Thread: Fiction: general audience or select demographic? What's your opinion?

Hey everyone I'm looking for some opinions. Would you write for general audiences or would you promote your work to a select demographic? What I mean by select demographic is writing to appeal to a certain religious, political or philosophical ideology of which you're a part of that goes beyond genres. Do you think it'd be more successful to specialize in a niche and perhaps be a big fish in a small pond or would you try to appeal to more general readers?

I'd be interested in what you all think.

Most of the big publishers only accept literary or commercial fiction. They want to sell as many books as possible, so having a limited readership is a disadvantage.

I believe the biggest challenge is actually writing a decent book. In my opinion it's best to worry about that, and let the audience demographic take care of itself.

Originally Posted by Man From Mars
Hey everyone I'm looking for some opinions. Would you write for general audiences or would you promote your work to a select demographic? What I mean by select demographic is writing to appeal to a certain religious, political or philosophical ideology of which you're a part of that goes beyond genres. Do you think it'd be more successful to specialize in a niche and perhaps be a big fish in a small pond or would you try to appeal to more general readers?I'd be interested in what you all think.

It isn't April Fool's Day already, is it? I must admit, you nearly got me in. You had me believing you were serious for a minute.

(to keep the part which wasn't idiotic by me)

Decent work will find its demographic.
A pile of garbage will find a bigger pile of garbage to be dumped into.

Worrying about demographic this or that is putting the cart a mile ahead of the horse. There are best seller generalised audience books, and best seller niche audience books. Then there's the 99% of complete garbage.
They're the facts.

Are you really writing to make a lot of money? It's possible to do so, but most writers starve. My advice is write the best material you can and let the market determine how much money you make. Don't expect much. If you become fabulously wealthy, let it come as a pleasant surprise. That is much better than expecting to be successful only to fail. I also think how much money you make by writing has less to do with how you write and more to do with how you promote yourself. You interchange the terms "writing for a general audience" and "promote yourself to a select demographic." They are not the same thing. Writing is an art. Promoting yourself is a business activity. As far as how to promote yourself, I think it depends on your book to some extent. Recalling biographies of people who have succeeded in various arts, most start out small in a niche market and build a fan base slowly, over time. The real break out happens when they cross over into other market niches. There are two kinds of people who buy books. The larger group only buys best sellers. The smaller group is what puts a book onto the best seller list to begin with. People in the smaller group read book reviews and are willing to take a chance with an unknown writer when they see a book at the bookstore or library. Assuming you don't already have name recognition, you should probably start out by getting people in the smaller group to read your book. It takes time, maybe as many as a dozen books or so, before you achieve critical mass and get on the best seller list but you build a fan base little by little until you have enough of a following to break out. Good luck. C.M.

Originally Posted by The Backward OX

It isn't April Fool's Day already, is it? I must admit, you nearly got me in. You had me believing you were serious for a minute.

But I am serious. I meant it as a legitimate question. Did I say something wrong?

Originally Posted by C.M. Aaron

My advice is write the best material you can and let the market determine how much money you make. Don't expect much.

That's pretty much what I intend to do, but considering there are certain stories that appeal to markets beyond the general like LBGT, minority, religious and political, the question is if one could see more success by writing good quality stories for those groups instead of general audiences. My reasoning is that in such a small market notoriety could spread quickly if you're good, in contrast to a large market for general audiences with more competition. I'm not asking what I should do; instead I'm asking what would you do and why. Your thoughts on what you would do might give me a better perspective.

Originally Posted by Man From Mars

But I am serious. I meant it as a legitimate question. Did I say something wrong?

In effect you said that you were such a good writer that A) You were bound to be a best selling author and, B) it is just a question of whether to be really famous or really really famous...

JK Rowling was rejected by about 10 people before an agent took her a chance on her; she was then rejected by a similar number of publishers; so yes, it was a silly question.

You should write to your strengths, everything else follows - Or to put it another way:

Don't put the cart before the horse
Don't count your chickens before they are hatched
Don't cross your bridges before you come to them...

Wait a second, my question was asking for other people's opinions. I never said, or meant to imply, anything about my writing ability or any success or what defined that success. My specific words were:

"Would you write for general audiences or would you promote your work to a select demographic."

"Do you think it'd [it would] be more successful to specialize in a niche and perhaps be a big fish in a small pond or would you try to appeal to more general readers?"

Just to be clear. I do NOT intend (or hope) to be on any kind of best seller's list nor to make millions off my work.

My experience with people generally, not just online, has been that if one says “What would you do?” the listener assumes that the asker may be intending to use the advice given as a guide for their own future behaviour.

Originally Posted by The Backward OX

My experience with people generally, not just online, has been that if one says “What would you do?” the listener assumes that the asker may be intending to use the advice given as a guide for their own future behaviour.

And you don't have to give it, but the better question is if asking for it warranted your response? To be clear, I'm not looking for someone to tell me what I should do. That wasn't the point of the post. Instead of making another thread begging for guidance and getting the same answers, I wanted to have people express their own personal thoughts, opinions and experiences so that I (and others) can get a better understanding of the choice that I (or we) might eventually make. If that means I'm using such information as a guide for my own future behavior then I'm guilty as charged, but what's the problem with asking?

What you just said is exactly the same as what I said, only expressed differently.

I wanted to have people express their own personal thoughts, opinions and experiences so that I (and others) can get a better understanding of the choice that I (or we) might eventually make.

And that's a problem because...?

My following sentence was "If that means I'm using such information as a guide for my own future behavior then I'm guilty as charged, but what's the problem with asking?". Not only did I admit that was my intent, but you didn't answer the question.

To go back to your original post, I would prefer to write for a general audience. If your book is in any way niche then it may find an audience among general readers as well as those with an interest in that niche market. To put it another way, people who read general fiction are more likely to pick up a book with leanings towards a particular niche than they are to go looking in a niche book shop, or in the niche section of a book chain.

I'm intrigued as to why people have dismissed this topic. Knowing the audience that you are writing for can influence the narrative or content of the book. I'm currently writing a fiction book about the development of Egyptology in the early 19th century. This could easily be a niche book aimed at those who already have an interest in the subject, but I want it to appeal to general readers as well and hopefully whet people's interest in a subject that they may not know a great deal about. To do this I have kept the historical and geographical details to what is relevant to the story and have instead put more focus on the journey that the characters are on. I have also attempted to draw people in by making reference, early in the book, to the best known features of Egyptology; like the pyramids and Cleopatra, etc.

It's also important to have an idea of your audience for a particular book when approaching an agent or publisher. They will expect you to have done some research into the market and where your book will sit in book shops. This is advice from the annually published 'Writer's Handbook' by an agent with 20 years of experience.

It's not presumptuous or arrogant to imagine that you might be successful as a writer. I can't understand why anyone would embark on a writing career if they think that they are only going to be a mediocre writer at best. There's no point saying 'I won't think about anything beyond writing the book because it probably won't be good enough anyway'. You've got to believe that you will be the best writer that you can be. As the saying goes, you've got to aim high to shoot low.