What do you consider a success for a story?

I think it can be pretty unhealthy to have a single metric for success. It's probably better to think of your successes, plural.

• Did you complete a whole story, or at least a significant number of pages or chapters?
• Did you level up your skills by learning from tricky problems or mistakes when plotting/writing/drawing?
• Did you sell a printed version to customers at an event?
• Did you earn enough in ink donations/ad revenue to withdraw and treat yourself?
• Did you hit milestones you set for yourself?
• Did you get a response from a reader who just totally "got" what you were going for?
• Did you make friends? (hey, you may laugh but making small press comics is how I got together with my fiance! I've been to the wedding of somebody I met through small press comics and a lot of my close friends both online and irl come from making comics).
• Did you place in a competition or get a feature?
• Did somebody pay you to draw a comic and you delivered to the brief and on-time?

All of these are successes. Just completing a page or chapter can be a success. Like yes, getting paid enough from your comics alone to pay rent is a very big success (though earning enough to live comfortably rather than just scrape by is a big step above that, which a lot of people don't realise). It's best to set realistic goals you can achieve. You can't guarantee you'll hit a hundred subs, but you can guarantee that if you keep working hard you can complete a hundred pages, and then it's entirely within your power to print them and book a table at a con to sell those books.

active readers and commenters
having people who are truly interested in your characters, doesnt matter how many

I call a success for my story is that i keep writing it lol
I don't know if having people read it is matter to success you can have all the people in the world reading it but if you don't want to write it anymore and you drop it like some manga i love reading called The Breaker that vanished long ago they said they get back in 3 years but never did... so yes i wouldn't call that success for even if a lot of people read it because they stop writing it

I can't call a success for a story if the write drops it even if its popular so i guess my what i call a success story is one that keeps writing until the end. or keep going even if no one reads it

I guess, to me, success is like. Living the dream. Being able to write and it support you, or at least support you enough that you only have to work a "real job" part time to make up the difference to live comfortably. So, monetary based. I say that because if you look artistically, it's just way too subjective. I couldn't really cast judgment on that. I would say "if the creator is satisfied", but that's not necessarily true. I'm never satisfied with my own stuff, and I prefer it that way. Being satisfied just means getting cocky to me.

I don't care about my number of subscribers, but my number of readers, comments, interaction, and actual engagements with my stories matter. Knowing that someone actually read my book and felt something is the most fantastic feeling in the world. I think I have a good growing base right now, but I wish I had more comments and engagements. I think people are reading my stories, but it's so rare that I actually know what they think. Likes are cool but they have nothing on comments lol.

So in short, I think what makes a story successful is the level of engagement it gets. Subscribing is hollow without the other stuff.

I think all these achievements are different examples of success.
A plot-related success, when the story is good, is an artistic success, maybe a personal success too. It doesn't mean it will be a commercial success though.
A large number of followers plus monetary revenue is commercial success.

To me, the most successful authors are those who achieve both of it.
Now if you ask... how many likes/followers/fans, how much income would make a successful author?
Then it's something more complicated...
To me, all those people trending here or at Webtoons or at any other platform with thousands of daily views and certainly a good revenue are successful authors.
But you can't compare their successes with Stephen King's or Eiichiro Oda's, for instance.

I think that depends on the person.

For me, I had pretty low expectations for myself because 1) I'm old. 2) the genre I'm doing has been done to death 3) I'm not kidding myself about making it big.

For me it's a success that I even completed my book and that I'm posting it here after dreaming about it for so long. I'm just happy that people read it and leave me some lovely comments.

In terms of stats I started posting the last week of May and I have now have 1500 views, 200 odd likes, and 23 subscribers. I'm very happy that someone reads my stuff at all

So whereever you're at, pat yourself on the back Congratulations!

My childhood dream was to create a comic strip. I started one when I was about 12. I had a nice idea for one and actually created a few strips, but never continued it. This is something I have always regretted. I'm 48 years old now and recently developed a new comic strip. I started posting here a few weeks ago and have it on other platforms too. There are 9 comics up now and just accomplishing that, I feel is a success story for me. I plan to continue posting a new one every Sunday. I will be thrilled if I can go a year, but would be a dream if I can keep it going for years to come.

If someone really likes the comic, it's an added bonus. If I can get a chuckle out of someone, I will feel even better about that. Please check it out. Hope you like it!

Finishing it.

Oh damn, gotta write at least 20 characters, here we go.

oh easy, while I agree with a lot of the things that people mention, like finishing it and all but I feel like it's when you promote your work and people do enjoy what you wrote. Hell, even a brief conversation about what I wrote, not even fangirling just a simple 'hey have you read this? no okay,' and I probably would feel like a millionaire.

Success is stumbling on fanart for your story that was never sent to you, on some random website.

Well finishing the script is a type of success for me. Then having more than10 subscribers cuz then I know it's not just family with accounts. After that trying to complete the series (whole script drawn and published). If anything else happens great!

If anyone is interested in my series:

Tapas:

Webtoons:

Pop Comic:

Novel (Tapas):

Novel (Royal Road):

Novel (Inkitt):
https://www.inkitt.com/stories/fantasy/747460

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Success for a story is finishing the story no matter how daunting and most importantly your story reaching the people you wanted it to reach and those people not only getting enjoyment out of it but also getting the message behind it. Success is never about how FAMOUS your story is. That's usually just a consequence of right time and place, oh and don't forget the media!

I don’t think I disagree with a single answer here of what success is because success happens at so many different points throughout the process. I don’t think there is a single point of “success”.

The only take I disagree with is that monetary gain and popularity aren’t success or the main points of success! They are proof of success— they’re just not the only markers of success nor should they be!

Comics require too much work and trial and error for someone to believe the ONLY mark of success is the end result of money and fame.

I feel like that while I'm always trying to reach more subscribers and readers, I feel most successful when a person reads my story and says, "This made me feel something." Even if it was just one person. Then I know my story had a point and a purpose, and did what I wanted it to do.

And then I go back to fishing for readers.

I'll consider a story a true success once it finds people that actually enjoy and connect with it, when someone comes along that understands enough of its subtleties to truly appreciate it. Which, conveniently, will likely also bring me MONEY.

I suppose for me as a writer, the first and most important success is being able to finish the story for myself and personally enjoy what I've written to matter how many times I've re-read it. Second to that would be seeing other people enjoy the world that I've created. I think it would be cool to have a little bit of a fanbase, even if it's a small one, but even if there's just one person that loves what I've created, that's enough to make me happy.

We can also add the self-success and accomplishing what you wanted exactly. There's nothing more satisfying that getting those ideas off your chest and out of your mind for people to see what you have.

Are you telling the story that you wanted? Happy with everything you've done thus far?

In the end, success can be told in different way. You will always get readers here and there but the person to satisfy is oneself. If you don't believe in your own success on how the story is going, the readers wouldn't.

Active fanbase to be honest, since you can buy your place to be best seller (there are ways ) and you can just do sub for sub on online platforms sub amount doesn't mean anything. I think your audience is the most important thing if you are publishing your work in any way