try to avoid sexual centered themes, then you are facing mainstream. FA, IB, SF, they aren't mainstream. Not even DA is. Even DA is mostly porn, even though its censored.
You'd have to write actual books and find a publisher. That's ... almost impossible to get anywhere. The beatles wrote a song about it
