So, you wanna post some clever, witty story to this group, in the hopes of "getting the word out to the masses" of your "glorious storius". I feel ya, I've been there. It's a subtle art, promoting a story, making your pitch quickly, and getting views.

I'm here to help answer some "newbie questions" you might have, as well as point out some general bad ideas.

There are a few "rules" that, if remembered, will make your story very well-noticed.

1. Post on the forum, not in the comments.

This is all about SHAMELESS self-promotion. You want your post in as many people's faces as it can possibly be. That means you want people's feeds to be flooded with your glorious story! Comments do not give as wide a spectrum.

2. Your thread title is everything!

Which one would you be more likely to read?
A. "Hey! Come read my story?"
B. "Doing what the group says"
C. "What happens when you get an unreliable, lemony narrator, Bee-god, a certain purple dinosaur unicorn, and a daisy?"

The answer should be pretty obvious. You want to give your potential readers just a taste of your story.

3. Cut to the chase

No one is going to sit and read you talk about your story's origin, how you decided on the story, how you wrote it, how it got rejected twice, problems with your pre-reader, yada yada yada. We want a brief link to the story, and a link. If we like what we see, we will come read your blog, and you can tell us all about it.

4. Mirror your story

If you write your post cleverly with a lot of puns, we will assume that is what the story is like. If you write about it as an intense, psychological ride, we will expect an intense, psychological ride. People don't generally react to bait-and-switch tactics well.
Think of your post like a trailer. It should let your audience know what kind of a story it is. Write it as such. Is it a comedy? Write a funny post. Is it an epic? Give us reasons why it's different. We want a reflection of the story.

5. Luna.

Lots of it.

6. Know when to stop

When we see a post, we will frequently decide tl;dr or just short enough. Make sure your post doesn't look like a wall of text. We want a brief, concise description.

7. Respond to comments.

The longer you can keep people on your post, the more likely they are to read your story. So keep them there! Respond to comments, let people know you read them, and have a good time with it.

This also accomplishes an ulterior purpose. When people comment, it bumps your post, bringing more people. Comments are great, so encourage them!

8. Do not talk about this post.

9. Do NOT talk about this post.

10. Be shameless.

Reference Dr. Who. Use the fan-favorite. Use an emoticon in your title. Post multiple times. Be loud, be proud. This is what you joined the group for. Take full advantage. Take what you can, give nothing back.

Hope this was helpful to you! May you have good luck in your future promotions!

2700455

Dr. Who

Doctor Who.
JK. Do what you like.

Great post. Gonna try it out.

I WILL BE LOUD!

2700455
Just how shameless is shameless enough?

2700480 There is no "shameless enough".

Take this section, for example.

The answer should be pretty obvious. You want to give your potential readers just a taste of your story. (By the way, the answer to that question can be found here.

I, pretending to be helpfully providing an example, snuck a pitch for my story AND a link right under your nose.

Be shameless!

2700498
Awesome. I love doing that very same thing. Though it is useful to mention then that not everyone appreciates it.

2700527 I am merely providing a "meta-example."

#5 is so true, its the reason why most of the shit is garbage.

2704560 Glad to be of service!

2700455 >lemony narrator
yes

Just thought we would sneek in here and say hi. Hi.
Anyway, nice post. Might just go see how well your ideas work. :)
Off to promote shamelesly. ~Dollars.

Just wrote my first fim fic. It's a love story, with a bunch of OC s belonging to the amazingly talented Kilala Lyla's mine, though. If you take the time to read it It'd make my day leave a comment you'll make my week

3215671 You just broke the very first rule!

3216451 oh Well, it got you to notice me

3216701 That it did.

Go look at all my stories and I'll give you money.

There, that might sucker in a few people.

Question.

How do you get someone to even comment on one's thread?

I have this curse...

I can make a post and it is ignored. Yet another post of the same rough topic gets posted after me and folks post. How do you get someone to even comment at least once in a forum thread?

((I am slowly seeing that ebb away with my stories. Almost to three pages, a first for anything I have written to be honest))

But forum posting still eludes me.

3702978 Easy. You make a post like this, then wait fo someone sarcastic like me or ThatWeatherStormChap to provide a ridiculous answer.

3703103

ah cool. Now to have that happen in the threads I made for my story. Thank you for the comments and the kind words. If nothing else it brought a smile to my face today.

Why not do what I did and just do weird stories and clop?

Saver yourself a shit load of trouble

Rule five is best rule.

2700455 Sooo, we can just post our stories as a forum on here?

4662209
Well, it might be a bit weird if you wanted to post your entire story into a thread.

But yes, you promote your stories by posting a link to them into the forums here. Look through a handful of the threads here and you should get a pretty good idea on how it's commonly done. (Just don't link directly to any Mature rated stories.)

