Winter Holiday 2024 Contest Support and Seasonal Story Discussion Thread

Probalby should be doing this one to one, but I find it hard to believe you have 2400 votes as my read to vote ratio is 0.6% but (based on the latest figures for Dildo for the Holidays is 3.6k (3600) views so a ratio of reads to votes of 66%. If that was one of my stories the votes would be 24! On your home page, the score and votes are shown like 4.66/24.
View attachment 2442581which is rating 4.25, 48 votes, 5 favourites, 4.3k reads (4303 when you hover over it) and 8 comments.

I would like to know if my read to vote ratio is admormally low, but it is fairly consistent.
As ever, I take the coward's motto of YMMV!
I work on an average of about 1 vote to 100 views and 1 comment to a 1000 views. It can move around a bit but as an average I find that's pretty constant.
 
Probalby should be doing this one to one, but I find it hard to believe you have 2400 votes as my read to vote ratio is 0.6% but (based on the latest figures for Dildo for the Holidays is 3.6k (3600) views so a ratio of reads to votes of 66%. If that was one of my stories the votes would be 24! On your home page, the score and votes are shown like 4.66/24.
View attachment 2442581which is rating 4.25, 48 votes, 5 favourites, 4.3k reads (4303 when you hover over it) and 8 comments.

I would like to know if my read to vote ratio is admormally low, but it is fairly consistent.
As ever, I take the coward's motto of YMMV!

My overall average is about 90 views to 1 vote, but across my stories the ratio ranges from about 50:1 to about 200:1.

My latest story, published today, so far has the best ratio yet at about 37 views to one vote.

A variety of factors can affect the ratio in ways that make different people's ratios hard to compare: category; story fit with category; story length (a shorter story, all things being equal, will see a higher percentage of views turn in to votes); whether it's a standalone story or a chapter story (chaptered stories will have somewhat better ratios because of reader attrition).

Your ratio is better than my worst stories but not as good as my best. Nothing obviously strange about it.
 
Thank you. It feels whiny to complain about a story that is still highly rated with a lot of feedback. But there’s no way this particular story drops 5 points in a matter of a couple of weeks, when it already had more than 2400 votes, unless something targeted was going on. I’ll send a request.

I think you meant 2400 views..... so dropping 5 points would be easy because you've likely got between 20-30 actual votes, and that # of votes make sit easy to manipulate the score.

If I look at your story, the 4.66 is the score, the 3.6k is the # of views - and we can't see the # of votes other authors get - only you can see that

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But if I look at my own story, I see a score of 4.09, and 55 votes with 10.3k views - so if I was getting 1 in 100 it'd be more like 100 votes right now. But as you can see, 9 comments - so close to 1 comment per 1000 views. The low vote to views ratio for mine is probably a combo of too much repetition (I was trying for an artistic effect that didn't come off) and being too long, the combination of which means readers aren't finishing the story and voting - so low vote to views ration. No worries, it was a kind of writing experiment that I'll rewrite after the competition. The learning curve..... :)

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But if I take a couple of older stories - this one has 125k views and 2.8k votes - so about 1 vote for 45 views
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Or this one - 196k views and 624 votes - so about 1 vote for 300 views - so you can see some large variations,

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A variety of factors can affect the ratio in ways that make different people's ratios hard to compare: category; story fit with category; story length (a shorter story, all things being equal, will see a higher percentage of views turn in to votes); whether it's a standalone story or a chapter story (chaptered stories will have somewhat better ratios because of reader attrition).
Votes/View also changes over time. It's relatively high in the first couple days, and falls to a lower rate after the first viewers have their way with it. This is a pretty typical example:

votes:views.jpg
The slope of the line is the votes:views ratio. The ratio is usually very low for the first few hours. The initial readers are probably skimming for something and not reading. The ratio goes up about 6 hours after a story posts and stays relatively high as long as its on the New List/Category hub. In this case, the story held a ratio of about 2.7%. The ratio is lower when readers find the story other ways. This story settled down to getting about 1 vote for every 100 views. Over all, the viewing rate is about 160 votes/8500 views -- a little under 2%.

