1000 reads

I’ve reached 1000 reads! Thank you, everyone!

What has 1000 reads on Vocal taught me? To be honest, it’s taught me a lot. I’ve learned to be a better writer because of Vocal. It’s given me more confidence. It takes a lot of hard work to become a great writer. It’s about networking and making friends. Also, I’ve learned that Vocal is a popularity contest.

Because of Vocal and the feedback from the other writers, I have improved my writing. Posting stories up to three times daily gives me the practice to improve my writing. Some of the stories and poems I’ve written have been decent lately.

The constructive criticism I have received from other Vocal members has also been a great help in improving my writing. Which, in turn, has made me a more confident writer. Knowing that no one will make fun of your writing, but instead find something they like about your story, and if you make any mistakes, they always let you know in such a kind way. This type of criticism helps so much in boosting confidence.

Writing, not just on Vocal, is a lot of hard work. Work that doesn’t stop once the story is published or posted. That’s when networking starts, sharing your story or poem with others and promoting your work. Promoting your writing is hard for many because you must decide who your audience needs to be. You have your family and friends, who, sadly, most won’t even read your posts, but you still have to share with them. Then you have your social media, and I have found I get the most reads from the site formerly known as Twitter (because who knows what Elon will change on the site next). But you still have to share on all the social sites because you might get more reads from them. The social media sites I share my links are Twitter, Facebook, and Threads. Other writers use different sites than I do. Twitter has supplied me with over twenty reads daily, once it went as high as fifty reads. I never share the same link to Twitter that I share with other sites, and vice versa. Sharing different posts has helped me keep up with views from various sites. So I have learned to keep up with what I posted, where it was published, and what gets the most reaction from each site. I’ve made many new friends because of Vocal and this networking.

In my two years on Vocal, I've learned that it’s all about popularity on this site. If your story gets many views, hearts, and/or comments, it’s sure to make a top story or even win the challenges. How can I say this? Because most of the stories that win, the writers have a lot of subscribers, and where do these subscribers come from? From Vocal, of course. You must have a Vocal account to subscribe; high subscribers generally correlate to the most reads. The more people read and heart your stories, it always helps bring about the top story and challenge winners. Of course, sometimes the Vocal Creators do surprise you, and a person you haven’t heard of wins, but this is very seldom.

So as you can see, this journey to 1000 reads has been challenging. It has taken a lot of practice and hard work. Making friends was a bonus I didn’t expect. One day, I hope to be able to write well enough to be a challenge winner, but until then, I’ll just be me and continue making friends.

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Friends I have made:

Jazzy Goncalves

Doc Sherwood

Jay Kantor

Ashley Lima

Dharrsheena Raja Segarran

Rene Peters

Real Poetic

HandsomelouiiThePoet (Lonzo ward)

Mike Singleton - Mikeydred

Rick Henry Christopher

Ariel Joseph

Grz Colm

Kendall Dafoe

Plus, many more.