4664962 Kk, thanks

2700455 Did I do something wrong? I followed the advice you gave and yet....

2700455
Dammit! I forgot about Rule 5 in my new story!

Why did I have to read this AFTER promoting my new group?! (Group promotions do still count, right?)

4963094

Group preto ions do still count, right?

Yes, group promotions are allowed here, so long as you are promoting a group on Fimfiction or an off-site group that is related to MLP. If you need any further clarification, the group's rules would be a good place to look (Rule 1 in particular for this kind of thing).

Hmmmm... I think I will wait a little bit for my stories to make se-AH SCREW IT

5730512
Probably a good idea. It's a little sad that the original poster, MeeesterBob, hasn't been online in half a year.

I've thought about rewriting this before, but it doesn't really seem like anything needs to be added to it, really. Maybe the New Groups group for new group promotions should be mentioned, but otherwise it's still pretty good.

--Sweetie Belle

5731949
Hi, I'm back. New name.

If you want me to revise it I can.

6626229
Hi! Nice to see you!

You know, this is still kinda a classic post, which is why I've kept it pinned. It's still pretty relevant, and it isn't so much that I'd want to change things as add a few things.

One thing I might have mentioned that's happened since the original post is embeds. I mean, which looks better in a promotion this link, or this?

ESweetie Belle's Short Stories

• MLP: FiM
• Anthology

A small collection of drabbles, flash fics, and short stories.

• Celestia
• Other
• Main 6
• CMCs
• Flash Sentry

SweetAI Belle · 4.7k words  ·  33  3 · 765 views

It's a good way of embedding mature stories, too, because while links to them aren't allowed, if you embed them, they don't show up if mature is off, making it fine to use! It works for groups, too.

And I'd probably have said if you are promoting, don't just promote here. If you're promoting a group, and it's in the first week, promote over at the new groups group:

New Groups

Bad Dragon

303Stories559Members2014October

And promote in your blog, drop it in all the relevant groups, promote in other groups that allow promotion, and so on...

Those are the main things I can think of off the top of my head! I also recommend grabbing people's attention with cute pictures, but that's mostly my style.

And, of course, I'd probably have put all the numbered lines in bold, but that's 'cause I can be a little ocd...

--Sweetie Belle

Can I promote only pony-related stories, or can I for example promote my account on Fanfiction.net?

6739444 Going off of the message on the front page of the group you can only promote pony related content in this group as seen here:

This is a place where we will love and tolerate any self promoters, whoever they might be. In this group, you can promote anything pony-related without fear of reprisal.

Now if you are promoting a pony related story that happens to be on your Fanfiction.net account, I don't think there will be a problem, however I would just go ahead and warn that most people from FiMFiction would prefer to read the story if it was posted here.

I hope this helps.

6739444
6739486
The rule thread is really what I'd go by here.

Specifically, Rule 1 is:

All new threads have to be promoting something, and it has to be pony-related, or at least site related. It doesn't actually have to be something of yours.

There are a few things here. The first thing is that it has to be first and foremost a promotion. This isn't really where you should be asking for an editor, for help, or just talking 'bout things. You can promote a blog post about something, and be asking for help there, of course. But we're about "Look at me!", not "Help me!", or "Lets talk!".

Second, it has to be site or pony related. You can promote your mlp stories, mlp art, yourself, your blog posts, things like that. You can't promote your Skyrim playthrough videos, your reviews of anime, or your new kitten. (Unless your new kitten is drawn mlp-style, of course.)

Also, we might call this the shameless self-promotion bureau, but you can promote stuff by others, too.

--Sweetie Belle

6739486
6739488

Thanks for the reply.

6626259
HOW DO YOU DO THAT??!?!?!

2700455

Post multiple times.

I can do that? Can I really promote the same story more than once?

7237778
In this group, at least, you have to have at least 7 days before promoting something again, and if you're promoting it a lot, we might ask you to wait a longer time between promotions.

--Sweetie Belle

7237781
I promoted my story on May 23rd. So I can re-promote it today itself. Thanks for the info.

7237792
No problem!

I personally think that promoting things too often makes people more likely to ignore the promotions, anyways, since they get used to seeing them over and over.

If you haven't promoted something in a while, then promote it, people are looking at it with fresh eyes...

--Sweetie Belle

7237804
Alright. I'll wait a little longer.

Alright, which bafoon disliked this post?

Hey, HEY. You, yes you. Dis book I shove in yo face? It good. Now read!... please?

Oh dear! Something slipped!

2700455

Use an emoticon in your title.

Didn't work. Is there a trick to this? Are you channeling Groucho and giving bad advice?