# Promulgating the Tale



## Chanticleer (Aug 8, 2008)

Iâ€™m new to FAâ€™s literary scene and I wanted to ask for some tips for getting noticed. It seems to be quite easy to have your work lost in a sea of other submissions.

So, (if itâ€™s not too impertinent to ask) what are some ways to make a name for yourself?


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## M. LeRenard (Aug 9, 2008)

Honestly, I'd say to get something published by a legitimate agency and advertise the fact that you did that all over the place.  Or just be really amazingly good; eventually someone will find you and word will spread.
But to be realistic about it, don't expect a whole lot of attention no matter how awesome you might be.  Writers just don't get as much as artists, plain and simple.  Ours is a medium that requires effort to explore, and that turns most people off, I think.
Example: Poetigress (one of FA's resident awesome writers, who has gotten numerous things published as well) has around 4000 page-views, whereas Blotch (one of FA's resident popular artists) has nearly 203,000.  Or, to put it in temporal perspective, Blotch has gotten 100,000 views per year (very approximately), whereas PT has gotten 4000 per year.  That's just how things go.


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## Chanticleer (Aug 9, 2008)

Hmm... So perhaps a good method would be to team up with someone and do a comic?


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## makmakmob (Aug 9, 2008)

Write yiff stories. Really, really weird ones.


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## Xipoid (Aug 9, 2008)

Tie your name to a popular artist, write good sex stories, write _a lot_, up-sell yourself, be lucky, or some combination of the five. Mostly the 'be lucky' part.


As Monsieur Renard said, writers receive no attention when compared to artists. The medium we use requires effort and some degree of intellect to appreciate which, truth be told, will greatly reduce your audience. (Not saying you have to be smart to read, but in general smarter people read more and thus count for more of the group.)


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## Chanticleer (Aug 9, 2008)

"Tie your name to a popular artist"? 
How would I go about doing that?


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## Xipoid (Aug 9, 2008)

Chanticleer said:


> "Tie your name to a popular artist"?
> How would I go about doing that?




Possibly be good friends with them, collaborate on something like a comic, anything that would display your name when someone views their page or work.


Of course with that said, that may just increase your page views not how many people actually read your stories.


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## Micah Coon (Aug 9, 2008)

Heh...welcome to the eternal struggle, my friend.
"Being noticed" is probably not a good idea for a goal here. Do it because you enjoy it, not to be noticed.

The one thing that I can promise you is this - even if it's small in number, if you write well, you WILL get a fan base going.


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## Chanticleer (Aug 9, 2008)

Maybe I should try to get the big three to give me the thumbs up...


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## Poetigress (Aug 11, 2008)

M. Le Renard said:


> Example: Poetigress (one of FA's resident awesome writers,



*blushes*  One among many.



> who has gotten numerous things published as well) has around 4000 page-views, whereas Blotch (one of FA's resident popular artists) has nearly 203,000.  Or, to put it in temporal perspective, Blotch has gotten 100,000 views per year (very approximately), whereas PT has gotten 4000 per year.  That's just how things go.



Gaining any kind of following in the fandom takes a lot more time and patience for writers than it does for artists, and certainly, it is always going to be a lot smaller of a following than any visual artist could get.  But I think in its way, it's actually more rewarding.  For one thing, I think we often get more insightful comments on our work than artists generally do.  It takes more effort to appreciate a good piece of fiction or poetry, but I believe those media can affect people perhaps even more profoundly than any visual art ever could.  It's one thing to see a character in a setting -- it's another to walk in their skin and experience their life.

Doing something like a comic with a visual artist might get you more traffic, but I agree with Xipoid that it may not necessarily get you more readers.  If that's a project you want to do for its own sake, that's great, but comics are a different storytelling medium than regular fiction, and those readers might or might not cross over to your other work.

Keeping in mind that many of the avid fiction readers on FA tend to also be writers, I'd say your best bet is to get to know your colleagues (and their work).  I'm getting the Thursday Prompt going again this week... I can't remember if you're part of that (I've been on vacation for four days, and the brain is slowly coming back up to speed), but participating in that seems to be a decent way to snag some attention, especially if your work is good.  It's a fun creative exercise more than anything, of course, but as a hefty side benefit, it does put you in contact with a good number of other writers on the site.

