Thanks and Introduction

So, right up front, I want to thank everyone for taking the time to do the survey.  I would especially like to thank the kind words that many people left in the comments.  They meant more than you know.

In the rest of this blog, I'll go over some of the feedback and offer advice as well as covering the open bugs.

Bugs

So, yes, there are still a few active bugs:

• Chapter comment notifications are not being sent.  We missed this one in the original bug hunt mostly because Story comment notifications are being sent.  This will hopefully be addressed this week in a bug patch as we get ready to upgrade the forums to 4.2.2.
• Some combinations of Advanced search options are not working consistently.  Specifically, combining Status and Genre seems to cough a hairball about half the time.  There are other combinations that don't quite work as expected every time as well.
• Top Reviewed Stories link is listing all the completed stories that have reviews but is not ranking them properly.  (Highest Star Average with most votes.  This means a story ranked 4.7 stars with forty votes is ranked higher than a story ranked 5 stars with one vote).  This feature will probably take a couple of patches to correct.

Those are the bugs that we are aware of that are open.  If you are aware of a bug that is not listed here, please open a topic on it in the Help forum.

Survey Results

I'm going to give general results of the survey now with fuller results most likely at a future date.  There is a lot of data, and I've read it all, but it is going to take some time to compile it.  I'm also using it as a basis of some articles and blog posts in the future.

• What is the most important feature that brings you back to Gay Authors?  90% said Stories. 8% said Community.  1% said Blog. 1% said Other.
• On the question of registered membership, 81% of the people responding to the survey were registered members.
• On the questions on Social Media, 85% (or more) do not follow us on Social Media.
• On the question of the newsletter, 40% of those surveyed subscribe.
• On the Premium Content question, the answers were all over the place.  25% were subscribers.  50% felt they could not afford it and 5% didn't know about Premium.  The remainder felt that Premium Content, despite keeping the site open, provided them no value.

Feedback from Comments

This is the one that will take the most time to formulate data from the survey since it was completely open-ended.  There was a lot of feedback in this section, and I've read it all and will work on addressing a few things.

To state a few obvious things right up front.  No, we are not going back to the old site.  No, we are not deleting everything except stories.  No, we are not going to make all authors the same.  

Homepage

This is a tough one.  Every homepage is a compromise between three competing purposes.  One, the homepage must provide enough details so that search engines know the purpose of your site.  If you don't provide the details, then the site is not listed on the search engine results page where it will do you any good. (top three results, typically).  Two, the homepage must provide an explanation of your site to new people that are arriving from search engines.  You have about 1.5 seconds to catch their attention, or they hit the back button and tracking software counts this as a Bounce.  We're about half the average bounce rate, which is really good for us.  Three, the homepage must provide the gateway to returning guests and members so they can jump off to wherever they are going.  A LOT of members never even bother going to the front page after getting used to the site.

Given these partially overlapping and partially competing purposes, we have to strike a balance.  The homepage we have now is striking that balance and hitting our needs as far as tracking is concerned.

I have added a small section called "Quick Links" to give members a direct link to three different story options. 

1. Newest Stories  - The latest stories updated on the site.
2. Completed Stories - The latest stories updated on the site, listing only completed stories.
3. Most Reviewed Completed Stories - Completed stories with reviews.

You can also click on the "Story Updates" link which is listed on every page by default and show the Latest Stories Activity Stream

Enough people asked for story listings, or reviewed stories, or a list of completed stories that I provided those links directly.  If you want to make it easier for yourself, select the listing you like best and then bookmark it.  Then go straight to that page and don't bother with the homepage at all.  If you struggle with using your computer, here is a nice video on how to use bookmarks.

These links should help address the biggest items that were mentioned most often in comments.  We focused on making the front page as fast as possible, and that is why we don't list stories there.  There are several other places better suited to that listing, as the links above all show.

Reviews

As I mentioned in the announcement that is showing everywhere, we have not emphasized reviews much with all the other changes.  As of the updated version of Stories, only completed stories can have reviews.  A review consists of a star rating of 1 to 5 stars and commentary.  Please see the announcement for more details, including a YouTube video on how to leave a review.

I'd like to ask everyone to take the time and go back and review the completed stories that you've read.  This helps both the authors, who want your feedback, and the readers who are looking for new stories to read.  Be sure to be constructive in your feedback and your review is likely to be found to be helpful and marked as such by others.  The system shows the most helpful reviews on top by default. 

As more reviews fill the system, a list of curated stories will automatically be created.  We have a LOT of really great stories on the site that tend to get buried because they aren't being actively posted.  Check out the completed story list and dive in!  Or check out the reviewed story list and weigh in yourself. 

Thanks again!  We'll continue to work hard to improve Gay Authors!