The little up-tick in the ratio at the end of the record is the result of this contest. Every story I looked at has it. I guess the readers who pick up my holiday story and go on to other stories in my catalog are prone to voting. That's one of those contest perks.
 
My Halloween story has 8300 views and 452 votes, so about 1 vote for every 18.4 views.

My Holidays story has 9600 views and 60 votes, so about 1 vote for every 161 views.

I suspect it’s because the former is a Romance story and the latter is Group Sex and also because the Holidays story is 30,000 words longer.

The scores are similar, so the people reading them and voting are feeling the same way about them. :)
 
Are you stories usually pretty long? I know that I will often open a story and see that it's 16 pages and click right out. I just don't have the time or attention span. I max out at 3 or 4 pages.

But, even though I don't usually go for the long ones, I would NEVER give a score to a story I haven't completed. Good or bad.
Not disagreeing with Freya👩🏻‍🦰 (wouldn't dare 😏) but the issue doesn't occur with the first story as it is top of the Series and the Series is new so it's at the top. It's later that it has an effect.

On frequency. If you consider I have been here just over a year and have 50 stories then it implies I did a lot of one a week (I did). (The following proof reader advice I have learnt more recently).
I didn't get complaints. But possibly try to be a bit slower than that. (The story stays [NEW] for a week)
Top tip, get a proof reader, or at very least use a screen reader (ideally both so your proof/beta reader isn't having to correct 'whist' to 'whilst' and so can help more with dialouge and other things).
Also no point publishing once a week for 6 months and then once a month for 6 months and then once a quarter...
Don's my coward's coat YMMV!
You can remove it from a series.

I agonized over things like this when I started here. The advice I got was not to worry about it. Just write good stories. You story should stay on the "new" list in whatever category it's in for a while. A week, maybe? But here are some thoughts.

Your story will get a bunch of reads as "new" but will (hopefully) get many, many, many more reads down the line as your presence on Literotica grows. Maybe a reader liked your story and wants to read more? No matter what you do, you'll wonder about what you didn't do. But I think the bottom line is to get some work out there and start making your stories known. In a week (or less) your "new" story is just another story in the pile. You may as well start adding to that pile!!
Right on, all, thanks! Good advice. One week. It's new, so it can stay, but remember for the future to not add it to a series for at least a week, don't go longer than 3 or 4 pages for a story. I well and truly doubt that I'll ever go that long, since I keep most short stories "chapter" length or I divide them up because "gosh this is too long now", but, still, good to remember.

It's funny, for the second new superhero story I'm writing, for a while I was thinking "I need to have sexual tension between these two characters" AND SUDDENLY I REMEMBERED WHERE I WAS and then I was like "I could just have sexual SEX between those two characters!" Not sure what catagory I'll need to use for it, though, since, like I said, it's less "romance" and more "hate sex".

It'll be kind of a "hate to hate sex to respect to lovers to romantic partners" thing and I'm pretty happy with it.

ALSO ALSO, my superhero story is publishing here tomorrow! Excited! And glad to know that I'm a good enough writer that my stories don't get rejected for bad grammar now. <if you're wondering, this new one isn't romantic, but it DOES use a technique I've become good at called "Stab the Reader in the Heart">
 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to be running at an insane ratio of about 1 vote per 21 views.

View attachment 2442656

LOL. You're a recognized author here, readers that like your stories REALLY like your stories, and you have a rather dedicated following, and what tends to happen is people who like your stories get that notification that you've posted a new one and dive in and read it right away, and if they like it, which obviously they do, they 5 star you right away. 1 vote per 20 views is really good. My best ever ratio was that 1 in 45, so wow, REALLY good :heart: - THAT is real appreciation!!!!
 
My Halloween story has 8300 views and 452 votes, so about 1 vote for every 18.4 views.

My Holidays story has 9600 views and 60 votes, so about 1 vote for every 161 views.

I suspect it’s because the former is a Romance story and the latter is Group Sex and also because the Holidays story is 30,000 words longer.