And yeah, writing adult stuff will get you noticed faster, but don't write it just to get noticed.  As was said above, don't write _anything_ just to get noticed -- besides what that does to your spirit after a while, it usually also shows in the work.


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## ScottyDM (Aug 16, 2008)

Micah Coon said:


> Heh...welcome to the eternal struggle, my friend.
> "Being noticed" is probably not a good idea for a goal here. Do it because you enjoy it, not to be noticed.


Micah, your comment is made of pure awesome!

Doing it for the wrong reasons is stoopid. Like those knuckleheads on YouTube who post videos of themselves doing something extremely lame or just plain illegal because they want to be famous. Mark David Chapman is famous, but as a consequence of his fame he's spent the last 27 years of his life in prison. Hell of a way to get a page on Wiki.

Write because you want to.
Write because you have something to say.
Write because you have to.
Write because you love to.
But never, never write for fame or money.

Scotty


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## Chanticleer (Aug 16, 2008)

*sigh* 
With all due respect, I've had that sort of comment thrown at me nigh constantly since I started writing, so I might as well throw out a clarification.

I write... because it's one of the few things in the world that I enjoy that I also have some actual talent at. You couldn't pry the activity from my cold dead hands.

However...
As I'm going to be writing anyway, I might as well do everything in my power to become the most renowned author that ever existed. And that, my friends, is exactly what I intend to do.

If my words offend you, disregard them.


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## kitreshawn (Aug 16, 2008)

There are some other things you can do is create an account on YiffStar which does attract people who want to read (though it caters to yiff almost exclusively).  Write a really good sex story than post it there and on your FA page.  Then in the comments for the YiffStar page leave a link back to the FA.

While the audience goes to YiffStar looking for yiff the fact that they are reading porn rather than looking at pictures of it means they are the type of people who may tend to enjoy reading.  If they like something you've written they may well take a look at your FA page to see what else you have.

This is actually something I did when I first created my FA page to generate some traffic (hense all my earlier stories being sexually oriented).  Once I finish my current project, whenever that happens, I plan to do it again.


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## ScottyDM (Aug 17, 2008)

Write romance. It's the largest selling genre in the English speaking world. Larger even than mainstream.

Sci-fi and fantasy typically sell in the lowest numbers per book and fairly low numbers of titles.


For Internet fame you've got to hit a much bigger site than furry sites. IMO YouTube is it. Nalts is a fairly popular fellow on YouTube and he's also a marketing director at a Fortune 100 firm (according to his blog). He has a free PDF booklet titled How to Become Popular on YouTube. Maybe Google that title and see if you can find it.

You're a storyteller. So tell your stories into a microphone and put up a picture or even a slide show to go with it.

Scotty


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## Chanticleer (Aug 17, 2008)

ScottyDM said:


> Write romance. It's the largest selling genre in the English speaking world. Larger even than mainstream.
> 
> Sci-fi and fantasy typically sell in the lowest numbers per book and fairly low numbers of titles.
> 
> ...



Actually, I _do_ write romance.
http://www.furaffinity.net/view/1430580/

Also, I was mostly asking about rising to the top on this site in particular. General fame I have different plans for.


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## Tanzenlicht (Aug 17, 2008)

Go forth and review.  Writers tend to be readers, so if you read the work of others and comment on it they might very well return the favor.

This just isn't the best site for writers.

Most of what is on FA is crap.  I assume that this is as true of its writers as of its artists.  Sifting through visual crap can be done fairly accurately by thumbnail.  Sometimes you get a nasty surprise but a few seconds, a quick click of the back button and it's over.

Stories must be opened, downloaded and read for at least a few paragraphs before you know what you've got.  Sometimes it's gold, mostly it's not.


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## hara-surya (Aug 30, 2008)

ScottyDM said:


> But never, never write for fame or money.
> 
> Scotty



Unless that's what you do for a living.


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## M. LeRenard (Aug 30, 2008)

> Unless that's what you do for a living.


True... but it's not particularly wise to try to make a living off of writing, so I've heard.
By the way, hi Ciaran.  This writing community kicks the pants off of the one on VCL.  You should stick around.


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