The Efficacy of Using Wattpad as a YA Writer
The Efficacy of Using Wattpad as a YA Writer
Elizabeth Harrington
Originally published in Bound Vol. 1
Traditional publishing is facing a strange, new world. As social media becomes more ubiquitous, traditional publishing must adapt to the way we share and produce content or risk becoming irrelevant. Wattpad, the world’s largest storytelling platform, is at the forefront of this change. Wattpad is an online community where users read and write stories for free. With 90% of users being either Gen Z or Millenial, it is not surprising that Young Adult fiction (YA) dominates the website, particularly in genres such as fanfiction, romance and fantasy.1 Boasting over 70 million monthly users and nearly 400 million story uploads, Wattpad’s intersection of social media and storytelling is clearly effective in captivating the YA target audience.2
Looking at Wattpad from a writer’s perspective, this report will also examine how the storytelling website is changing the way YA fiction is being consumed. With its emphasis on social media and community, Wattpad is blurring the boundaries between author and reader, so readers are closer to the author than ever before. This report will also examine the efficacy of using Wattpad to advance an aspiring YA writer’s career. Since the remarkable success of Wattpad author, Anna Todd, other Wattpad authors have achieved success with publishing, film and television deals. But with so many users and story uploads posted, achieving a similar amount of success to Todd is unlikely. However, Wattpad has other benefits for writers. Wattpad resonates with a huge, global audience made of young, technologically proficient people, so YA writers would benefit from analysing the ways Wattpad achieves this. Wattpad’s advantages and disadvantages will also be explored as they relate to YA writers, including being able to write without editorial constraints, building a dedicated global audience, and to create stories that are collaborative, easy to consume and versatile, with the end goal of being able to engage young people.
The Rise of Wattpad
The majority of Wattpad users are readers, with only 10% identifying as writers. The majority of these readers are teenagers. Despite having a reputation for being difficult to reach in book marketing, Wattpad is proving that not only are young people reading more, they are reading voraciously and differently.
The majority of Wattpad users are readers, with only 10% identifying as writers.3 The majority of these readers are teenagers. Despite having a reputation for being difficult to reach in book marketing, Wattpad is proving that not only are young people reading more, they are reading voraciously and differently.4 Alongside the rise of eBooks, Wattpad users are reading primarily on smartphones, tablets and laptops, representing a shift towards using technology to consume content.5 Wattpad utilises this technological shift by turning storytelling into a ‘social, on-the-go experience’, where users don’t just read and write, but also engage with an active online community.6 Users can comment and vote on chapters, follow each other’s profiles and chat on forums with other young, passionate and like-minded people. It is easy to understand why Wattpad is so appealing to younger audiences, as it is not just about reading an abundance of free, easy to access stories—it’s about the community and the sense of belonging offered at the touch of a button.
As most teenagers are frequent users of social media, it is necessary that YA writers tap into this and try to understand the online world they occupy. According to Ramdarshan Bold, it can be a sensible decision for YA writers to use Wattpad to build a loyal audience by engaging with their young target demographic.7 On Wattpad, it is impossible to be successful and popular without also being socially active by constantly engaging with the community. It is necessary to frequently read, comment and vote on people's stories, with the expectation that other people return the favour.8 This creates a reciprocal relationship, where according to Davies, ‘the more attention you get, the more attention you generate’9. Successful Wattpad writers need to maintain a constant engagement with their fan community, which has caused a significant shift in the author-reader dynamic.10 Readers can now communicate more readily with writers, not just to comment on their stories but to go so far as inquire about the author’s private life.11 Wattpad’s social media function makes it easier to build a loyal and intimate audience, and humanising the writer, as well giving writers greater insight into what the audience wants.12 If Wattpad writers are able to achieve this, then this can help further their writing career. This is because they can be an appealing offer to potential publishers for the added bonus of an established audience, which shows there is an existing demand for their work.13 Wattpad’s ability to build audiences has caught the attention of well-established authors. Margaret Atwood, Paulo Coelho and Scott Westerfeld are some of the many esteemed authors who have created a presence on Wattpad.14 Westerfeld published his 2005 book, Uglies, on Wattpad for free, in order to attract both old and new fans to his work.15 The YA demographic is technologically adept and have grown up using social media, so it’s critical that YA writers utilise this. Platforms like Wattpad offer YA writers a free way of attracting their target demographic to their work, build an audience, as well as gain greater insight at how to catering to their desires.16