The scores are similar, so the people reading them and voting are feeling the same way about them. :)

LOL. As above. 1 in 18 is at the "wow" end of the bell curve. Good one!!!!!
 
The little up-tick in the ratio at the end of the record is the result of this contest. Every story I looked at has it. I guess the readers who pick up my holiday story and go on to other stories in my catalog are prone to voting. That's one of those contest perks.
That just about always happens to me - I put a story in a contest and I get an uptick in views and comments on my other stories as readers who come across me for the first time decide they want to try more of my stories. One of the benefits of entering the competitions, and the thing is, Literotica is ALWAYS getting new readers. It's not a steady audience by any means, it can be very fluid.
 
Thank you. It feels whiny to complain about a story that is still highly rated with a lot of feedback. But there’s no way this particular story drops 5 points in a matter of a couple of weeks, when it already had more than 2400 votes, unless something targeted was going on. I’ll send a request.
Your latest story has 3600 Views (when I looked just now), not Votes. I think you're confusing the two metrics. Based on the typical ratio, I reckon you'll have between 30 and 40 Votes. Your Comments ratio is pretty good.
 
Hang on!! Vote to view ratio? So, there's even ANOTHER thing to obsess over? Okay. I'm going to check.

Alright. If my math is correct, my Holiday Contest Entry is working at a 0.0034% vote rate (81 votes 23.7K views).
My comment ratio is 0.0005%.

The takeaway here is that I have discovered another thing that I'm doing wrong.

Hmmm....

Wait! My highest viewed story is at a 0.012% vote to view, so I'm in the range. But still, that's a story that's over a year old. Maybe I'm a late bloomer?
 
Alright. If my math is correct, my Holiday Contest Entry is working at a 0.0034% vote rate (81 votes 23.7K views).
My comment ratio is 0.0005%.
Freya,👩‍🦰 It appears that you are forgetting to multipy by 100 when going from rate to % so the above figures are 0.34% and 0.05%
My highest and lowest comment % are 0.1% and 0% (nearly 20% with no comments)
The takeaway here is that I have discovered another thing that I'm doing wrong.
There is no wrong except not enjoying being here!
Wait! My highest viewed story is at a 0.012% vote to view, so I'm in the range. But still, that's a story that's over a year old. Maybe I'm a late bloomer?
Again I assume 1.2% which is in the range given. I have about 3 (out of 50) that are above 0.8% and one of those was a comp. So my average still sucks - but hey ho! That's not stopping me! 🕵🏼‍♂️ (new avatar hopefully coming soon)
 
I haven't noticed any sweeps so far, though it's possible that my slow rise in number of votes has offset any votes removed. The score itself has gone up 0.02 points from the low about a week ago, but that's over time due to added votes.

Regarding ratios, the suggested 1:100 and 1:1000 ratios vary a lot by category, by story length, and by writer. With 80% of my stories in Romance and Mature, my vote per views ratios in those categories range from 1:18.5 (best) to 1:100.5 (my only one above 100) with an overall average in all categories of about 1:37. My comment per views ratio is all over the place but the average is about 1:1100, similar to what was suggested.

For my Holiday Contest entry in the Romance category and 33K words in length, it's currently at 22.2 views per vote and 401 views per comment.
 
Regarding ratios, the suggested 1:100 and 1:1000 ratios vary a lot by category, by story length, and by writer. With 80% of my stories in Romance and Mature, my vote per views ratios in those categories range from 1:18.5 (best) to 1:100.5 (my only one above 100) with an overall average in all categories of about 1:37. My comment per views ratio is all over the place but the average is about 1:1100, similar to what was suggested.

For my Holiday Contest entry in the Romance category and 33K words in length, it's currently at 22.2 views per vote and 401 views per comment.

Nice! And yeah, that 1/100 and 1/1000 is very much an approximation - it's a bell curve after all. Most of mine are more like 1/150 or 1/200, but on the other hand, the votes that are cast are usually on the high side, so while I don't get the high votes to views ratio, the ratings are usually good. It;s always fun looking at the stats, altho I don;t do it anything like as much as I used to. LOL

When I first started here, I'd track the competition stories and votes and ratings daily. Now I kindof laugh at my earlier self, but I can empathize with the interest. It IS fun to watch, and its always nice to see good results - and a 1/20 is a REALLY good result, regardless of views or score.
 
