IT HAPPENED TO ME…
So — Your Article Flopped.
Here’s what you can and can’t do about it.
So, you wrote an article. You poured your heart and soul into it, edited away, and picked the perfect image.
You decide to give it a final look, add some tags, and take a deep breath before you click the green publish button. It’s ready to be seen by the world!
First, if you have ever pressed that green button, give yourself a round-of-applause, a pat on the back, and take a deep breath. because that takes courage to do each and every time — it may get easier, but it’s still a demonstration of bravery no matter how many times you’ve done it.
That goes for sharing any type of creation or idea — it is one of the most difficult things you’ll ever do.
Yesterday I published an article that was my first real “flop”.
I’m doing a 30-day writing challenge outlined below. I knew I was bound to have some that didn’t go as well, even though the first week was off to a great start:
I’m going to lay out what happened with my least-read article yet so that you can compare it to your own “flops”:
Maybe together, we can figure out how to improve our writing and our stats. That’s the dream, right?
This “flop” article was about how to level up and deepen friendships right now. I thought I’d make a play on words since a lot of people are playing video games right now, and it just felt right!
You can view it here if you’d like, for the sake of the article you’re reading:
Here are the stats for this article as they stand about 20 hours after publishing, and after I “promoted” it the same way I have the rest of my articles (on a few Facebook groups and by spamming my friends with the friend link whether they wanted it or not):
The read ratio is bad compared to my other articles. So I thought — was it the headline? The image? The fact that I posted it at one in the morning?
Here are some factors to consider:
#1 : I changed the image a few times. First it was of this campfire image (left), then I changed it to a GameBoy (right) — I think while the first image did symbolize friendship, it wasn’t particularly eye-catching and didn’t fit as well with the leveling-up theme. The GameBoy helped with that, and I even got a comment on Facebook telling me that it had interested someone, but I’m not sure the actual article kept them there.
I bring up the image change because now, when you go to my profile and look at this article, it shows you this, without a picture:
The rest have pictures and look fantastic, unlike this one. No matter what I do to it, the picture won’t appear in the preview, and I’m wondering if it’s a bug, but I’m not going to re-post it because I want this experiment to be as genuine as possible.
#2: I published it at 1 A.M. when I wrote it. I’ve heard people say that publishing time does matter and also that it doesn’t. I haven’t posted any others at that random hour, so I don’t have any data to compare it to, but I’ll let you know if it happens again, or if a middle of the night story takes off!
#3: It’s not about writing, and it is on the heels of two very successful stories.
#4: I started with the most basic things you can do to deepen your friendships because I thought it would be cute to start at “beginner” and work up to “advanced”. What I’m thinking is that readers clicked it and thought, ask a question? Write a letter? Basic.
They then didn’t get to my gummy worm rant or book idea. I could be projecting, but based on read time, that’s what I’m thinking. I think I could have started with advanced, but I’m not sure I would have liked that as much to be honest.
#5: I’ve had better headlines. Full transparency, I really have! The idea was cute, but maybe it wasn’t as catchy as others. The article could have been better too — but that’s a rabbit hole all by itself.
Here’s what I can’t do about my “flop” of an article:
- Force others to read it or enjoy it
Here’s what I can do about my “flop” of an article:
- Revel in the overall frustration
- Wonder why this happened and share it with others in case they’re feeling the same way about a piece they wrote
- Reflect on it
- Laugh it off
- Very sarcastically wonder if people hate their friends and do not, in fact, want to level up at all
- Keep writing
- Move on
Should a “flop” keep you from writing?
I’m not going to lie to you, it might for a little bit. It hurts! It feels personal, but there is a 99.9% chance it probably isn’t.
I keep using “flop” in quotations throughout this article, because even if it’s not “successful” and people aren’t reading for hours, clapping, responding, sharing, and complimenting you on your genius, it’s OK!
It might have lower stats than your other stories, but I received incredible advice today while explaining the situation of my “flop” article. This person said “Good, so you got that out of the way. One was bound to be a flop. There it is! Now keep writing.”
I needed that. So I took a deep breath, and decided to just think about what had actually happened and why it might be so much lower than my other articles. Here we are.
I still have plenty of ideas — it’s just all about connecting with the right one at the right time to spark some magic. I think that’s true for creation of anything whether it’s an article, a book, a video… any idea needs a little fuel and the right timing.
Who knows, maybe someone will find my “flop” article and it was meant to help that one person, not the masses.
The same is true for you — so be upset if you need to (I did) — go back to your list of notes, and begin again tomorrow. Or right now — whenever feels authentic to you.
You’re a writer, and you’ve got this.