To engage young people in reading, Miller states that stories should be ‘instantly engaging and easily digestible’17. Wattpad achieves this through serialisation. Writers upload chapters one at a time at regular intervals, from once a day to once a week, averaging at around 45 chapters per story.18 By posting short and easy-to-read chapters, readers are able to consume them more frequently and in a short amount of time, making it easier to squeeze reading into a young person’s life, such as in-between classes and to and from school. The success of this system is evident in the fact that the average reading session is around 37 minutes—an impressive feat considering young people face a flood of other media vying for their attention.19 Serialisation is not a new phenomenon; it was common practice in the 19th century for authors like Charles Dickens to publish their books in a piecemeal way.20 While this has largely fallen out of practice since then, Wattpad is proving that not only do modern, young readers respond to this format, but millions of users actively prefer it. Compared to the traditional method of publishing a completed book every few years, Wattpad offers less waiting time between publications. In addition, by posting chapters in short but frequent intervals, it can be less intimidating to tackle a huge novel and readers are able to remain steadily engaged with the content.21 This format is not easy for YA writers to replicate unless they are using Wattpad. However, it demonstrates that younger audiences are responsive to stories that are easy to read, have short chapters, and have less waiting time between publications—something which all YA writers can learn from.
Wattpad’s serialised format allows readers the chance to engage with the writer’s story, opening a creative dialogue where they can potentially influence how the story develops.22 Davies calls this ‘collaborative production’23. Users can comment on chapters and offer feedback, which the author can choose whether or not to accept. Depending on the author, the amount of comments can range from the tens to the thousands—a situation that can be intimidating, frustrating, but also helpful to writers. Matthew Bin, a fiction writer based in Ontario, calls Wattpad ‘a new writer’s circle’, except Wattpad’s numbers are significantly higher and made up mostly of readers.24 By commenting on unfinished works and potentially changing the outcome of the stories, the reader takes on the role of both beta reader and editor.25 One advantage of collaborative production is that writers are able to collect data on what is and isn’t working, giving writers instant validation if the feedback is positive.26Wattpad’s website describes the stories as ‘living’ and ‘breathing’, because the author must accept that they are fluid and not static.27 This shows a significant shift of control in the author-reader relationship where according to Davies, ‘fans are not only adding value, they are actively determining what the value is’.28 This process can be a potential drawback to writers, where the work takes centre place over authorship.29 For writers who choose not to engage in this way of sharing stories, they lose the chance of building an engaged community. While it is impossible to please every reader, if YA writers wish to be successful on Wattpad they must be open to this process of change and adaptation, even if it means relinquishing some control over their story.
If a Wattpad author frequently engages with Wattpad’s online community and amass a passionate and loyal audience, they often join the Wattpad Stars program, which gives popular writers revenue through advertising and display ads between chapters. This program then creates opportunities for authors to be represented by Wattpad Books, the platform’s own publishing division, or be represented by other established publishers, such as Simon & Schuster and HarperCollins, which use Wattpad as a discovery tool to sign book deals with authors.30 But among the 400 million stories published, only around 1000 have been published or adapted into print, film or TV.31 While aspiring YA writers may see Wattpad as a potential stepping-stone towards traditional publishing, monetary gain and publishing success are by no means guaranteed. Despite this, a large amount of writers are showing that they are willing to publish their work for free, which indicates that there is a greater desire to be read and recognised, rather than to be financially successful.32 Before using Wattpad, it is necessary for writers to critically assess and identify their motivations for publishing.
