Hey everyone! I didn't know how to go about this, so I thought I should just mention it in here...another member and I were discussing the low amount of voting participants in the short story and poetry contests. There's a lot of great pieces of work in these contests and as a someone who has entered before, I know I put a great amount of heart and soul into my work, so I'd like just a small recognition from the audience back; even if they don't like my writing, just to vote in general. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix this or should we all just make an effort on reading and voting more often? Thanks for listening!
Normally the members running the contests post up reminders in the Lounge. For some reason, that didn't happen this time, probably due to a tight schedule. The latest contest had a lot of votes, but spread over an unusually large number of entries.
Oh, okay, I didn't know that! But it still seems odd to me that out of all of the members on the forum that only under 30 people seemed to have voted for this competition. I know it's a bit tedious trying to read all of those entries, but the latest contest only has 4 or 5 stories, and the poetry contests usually don't have that many, and if they do, they are short reads. I'm just trying to find more ways to promote interest in the competitions and voting, in spite of the fact that you don't win anything, because that's not what I'm after at all! I'm after the joy of writing, which I think all of us on here are But thanks for clarifying what the running members do!
Last year in Sept 2007, Daniel pm'ed all the members a message for the short story contest with a link to the page. That's how I was reminded. I didn't actually visit the Lounge for a while, and I'm sure I'm not the only one, so maybe that accounts for the low number of voters. I did vote though.
Compare that to the number of members who review on a regular basis (as opposed to only when they want to post something for review), and it won't seem surprising at all. However, that was not for a weekly contest, but for the featured site contest that takes place no more than two to four times per year. Trying that for our two weekly contests, even though they actually begin less frequently than weekly, would quickly become annoying. Double it up (once for submissions and once for voting), and it would not be long before people would be clamoring for it to stop.
That is true Cogito...oh, well, I was just trying to think of some other way to bring in more voters. Thanks for helping/listening guys!
What if in order to enter, you had to have voted in the last contest? I mean, we announce the voting and new contest in the same thread, so why couldn't we do that?
I'd suggest more advertising. If people talked about it more in the forum, more people might vote. I didn't even know there was a contest.
That could work, but that may also just limit the people who enter the contests, ya know? Any suggestion could be made to work though! And yep, Paranormal, there are weekly short story and poetry contests, as well as contests with prizes. There is one going on now for short stories, but I think the deadline is soon. You can check them out in the contest and competitions thread. You'd think that having this type of thread would be enough advertising...guess not.
I've only been here a month, but I try to read and vote in the contests. I probably should start posting in them, just to show I have read the entries and do appreciate the effort of the posters who have entered. I do think, though, that the voting numbers and feedback are pretty good.... at least compared to some other writing forums I've been a part of. Also, I'm impressed the contests begin and end so seamlessly; I know on other forums, many of the times things seemed unorganized and forgotten half of the time, making ME lose interest. That's definitely not the case here. I think the contests run rather well, even if they could use a bit more voting and feedback. I'll definitely try to do my part and keep voting/posting feedback.
I used to advertise to all new joiners in the form of a welcome post in the introductions forum. I'd say that they were welcome to enter the contest and the voting for both the short story contest as well as the poetry. I stopped this purely to do with personal time constraints. Cog - how about including something similar in the newbie package and standard post that you give to new members?
I like the idea of including something about the contests and voting int he newbie package, Gannon, I think that actually may advertise it better and aid with voting!
I did mention the contests, though didn't have any particular focus on the voting portion. The packet should probably be in the new members section.
That's a good idea, mentioning the contests in welcomes. I know I've only recently even figured out how to vote, and I'll bet a lot of other newbies are slow to find the voting threads too.
Thanks Gannon and Cogito for making this work a bit more effectively! I really enjoy the contests, being a voter as well as a contestant, and just want to see them expand. Thanks to everyone for making suggestions!
I provide hyperlinks to the two weekly contest forums. The top level forum is clearly visible on the home page, so I didn't bother with that.
Of course another way to increase voting is to leave the vote open longer. We've certainly seen more in the 50th poetry contest with it being open longer than usual.
