How do you deal with a declining viewcount trend on your story?

[ForestDweller]

Change the story's direction rapidly? Give a better synopsis and cover page? Or just halt writing until you can figure out the problem?

 

[TachimeSan]

I would highly advise against that.

I myself am currently suffering with this. I took a long break from writing, and even when I came back my updates were sporadic and random, so I went from having 9-10 people commenting and hearting my chapters to having at most 4-6 people commenting and hearting. It's inevitable.

My advise would be to just keep doing what you're doing, if you try to change too much of your story you might lose sight of what you wanted your story to be in the first place. Other people would eventually find your story, so just keep writing. You never know, the readers who lost interest may comeback once they see that chapters have stacked up.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

Be glad as you are complaining on a high level. Many authors on this site would be glad about even a fraction of your stats.

 

[TachimeSan]

Be glad as you are complaining on a high level. Many authors on this site would be glad about even a fraction of your stats.

This as well. I took a look at OP's story and by God they have over 300k in total views. That's a lot, I don't think you need to be worrying about losing view counts, you've got plenty of them to spare

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

This as well. I took a look at OP's story and by God they have over 300k in total views. That's a lot, I don't think you need to be worrying about losing view counts, you've got plenty of them to spare

It is not only not worrying but comes of as entitled as well. Like a billionaire complaining, they lost a few millions on the stock market.

 

[ForestDweller]

Be glad as you are complaining on a high level. Many authors on this site would be glad about even a fraction of your stats.

True. Wordcount wise, there are some stories with wordcounts higher than mine that have less views.

But on the other hand, there are many more with less wordcounts but higher views. That means they're succeeding more with less effort. It's natural to get a lot of views the more you write. But it's less natural to get a lot of views when you haven't written much.

Not to mention that declining views mean the story isn't as engaging as it ought to be to the readers.

And no one wants their story to decline instead of growing.

 

[ZesshiLavi]

Is this some kind of popular author joke that I fail to understand?

 

[Jamminrabbit]

View count doesn't matter. Has your reader gained slowed, or valid reads declined?

All view count really shows is someone clicking on your page, but not necessarily reading it. So that is borderline useless information.

 

[ForestDweller]

View count doesn't matter. Has your reader gained slowed, or valid reads declined?

All view count really shows is someone clicking on your page, but not necessarily reading it. So that is borderline useless information.

Ah, I should check those.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

True. Wordcount wise, there are some stories with wordcounts higher than mine that have less views.

But on the other hand, there are many more with less wordcounts but higher views. That means they're succeeding more with less effort. It's natural to get a lot of views the more you write. But it's less natural to get a lot of views when you haven't written much.

Not to mention that declining views mean the story isn't as engaging as it ought to be to them readers.

And no one wants their story to decline instead of growing.

You must measure chapters, not word count. Better metric.

 

[ForestDweller]

You must measure chapters, not word count. Better metric.

That means you should write 1k chapters.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

That means you should write 1k chapters.

Of course, it does. How do you think the Chinese novels get to their thousand of chapters? More chapters, more views, more hearts, more comments.

There are exceptions, but exceptions prove the rules.

 

[ForestDweller]

Of course, it does. How do you think the Chinese novels get to their thousand of chapters? More chapters, more views, more hearts, more comments.

There are exceptions, but exceptions prove the rules.

It was a mistake to write 3k chapters all this time. And now my readers want 4k chapters.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

It was a mistake to write 3k chapters all this time. And now my readers want 4k chapters.

How that? Do they force you?

 

[ForestDweller]

How that? Do they force you?

They say it's better pacing-wise.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

They say it's better pacing-wise.

Readers say a lot when they are demanding. They primarily want more of evertyhing.

But aside from that, declining growth is completely normal. Like in economies, no growth is exponential. It is finite. At a certain point you will hit a ceiling and automatically stagnate with diminishing returns. It is inevitable.

It also has to do with market saturation.

 

[ForestDweller]

Readers say a lot when they are demanding. They primarily want more of evertyhing.

But aside from that, declining growth is completely normal. Like in economies, no growth is exponential. It is finite. At a certain point you will hit a ceiling and automatically stagnate with diminishing returns. It is inevitable.

It also has to do with market saturation.

There's a difference between stagnating and declining though.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

There's a difference between stagnating and declining though.

Granted, but you have to use weighted averages. I don't know your statistics, but daily trends are not useful. Weeks and months have value.

Also you have to consider that the competition on scribble is growing stronger. More and more stories fight over the readerbase.

 

[ForestDweller]

Granted, but you have to use weighted averages. I don't know your statistics, but daily trends are not useful. Weeks and months have value.

Also you have to consider that the competition on scribble is growing stronger. More and more stories fight over the readerbase.

I've charted a best fit line for the last 39 days of my views. Definitely a downwards slope.

 

[Jamminrabbit]

If it makes you feel any better, it probably won't, all 3/4 of my novels that have been running for longer than 6 months are on a downward trend in valid reads, favorites, comments, but I have a consistent reader gain.

Number of fucks given: 0.

It's like anyone following a mango that's been running for a long period of time, it eventually drops off their radar.

So to answer your original question-- write something else or get over it. Your next story, don't try to write the next One Piece or Boku no Hero Academia. No one cares that you're going to write the next Homer's Epic. Write a story with a foreseeable ending and hit that within 100 chapters or less, so at some point you peaked in readership and then leave it as a success rather than perceive it as an eventual failure.