Rather than using Wattpad for monetary gain or publishing success, writers should recognise Wattpad’s strengths. Ramdarshan Bold states that Wattpad offers writers opportunities that ‘are not initially attractive to large publishing houses’33, meaning that they are free to express themselves authentically without being dictated by trends or conforming to traditional industry standards. This can be a freeing experience as it does not matter who they are or where you they from, they are free to write anything.34 With so many diverse readers from around the world, the writer is bound to find even the most niche audience. Wattpad writer’s are free to experiment with their writing style, voice and subject, as well as make mistakes and learn from them, based on reader feedback. They are free to explore darker, grittier themes, as well as themes which have been historically ignored in mainstream YA publishing, such as sexuality, race and gender identity.35 Wattpad writers are able to write what they cannot find in bookstores, which can resonate with readers who might not have found these pieces otherwise.36 By having no ‘editorial gatekeepers’, as Miller calls it, Wattpad is suddenly standing at the forefront of emerging trends in YA fiction, as seen by the prolific explosion of diverse and inclusive stories involving people of colour, nonbinary characters and LGBTQIA+ stories.37 During Pride Month 2018, more than 700 million minutes were spent reading stories tagged as #LGBTQ.38 Between 2017 and 2018, stories with the tag #MuslimLoveStory trended and witnessed a 51% increase in reading time, despite there being less uploads in this category compared to other trending tags, such as #PoC and #DiverseLit.39 This is important for aspiring YA writers who are considering the efficacy of Wattpad, because instead of struggling to predict what will be popular with readers based on what’s in a bookstore, they can see what is trending at a particular moment in a particular country, and write to meet this market, increasing their chances of finding a responsive audience.40
Wattpad writers are free to experiment with their writing style, voice and subject, as well as make mistakes and learn from them, based on reader feedback. They are free to explore darker, grittier themes, as well as themes which have been historically ignored in mainstream YA publishing, such as sexuality, race and gender identity.
There are significant drawbacks to using Wattpad to enhance a writer’s professional career. One of the most frequent critiques of Wattpad relates to the quality of writing and type of stories it publishes. With millions of uploads which have been written by a large proportion of teenagers, it has a reputation for low-quality writing that is full of cliches, poor grammar and spelling, and underdeveloped stories.41 In addition, Wattpad is most well-known for its fanfiction, which make up a large volume of the stories available. While the fanfiction stories themselves may have original plots, they are largely derivative of existing worlds and characters, which may turn away writer’s of original fiction from considering self-publishing on the platform.42 It is also worth noting that there are millions of stories available on Wattpad. With such a deluge of stories, regardless of whether they are poorly written or unoriginal, it can be difficult for even the most talented writers to stand out.43 All of this stigma can be off-putting for writers, as they may fear losing respect among peers or see Wattpad as an unsuitable platform to self-publish.
The Remarkable Case of Anna Todd
It is the dream of most writers to be professionally published, and Anna Todd presents the most notable example of a Wattpad success story. Anna Todd first started writing her One Direction-inspired fan fiction, After, on Wattpad in 2013. After has now been read 1.6 billion times, published as four novels by Simon & Schuster, translated into over 35 languages, on the New York Times bestseller list, and was recently adapted into a feature film released in early 2019.44 Todd’s success paved the way for hundreds more stories to be adapted to film or media, or be signed to publishers like HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster.45 Todd’s success is due, in part, to being a disciplined and prolific writer, posting a chapter almost every day for a year. She preferred to ‘write socially’, in which she would review the comments on each chapter and modify the plot based on them.46 If many readers commented on feeling happy reading a chapter, in the next chapter she would write a twist to make them sad, so she always kept them on their toes.47 After also included a variety of topics that, according to Bosker, ‘today’s book editors and hovering parents might consider too mature for young audiences’48, such as explicit sex scenes, as well as dealing with issues such as rape and alcoholism.
