I've been thinking about doing something like this since my days in another webnovel website, but I never found enough novels in the same general genres as mine or anything I would like to endorse that much. However, I've found a bunch here on Tapas after just my first week, so I think this could be a good idea.
The reason why promo for promo and sub for sub is generally useless in the long run is because, in the first case, you'll usually be recommended to an audience that's not interested in your work, and, in the second, people are subbing just to get a sub back and they will rarely read or interact with your work beyond that. So, what I'm proposing is a bit more organized and would hopefully put your work in front of people that want to read it. Here's how it would work.
- Post a link to your work.
- Actively look in the thread for other works that fit with yours in terms of genre or that you think your audience might like. (Don't just sit around and wait for someone to come to you or this will go nowhere!)
- Once you find one, you reach out to the author and propose a promo.
- If the other author agrees to also give you a shout out, you set everything up (dates, whether the shout outs will be on a chapter or on your wall, etc).
- Do the promo!
Note: No hard feelings or drama if someone refuses to promo you. Maybe they didn't vibe with your story or maybe it contains themes they're not comfortable with. No one has to explain their tastes or trauma to you. Do be courteous and polite when asking, refusing and accepting or dealing with refusals!
I have a discord for dark and horror fantasy authors that we can use to organize ourselves, if you guys wanna join and we can do a little "spreading darkness all year round, not only on Halloween" promo tour for each other. The thread is open to any genre, however! It can serve as a hub to find both people and groups doing promos and promo tours, as I encourage you guys to gather around to organize your promo tours in other genres as well!
Tell me what you guys think and any ideas / modifications to this that you think might help us to get actual involved readers!
Leaving my novel link here as a start; it's a gothic dark / horror fantasy and I'd love to feature anything in this style.
Edit: Forgot to add warnings for my story, I'm sorry! There's some gore and violence, including slight abuse perpetuated by non-human entities that aren't aware of what they're doing. Also deals heavily with mental illness and there might be some fade-to-black sex scenes later on (het, mlm and wlw, since the characters are bisexual).