Guided Search - What do you think?

[Myr]

So, as some strong feedback in our survey, finding stories was an issue.  I was able to create a quick Guided Search tool to help people find stories faster until we're on the new software, which has a better search function.

Try it out. 

https://gayauthors.org/guidedsearch/

What do you think?

[Jason Rimbaud]

Honestly, I tried different genres, and search parameters and the same handful of authors popped up each time no matter what options I chose. 

That being said, I know the new software is on the horizon (end of year anthology plug) so I'm sure other people might find it helpful. I also don't think I have a bunch of data saying what stories I like as I always forget to use that feature so its probably my lack of hitting the button.  

[Myr]

29 minutes ago, Jason Rimbaud said:

Honestly, I tried different genres, and search parameters and the same handful of authors popped up each time no matter what options I chose.

That’s unlikely using the tool. Please provide exact choices so I can reproduce.

[Jason Rimbaud]

Here is the steps I used.  

And remember, I said same authors, not same stories. And don't make me feel bad cause I'm bad at tech things. 

Include both
Comedy, Romance, General Fiction
Doesn't matter
Surprise Me

I didn't try other genres, just those three. 

 

[Myr]

31 minutes ago, Jason Rimbaud said:

Here is the steps I used.  

And remember, I said same authors, not same stories. And don't make me feel bad cause I'm bad at tech things. 

Include both
Comedy, Romance, General Fiction
Doesn't matter
Surprise Me

I didn't try other genres, just those three. 

 

Ah, ok. That makes sense. You only sorted on genres and those three have a lot of crossover. You will get more variety if you do something besides just sort on those genres. 

[Jason Rimbaud]

3 minutes ago, Myr said:

Ah, ok. That makes sense. You only sorted on genres and those three have a lot of crossover. You will get more variety if you do something besides just sort on those genres. 

Something I did makes sense, I believe that might be a first.  And I'm still batting a thousand at being unhelpful. 

[Kileoli]

It's cool how the widget appears on top without being imposing. I mean I can easily navigate to where I want but if I scroll a bit I can use the guided search.

It works pretty well but is it me or I can choose one genre i want and add several genres which I don't want? Can't I choose several genres?

Another thought for someone who is new and doesn't know the GA structure, if I choose recent stories, it gives me the recent stories but of course not from the beginning of a series/ books. So I might end up starting with a second book from a series. 

Is it too much to give a warning or additional choice?

Sorry Myr, my brain works in a way to make things fool-proof and avoid accidents. 😅

[Myr]

3 hours ago, Kileoli said:

Another thought for someone who is new and doesn't know the GA structure, if I choose recent stories, it gives me the recent stories but of course not from the beginning of a series/ books. So I might end up starting with a second book from a series. 

It is literally giving you the lastest stories. The archive has no concept of Series in that situation.  As book one of a series is clearly not the latest. That said, if the description of that story is interesting, just click on the Series link and go to the series instead of loading the latest story of the series.

To whomever said they can't figure out how to navigate stories in a series in the survey... That's a Link. Click it.

[Myr]

5 hours ago, Kileoli said:

Can't I choose several genres?

oh, forgot to answer this one.  It's because the tool is using "AND" as a logical operator.  By adding something different like "Fantasy" and "Western" you'll end up with little to no stories.  As this tool is intended to assist those who weren't successful in using the filters by filtering the system for them, I removed a variable that was most likely to lead to no results, and then comments like "This thing doesn't work because it never gives me stories."

[Davide]

I played around with this tool and it seems very useful, especially for new readers. It was a bit overwhelming to figure out what to read when I first got here.

[Kileoli]

1 hour ago, Myr said:

It's because the tool is using "AND" as a logical operator. 

I like the or logic but you have a good point. Limiting things and giving fewer options lead to better results 

[E K Stokes]

The concept is excellent, this version gives a good idea of how it works to find stories. One major problem is Popular stories. Why? Because if I'm right a story published 10 years ago has a much higher chance of being popular simply because it's been around a long time. To my way of thinking popular is by number of page views in say the last month or three, not page views for the last 10 years. You might want to get trending stories, page views increasing.

[Myr]

1 hour ago, E K Stokes said:

One major problem is Popular stories. Why? Because if I'm right a story published 10 years ago has a much higher chance of being popular simply because it's been around a long time. To my way of thinking popular is by number of page views in say the last month or three, not page views for the last 10 years. You might want to get trending stories, page views increasing.

Nope.  It's sorting by review score.  None of the top 5 are more than a few years old.  

[ReaderPaul]

Something else useful is the way the GA home page is now set up.  Giving the categories such as Fantasy, Western, Poetry, Comedy, Historical, and so on, are very helpful.