Despite her previous publishing deal with Simon & Schuster, Anna Todd decided to publish her most recent book, The Brightest Star, on Wattpad, one chapter at a time like she did with After.49 In Todd’s own words: ‘I just wanted that control back’50. By control, she means control over everything from the cover design to the editing process, where she used her closest fans as editors, fans who had been there since the beginning.51 When realising she could do her own marketing and editing, she asked, ‘what is the benefit of having a publisher?’52 Both Wattpad and Todd’s popularity signified a change in contemporary publishing, where there is ‘a demand for authorship without the intervention from publishers’.53 Both readers and writers are easily affected by the constraints of traditional publishing. Everything from territorial boundaries, to the editorial gatekeepers who filter what gets published, to delays in publishing time—all of these create a distance between the author and reader, as well as limit the amount of control the author has in the process.54 Todd is an example of a successful Wattpad author who defied traditional publishing by choosing to self-publish and share it for free to millions around the world. By choosing to publish her second novel on Wattpad again, Todd has taken advantage of Wattpad’s strengths to build a strong fanbase, have control in the publishing process, and be free to write any topic without fear of rejection by publishers.55
Conclusion
Wattpad’s dominance comes from its willingness to grow with technology, rather than resist it. If traditional publishers and YA writers wished to contend with Wattpad and reach a younger audience, they need to learn from this and adapt. Writers must acquire new skills and mindsets in this ever-changing world, taking advantage of the opportunities online platforms like Wattpad offer them.56 There are many features of Wattpad that writers of YA fiction can stand to learn from whether or not they choose to publish on the platform. These include writing in a serialised format, allowing readers more say in how a story develops, and making stories free, easy to access and available worldwide. Wattpad also has its drawbacks, due in part to its reputation for poor-quality writing, its overwhelming amount of stories available without editing, as well as its lack of revenue for most writers. But for YA writers in this current publishing climate, the benefits of Wattpad override most of its shortcomings. YA writers have the chance to build a relationship with their readers, the kind which until the advent of social media, was not common or perhaps even necessary to be successful. Today, it’s not enough for readers to passively consume a story anymore; they want a relationship with both the author and other readers, which Wattpad provides with its online community. Wattpad also allows YA writers to delve deeper into the minds of young people, gaining insight into their wants, needs, and the kinds of topics they are interested in, information which can be used to create relatable and authentic stories. Despite its weaknesses, writing on Wattpad can be a freeing experience, one where writers are able experiment with their voice and style, gain useful feedback for free and ultimately, create stories not to earn money, but to share with a global community.
Notes
1 Wattpad 2019, About Wattpad.
2 ibid.
3 Davies, R 2017, ‘Collaborative production and the transformation of publishing: the case of Wattpad’, in A Gandini & J Graham (eds.), Collaborative Production in the Creative Industries, University of Westminster Press, London, pp. 51–67.
4 Miller, M 2016, ‘What Wattpad brings to the publishing table’, The Winnower.
5 ibid.
6 Wattpad 2019, About Wattpad.
7 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, ‘The return of the social author: negotiating authority and influence on Wattpad’, Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 117–136.
8 Davis, R 2017, p. 58.
9 ibid.
10 ibid.
11 Silverberg, D 2015, ‘What Wattpad says about writers today ... and the writers of tomorrow’, Broken Pencil, vol. 69, no. 12, pp. 13–15.
12 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 118.
13 Gardner, A 2015, ‘Wattpad’s 40 million readers create opportunities for publishers’, International Publisher’s Association.
14 Davis, R 2017, p. 60.
15 Miller, M 2015, p. 7.
16 Springen, K 2013, ‘Teenage tweetland: YA authors and publishers reach out to young readers where they live: online and on their smartphones’, Publisher’s Weekly.
17 Miller, M 2015, p. 2.
18 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018.
19 Wattpad 2019, About Wattpad.
20 Miller, M 2015.
21 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018.
22 Davis, R 2017.
23 ibid.
24 Silverberg, D 2015.
25 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018.
26 ibid.
27 Wattpad 2019, About Wattpad.
28 Davis, R 2017, p. 61.
29 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 127.
30 Miller, M 2015, p. 7.
31 Wattpad 2019, Wattpad Writers.
32 Sliverberg, D 2015, p. 13.
33 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 131.
34 ibid.
35 ibid.
36 Davis, R 2017.
37 Miller, M 2015, p. 7.
38 Gardner, A 2018, ‘Data, diversity, and the future of publishing: canadian digital platform Wattpad is using machine learning to discover what readers want’, Publisher’s Weekly.
39 Gardner, A 2019, ‘Wattpad books, technology, and the future of publishing’, Book Industry Study Group.
40 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 132.
41 Bello, G 2012, ‘Wattpad revolutionises online storytelling: even Margaret Atwood is an enthusiastic user of self-publishing site’, Publisher’s Weekly.
42 Davis, R 2017, p. 55.
43 ibid.
44 Bosker, B 2018, ‘Crowdsourcing the novel’, The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 322, no. 5, pp. 18–21.
45 ibid.
46 ibid.
47 ibid.
48 ibid.
49 ibid.
50 ibid.
51 ibid.
52 ibid.
53 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 118.
54 ibid.
55 Davis, R 2017, p. 59.
56 Ramdarshan Bold, M 2018, p. 133.