Postby Alelou » Thu Aug 02, 2012 2:19 pm
Unflattering names! I must go check those reviews just to see that...
I don't pay much attention to the stats here. Without a way to separate out repeat visits from the same person, I consider them fairly meaningless. And honestly, what I mostly gather from stats at fanfic.net are some general rules:
1) Get on the front page next to a new DP chapter from Rigil if you can. (Good luck with that.)
2) Summer weekends/weeks are slower.
3) Multi-chapter stories build up an audience over time, while one-shots often fail to get much notice.
4) Your stats will probably make you happier with nice big numbers on the first day if you post early in the (EST) morning.
5) If you really care about it -- say, because reviews are scarce -- the stats will somehow know this and go on the fritz for a day or two.
6) If you want big numbers, you must post at ff.net first, rather than watering down your responses by posting elsewhere first. (This is why the missing scenes from the first and fourth seasons have so many more reviews than the second and third, which ran here first.)
Does this prove I want big numbers? Yes, I'm that shallow. If nothing else, I like to have a baseline to compare myself against. I worked for years in direct mail, where the response rate is everything. I don't let numbers affect what I'm writing (a wonderful advantage over DM publishing, where that response would decide which of our books stayed in print and/or which of our copywriters and list managers was doing a good job), but I really love to see how they work out.