Posting these for completeness. The first one is the daily graph. The second is the series of annual totals, but with the earlier years corrected so that multiple entries in a series counted as one entry only. There were still entries that were part of a longer series, but I only counted one per series.

I was going to do a normal distribution but then ran out of energy - you can see where 2024 sits! What a huge effort from everybody, including the amazing @Laurel and @Manu of course.

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Thank you, @Actingup and @AlexFourways for doing the number thing. What I find fascinating is the number of stories graph. When it was just projected, my thought was, "No! It'll taper off. The majority of stories will be in the first couple of days, then a smattering, then a couple of people just under the wire." But, nope!! It stayed pretty much true to the projection. Stories just kept being submitted throughout the entire length of the contest. Crazy!!!

Congrats to all!!!!
 
Someone upthread was curious about stories getting high scores, so I clicked through all of them just now. Of the 180, there are 12 at 4.8 or higher (I’m not going to list them to avoid the trolls). There’s a bunch more in the 4.75-4.79 range. I didn’t see any pushing 4.9, but that really is tough to do.

I have no idea how that compares with previous years.
 
I'm going to reiterate, the scores mean nothing until final sweeps are done and Laurel has the calculations at a set point in time when she chooses the winner.

The stories that stay 4.8+ often (not always, but often) don't see a big change in final scores, where stories in the 4.6-4.78 range will often see a bigger effect from the sweeps, and those changes can and often do push those stories up over the winning threshold. (Much to the surprise and upset of many.) Some scores even lower during the sweeps due to suspicious high votes as well as low. I had one that dropped .08, from a 4.88 to a 4.8 in... I think it was the first contest I entered? It was a Halloween entry, anyway. It came in as the fifth or sixth highest of the contest and I was fucking thrilled! Bummed that my score dropped, but still thrilled.
 
Someone upthread was curious about stories getting high scores, so I clicked through all of them just now. Of the 180, there are 12 at 4.8 or higher (I’m not going to list them to avoid the trolls). There’s a bunch more in the 4.75-4.79 range. I didn’t see any pushing 4.9, but that really is tough to do.
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the final winners and the scores the stories have don't always match up. I usually don't think to check until something reminds me (and It's usually a day or two past the contest end), but not only can the final sweep make a dramatic difference, but the fact that some entries are disqualified can change the winning three. I've seen (I think) two that are part of a series (not allowed). And perhaps someone with one of the top three highest rated stories has already won one of the previous two contests (their story/stories would be out of the running). Also, if someone had multiple stories in the top three, only the top-rated would be considered (the others would be out). Also, some people don't use the tag ("The following guidelines also apply: Author must copy and paste the phrase "WINTER HOLIDAY 2024" to the "Notes to Admin" field of the submission."), so those stories would also be disqualified (although that is splitting hairs).

The point is, a lot can change all of the sudden!
 
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I'm going to reiterate, the scores mean nothing until final sweeps are done and Laurel has the calculations at a set point in time when she chooses the winner.

The stories that stay 4.8+ often (not always, but often) don't see a big change in final scores, where stories in the 4.6-4.78 range will often see a bigger effect from the sweeps, and those changes can and often do push those stories up over the winning threshold. (Much to the surprise and upset of many.) Some scores even lower during the sweeps due to suspicious high votes as well as low. I had one that dropped .08, from a 4.88 to a 4.8 in... I think it was the first contest I entered? It was a Halloween entry, anyway. It came in as the fifth or sixth highest of the contest and I was fucking thrilled! Bummed that my score dropped, but still thrilled.

That is true, although the leading stories sometimes attract a flurry of late one bombs and do get significant boosts when those are swept out.

But, yes, lower scoring stories can not be counted out until the final results come in. I once had a story bounce fro around 4.55 to something with 4.85.
 
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