How to Hit the Hot List - Standing out in the World of Wattpad

Step 7: Harnessing the Power of Votes

Step 7: Harnessing the Power of Votes

The fastest way to find out if any of your stories are on the Hot List is to go to your profile page. If your story is on the list it will have gray letters under the title, listing the genre and the ranking. Only the top 1000 stories are assigned a rank on "What's Hot," so if you don't see a number your story could be ranked anywhere between #1001 and #1000000. If you're lucky, your story may be on the list for both categories it's listed in! Some categories are larger than others, so it will be harder to climb high. For instance, I have a book that's a Fantasy Romance, and it's ranked #47 in Fantasy but #297 in Romance. I assume that competition is stiffer for spots in the 'Romance' category than it is in the 'Fantasy' category.

You may have wondered how the "What's Hot" list is calculated. After all, the stories that top the list may have millions of reads - or only hundreds. They might have thousands of votes and comments - or only a few. What gives?

The "What's Hot" list doesn't care what your overall stats are. It only matters how many reads, votes, comments, and updates you've made recently. That means that a book that has 15 votes this week can beat out a book that's gotten 500 votes over the last year. It doesn't take much to make a dent, either. Yesterday one of my readers voted for two parts of this book, and it launched up to #736 on the Humor Hot List. Just two votes!

Now let's talk about what you can do. First off, you're allowed to vote on your own stories. That's not cheating. Everyone is given one vote they can place on each part of every story they publish, so no one has an unfair advantage there. The trick is to maximize the effectiveness of your voting. 

Imagine you have a little pebble (in this analogy, that's your one vote) for each part of your story. If you toss one pebble into a pond every few days, how much of a splash will you make? That's right - almost none. Now let's imagine instead that you save up your pebbles until you have five or ten or even twenty, and you throw them in all at once. The splash will last a much shorter time than if you spread them out over days or weeks, but it will be a much bigger splash.

Now think about what would happen if you had your mom, dad, brothers, sisters, grandparents, and friends read your stories and vote for them on the same day that you voted for your own story. Even bigger splash! They don't have to create a separate Wattpad account to vote, they can log in using a Facebook or Twitter account so it's even easier.

PLEASE REMEMBER that having people that have not read your story vote on it just to get votes is against Wattpad guidelines and can get you and your account in serious trouble. There is, however, no rule against having Grandma read your story and then very sweetly asking for her vote. If you explain to friends and family how important it is to you that they remember to vote on your stories, I'm sure someone will be willing to help you.

Make sure that your story is ready for public scrutiny before you cast your votes into the pool! This is a one-time opportunity. If you and your family or friends propel your story to the Hot List and it has no cover, no blurb, and only a little poor-quality writing you still won't attract the kind of attention that gets people to read, add, vote, and comment. It'll sink back down to the  bottom, and you'll have to wait until you've published several more parts to try again. Why not wait until you're ready?

This morning I voted on all seven of the previously published parts in this book, and had one other person read it who I knew would vote for me. A total of fourteen votes this morning sent this book from below rank 1000 to #66 on the Non-Fiction list. That's a considerable leap.

Be aware that "What's Hot" doesn't update all that frequently. Once you place your votes you're going to have to wait, possibly a few hours, to see the results. This is good for you in reverse, though: once you hit the Hot List you have at least a few hours on it before your story begins to sink back down again.

While your story is high on the Hot List, increase your efforts to hustle it and spread the news to people on Wattpad. That way you can slow it on the way back down and possibly even help it go higher!

Who's ready for Step 8?