5 Great Ways to Lose Your Audience

Without Really Trying

For the majority of us in the Fiction Community here on Substack (or anywhere that a group of people writing fiction gather), I am sure these are obvious. But there are those select few who are either blind, naive, or worse, too self-absorbed to get out of their own way. If you are sitting there thinking “Well, she sure as HELL ain’t talkin’ ‘bout me…” chances are, I am! Take this list with as much salty sarcasm as you can. Tell me to go to hell or even better, say less and Walk Away Renee. I just had a few things I wanted to get off my chest about you, so I’m getting it off my chest. That’s it. Be chill! 😈

ONE

Complain about lack of engagement when your last post/email is nearly a month old (or more) and your posts before them are all over the place. Consistency is vital and important to build trust between you and your audience. They look to see that the time they spend on your work is worth it. Meaning, why would they waste their time engaging with someone who can’t be bothered to be consistent with their content? And no, this does not include the person who states their fiction will be once a month or once every quarter. The key is being consistent in whatever expectation you set. And being inconsistent all the time is not an excuse to continue that trend. So, stop complaining, and get to work putting content out consistently. Also, you may not be aware of this fact, but your subscribers owe you nothing! Shocking, I know! But you are not entitled to Likes or Comments because you decided to put content out today. It’s a silly complaint to make and one that can easily see a decline in whatever audience you have.

TWO

Demanding money for a future promise with no results to back it up. Sure, we all have to start somewhere. We are all asking for paid subscribers and starting at zero. But asking for paid subscribers on the promise of a serial you haven’t written or monthly short stories and your backlog is zero, or worse, you have a backlog but it’s clear from the dates that you were not consistent on their releases, ever. In this business you have to prove your reliability. Money is not something to joke about. If you want it then what have you done to prove you’re a good investment? Have you only ever released one short story in the month since you started your newsletter? Have you sent monthly emails on different days and times or skipped a few in the last year? And yes, you can totally start off by putting your work behind a paywall. That’s not the issue. The issue, as mentioned already, comes back to consistency and showing that you actually are keeping your promise of delivering fiction. If you claim to be passionate about storytelling but you don’t have much fiction to show, how can you expect an audience to buy into that?

THREE

Belittle and demean any aspect of the thing you claim to be a champion for. Listen, I don’t like romance. It’s a genre I’m not rushing to read. But I’m not gonna get on a soap box about it. Then again, just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean I feel it should never be written, ever. You’re allowed to not like an aspect of fiction and choose, for yourself, not to read it or write it. Do you boo-boo. But short stories, micro-fiction, novels, novellas, poetry, are all valid forms of fiction. Just like being a “pantser” or “plotter” are terms that some people like to use. I’m not one of them, or if hard pressed I’ll say I’m a “plantser.” It’s okay if someone refuses to use an outline or if someone else can’t work without one. It’s okay if someone wants to share a story they know isn’t 100% polished to their audience. It’s not for you to question their fiction choices. 1st person, 2nd person, 3rd person limited or omniscient are all acceptable forms of storytelling. You know why? Cause they exist and there are examples of their use in all forms of fiction from way way back in the day, to today. There is no right or wrong route to take in fiction. You are not the police with some form of credentials (college degree or experience) that makes you the judge of what is right and good. Are there grammar rules? Sure. But if you’re not asked for it, don’t give it. Let the writer have their freedom to write what they want how they want. And if you don’t like it, you know what you can do? DON’T READ IT! Ha! Funny how easily you can do that, isn’t it?

FOUR

Talk about numbers like it’s going out of style. Whether it’s your lack of subscribers or your abundance of subscribers. Whether it’s about your lack of paid subs or the thousands you have, thereby proving the awesomeness that the rest of us clearly aren’t acknowledging to your liking. Don’t talk about it. Be about it! Have you ever heard the saying, “before you talk the talk you gotta walk the walk?” Well, in short, it means sometimes you can speak volumes just by what you’re doing. But if all you’re doing is talking about the numbers you have, the numbers you want, the numbers you deserve, and don’t have anything to back that up, your words fall on deaf ears. Maybe you think you’re “faking it till you make it” but that’s not how it looks from the receiving end. The receiver of your persistent “number pimping” (as I like to call it) is fatigued. And when you fatigue a person, the next inevitable step they take is to silence you, till you’re literally shouting into the void. Don’t be that person who is willingly walking into the void. Especially, when the solution to this pimp problem is so damn easy!

FIVE

Start a new “money making scheme” every week without following through (or being consistent) on one of them for, I don’t know, a year or more? Okay, okay, I know this might be hitting a little close to home cause I do have [insert shameless plugs of my other Substacks here] The Serial Hour Podcast, MicroZine, and Top in Fiction all started this year. But, and however, NONE of them are asking for money. ALL of them were created with the honest and true intentions of helping the fiction community. No shady, underhanded fine-print where you gotta pay-to-play. I’m not trying to take money out the hands of those who are trying to make it same as me. I say I’m out here on these streets trying to help my fellow fiction writer and doing it on my time, on my dime, expecting nothing in return. See, I’m not talking the talk, I’m just walking the walk. Does that mean I don’t like money, want money, need money? Of course I like it, want it and need it. That’s why my personal Substack and my personal fiction, that I’ve got a backlog of three years worth to fall back on as proof for all the world to see, is mostly behind a paywall. I don’t expect everyone to be a paid subscriber before I will give them the information I am promising. I’m not out here building four houses of straw that a gust of wind can knock down. I’m building foundations brick-by-brick with help and support from those who see my truth and my contributions. They add a brick, I add two. Simple. I’m not saying you gotta be a goody-two-shoes like me. But you don’t gotta be so obvious and desperate with your actions being all “money first” and substance, way way way way, (never?) later…

ONE SOLUTION

I’m all about solutions, so I’m gonna offer up ONE in case you’re interested:

Take ONE FULL YEAR (that’s 12 months) and give freely. Not because I told you to or because you’re trying to “prove me wrong” but because you genuinely like the fiction community and you like writing fiction. And when I say “give” I mean give us your fiction. Don’t paywall it or anything. Just write fiction and share it. Regularly. Don’t be a skimp! And if after that year you want to paywall it all, I don’t care. But take the year to just focus on that thing you claim to love so much, and participate with the rest of us in the fiction community by contributing your own fiction to it. You never know, you might find you like it more and want to do more within it than you realize. Plus, your imagination will thank you for it! I guarantee it!