AnonGrimm Posted October 31, 2012 Report Posted October 31, 2012 Can we invent a better way to communicate with readers/reviewers? We aren't allowed to respond in the reviews, which makes sense, bandwidth and all, but the forum story threads I started are only posted in by me, while readers leave reviews and assume I'm not responding to their kind reviews. I have author notes and notes on my bio, but no way to talk to readers where they will see it. What can we do? More readers might review stories of they could talk to the authors. They simply don't seem to go to the forum. Help? I have readers trying to ask my update plans, and I have no way to tell them. Thanks for all you do, I know it's a lot of work! Quote
DemonGoddess Posted October 31, 2012 Report Posted October 31, 2012 Have you linked to your topic in your chapter telling them where the responses are? Authors who do that, get responses in their topics. Especially as we don't require your readers to register to respond to you. They only have to register if they want to use the entirety of the forum. Quote
AnonGrimm Posted November 1, 2012 Author Report Posted November 1, 2012 Yes I always have a link. They review, but they don't go to the forum. We need a better way to respond to them. Many people don't go onto forums anymore. Is there any possibility of a non-forum resource? Maybe to do with the author's bio? Quote
ApolloImperium Posted November 1, 2012 Report Posted November 1, 2012 The other thing to keep in mind is that just because they don't respond in the forum doesn't mean that they don't read your responses. I'm showing one of your topics got over 1700 views and the other almost 1500. Quote
AnonGrimm Posted November 1, 2012 Author Report Posted November 1, 2012 Views perhaps, but views aren't a conversation. My feedback often contains questions I can't respond to, because social media stats show that most people don't use forums anymore; every forum I used to be on daily has dried up and disappeared. It made me sad, to be honest, I always enjoyed them. Here, I'm pretty much the only person posting on my story threads, and it has made me less likely to post there, too. For a long time, I got no reviews and when an opportunity came that ate a lot of my writing time, I figured I could take a break because no one seemed to be reading anyway. Then I started to get email notifications of new reviews and it made me want to update, so I did. But I keep hearing readers say they are worried I won't update, and I'm worried they won't see the author notes or bio notes that I am working on the stories again. I suppose if a forum is enough for the majority, I'll have to make do. It just seems to me there could be another more immediate way to respond to reader questions and to thank them for reviewing. But I know you all work very hard on this site and I do appreciate all that you do to keep it running so well. I guess I'll just add more author notes and hope the readers who avoid the forum but who are asking questions see my answers. Thanks again, both of you, for responding and for your help. Happy Halloween! 😊 Quote
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