Ghost Readers and Reviews

I had an interesting discussion with a friend about ghost readers and reviews. We talked about what makes readers not review stories and what can be done to change that, if there’s anything that can be done about it. Written below are some of the points we made.

When authors ignore reviews and/or not reply to them. When authors do that readers feel like their reviews won’t matter. That the author won’t care what they have to say either way. It’s even worst when authors pick and choose what reviews to respond to. If there is some acknowledgement from the author for every review then it would encourage readers to review and interact more. 

When authors ignore constructive criticism/advice or take it badly. Some readers stop reading the story because of that or others stop reviewing in fear of saying something that would anger them. It’s important for authors to be mature about such reviews. To handle it with a level head and not jump to conclusion that every reviewer who points something wrong is a troll.

When authors beg for reviews or withhold chapters for them. It makes the readers purposely not review because they do not like being force to do something. It’s also insulting for those who do review because it makes it seem like their reviews were only to fill the authors quota. Also authors who do that, make themselves look bad. It’s important for them to think of the reasons they are writing in the first place.

Some readers unintentionally become ghost readers. Most writing sites require them to sign up in order to leave reviews on stories. So some readers might not know that until they already read the story. Yes, they can sign up but not every reader wants to join just so that they can leave a review. Another reason is because the author disable the anonymous option. Or they can’t review because they need to be a member to even view and read the story. A solution to this, is to make sure anonymous reviews are allowed. Or it might help if authors post their stories in more then one place. That way if a reader can’t review or read on that site then they’ll be able to do so on the other.

Pet Peeves. Readers sometimes don’t continue reading or review a story when it raises a flag within them. Some hate it when stories break the rules (having author’s notes as chapters, a huge bio on the first chapter, author’s note interrupting the middle of the story, etc.). So instead of letting their annoyance show in their review, they decide to not review. They rather not say anything to avoid conflict with the author because they don’t know how they would handle it. So it would help if authors make sure they’re following the site’s rules and keeping in mind what’s unnecessary to have in their story.

Not every reader knows what to write for their reviews. Sure they can always put “great story, update soon” but that’s so generic and boring. An author might say that’s better then nothing and that’s true, but a reader wants to contribute something different. So what might help is if the author gives them a few questions to answer in each chapter. It would give them something to think about, something to write in their reviews about. Authors don’t be afraid to ask your readers what’s their favorite line in the story is? What’s their favorite scene? Their least favorite scene? What is their prediction (or who ends up together, what will happen next, etc)? Did they catch the reference in that chapter? Did they figure out the song the character was humming? Just ask them two or three questions in each chapter. It would help encourage them to review more.

Some readers don’t have enough time to leave a review. But sometimes that feels like a petty excuse. If they are capable of reading a story that contains a few drabbles (100 words) and still have time to read other stories, then why not leave a review? If they’re short on time and have nothing to say then why can’t they leave a review that says that? Tell the author that you enjoyed their story but you don’t have much time to leave a proper review. Or tell them that you plan to review again but hope that you don’t forget.

The read count isn’t accurate. Just because an author has 200 viewers doesn’t mean that 200 people read their story. Most of the time it’s the same person who might be reading the story over again. Or they accidentally click on the wrong chapter. Or someone stopped reading because they realize it contains mature content or for whatever reason they stopped. So ghost readers aren’t always ghost readers.

Readers don’t review because they’re lazy or too shy. This one is pretty self-explanatory.