Any mileage in a good story?

[horney]

Hi, Folks,

I read somewhere, probably in Cozy Academy, that it is a good idea to take a free story and wrap it round a sponsor's banner.

How about if you're any good at writing stories? Is there any money to be made from them? If so, is it better to write short ones of, say, 600-1,000 words, write longer ones and publish them separately, or write longer ones and serialise them?

Or is it all a waste of time and I should be concentrating on other things?

Slightly off topic, I'm new to this business so have posted in the noobs section, but is the question likely to have had a broader appeal? Or no appeal at all?

[Cozy Monica]

I don't think there is a lot of money in stories on their own, but to add value to a website, they are good. As you mentioned, they can be wrapped around sponsor's ads, which can be good.

IF you are writing erotic stories as an addition to a main website, I would suggest keeping them short, not serialized and long. You don't want the effort of writing the stories to take away from the time you need to spend on the main site itself.

[horney]

Thanks for the feedback, Cozy Monica, much appreciated.

Following on from there, is that fact that writing stories myself makes them fresh likely to add any appeal to site visitors? Or would I be just as well off recycling those that are out there already, freely downloadable?

[Jamdin]

Match your stories with your sponsor just like you would match a picture gallery. Original stories does better than recycled stories and keep them short. Serialized stories are only good if you promoting your own story pay site.

[horney]

Thanks, Jamdin. Very useful comment.

Also, since I last posted here, I did a bit of surfing and found some sites which will print your short stories - doubling the reason to keep 'em short - and link the story back to your site, so I may have found a traffic source, too.

[Cozy Monica]

I agree that it's way better to have your own story content. People who really enjoy erotic stories will probably have read all those free ones.

Also, stories (even ones you've paid for) are often very poorly written. I had a surfer write to me to tell me that in one of my stories, the main character's name changed partway through the story! I was horrified!

[horney]

in one of my stories, the main character's name changed partway through the story! I was horrified!

I wonder how mine will go down with an American audience? I can't help spelling in English English and using very English words and phrases! Should be good for another laugh.

[phuckbunny]

I've been weaning myself off of old spelling habits for years and still slip in the occasional non Yank thing, it's really not a big deal if you write with the REAL spelling once in a while, lol.

But back to the question, I'm not sure what you mean by making money off of it. Writing skills are very important, if you're keen on writing use it to your advantage on blogs to get traffic and money to your site and to your sponsors. If you're talking about just writing 'literotica', I think there is a huge market for that as well, I just don't know muh about it. Are you familiar with Kristen Archive , Naked Loft Party and Sugasm and what not? There are a LOT of classy written smut sites that get a tonne of traffic and probably do well with selling ad space.

Thing with literotica, is that much of it is geared for women; you know the whole thing about men being more visually oriented and women more about the imagination and words... I'm an exception in that much of that stuff pretty much bores me, and I prefer to actually look at naked people. On the other hand, I've also read that women are buying almost as much online porn these days as men. It's hard to do ad/demo research for this stuff, but for now if I were you, I'd follow Monica's advice and you will see how much added value well written copy will add to your sites.

[razor]

Dont bovver wif stories, riting is not imprtint.

The serfers wnt to look at pictchures of nekkid slots

[phuckbunny]

Stop speaking Xhosa and/or Tsotsi Taal, Raz.

[horney]

I'm not sure what you mean by making money off of it.

In its broadest sense. Whether original articles will add value to the site for visitors. Whether short stories could be bundled as a downloadable sale. Whether a full length story or novel would sell from a porn site.

I really don't fancy the time commitment involved in running a more purely literotica thing although I may be tempted to pay someone else to do it at some point in the future.

From the feedback here, the short story thing is certainly worth a try. I'll write some for the site to give it an extra edge and get them out around the various publishing sites to try and draw traffic. Once I've tried that, I'll see what else I can do with them. Ideas on a postcard, or by continuing this thread, please.

I keep looking around lots of different porn sites, trying to assess what it is their owners are doing which persuades people to sign up with their sponsors or directly with themselves. In other words, to part with money. I see a lot of duplication. OK, the models are mostly different, but who's looking at their faces?

I asked people to look at my own first attempt. The lack of response tells me just how awful it is, so it will all be changed quite drastically. I'd still love some feedback on its specific elements, though.

so im not 2 sre rzrs ides iz any gud coz the kidz takin lke dat wil grw up sun n wont summat els 2.

I suppose the nub of all that is, I'm looking for ways to get visitors to like my site(s) enough to want to stay, to return and to accept my recommendation to sign up with my sponsors. Just like everybody else here as well as the owners of those repetitive sites.

So thanks for the encouragement so far. Keep it coming, please.

[phuckbunny]

I'm going to wriet you a response to your other post now.