Thursdays with Amanda / Ask the Agent: Using Wattpad as an Author

We’re doing an Ask the Agent series, and a few questions came in about Wattpad, the website that allows writers to upload and share their work with readers. Authors can upload entire books at once or they can upload chapters or scenes. Many use Wattpad to get feedback from readers as they write, and some have developed pretty substantial followings.

Here are the questions that our reader asked:

Does sharing your work through Wattpad count as self-publishing? Does it affect how traditional publishers see you?

Can Wattpad be a powerful marketing tool or a risky way to show unpolished work?

If you use it, would it be better to share just the first part of your book (so that you don’t give away the ending) or the whole thing?

I remember a few years ago, my friend was seeing some really great success on a HarperCollins-owned website called InkPop. The site was similar to Wattpad in that you’d upload your chapters as you wrote them and get feedback. The only difference was that InkPop promised that if you got high enough in the ranks, a literary agent would review your work. They even had an example of a young writer who had received a really nice HarperCollins book contract—all because of this website.

My friend climbed really high really fast. Within a month, she was near the top and received the coveted agent review. But in all truth, her book was hastily written. She had uploaded the first bit on a whim, not thinking it would go over. And then it did. And then she felt pressured to hit the agent review deadline. So even though I was giving her feedback as she went, she didn’t have time to polish and perfect. She put forth a manuscript that wasn’t her best.

Now, I think if any writer is on the cusp of getting a free review with an agent, he/she would pursue it with all they have. But of course the holes in my friend’s story were too much to overcome and the agent declined to rep the project.

I feel this is a great example of both the good and the bad of manuscript sharing sites such as Wattpad.

Too often, authors will throw up a chapter or two, “just to see what happens.” The only problem is that they really don’t have a game plan for what happens if people love it. Or if people hate it.

Authors need to treat Wattpad (and similar sites) more like a calculated business move than a way to get feedback on their project.

So to answer the reader’s questions:

Does sharing your work through Wattpad count as self-publishing? Does it affect how traditional publishers see you?

Yes and no. It counts as “published content” just like blog posts count as published content. It is out there for the world to see. If a publisher were to contract a book on Wattpad, they would probably request that the author take the content down. And there are so many sites like Wattpad, that publishers aren’t really phased when an author has content there—unless the content is bad. If they’re considering an author and they stumble across poorly written fiction that was published to Wattpad, they’re going wonder if the author is ready for a publishing deal.

Can Wattpad be a powerful marketing tool or a risky way to show unpolished work?

Both. If you’re just slapping up content willy nilly, the website becomes an extreme risk. But if you have carefully crafted your novel and if you’re intentional about uploading one chapter every Monday morning at 8am AND if you are serious about leading your followers to your Facebook page or your email list, then it’s a brilliant way to gain readers and a platform.

If you use it, would it be better to share just the first part of your book (so that you don’t give away the ending) or the whole thing?

I assume you have more than one book in you, right? So share it all, recognizing that publishers may not contract you for this book, but if you get enough followers they may contract you for your next one. And of course if your book sees enough success, they’re going to want it.

What other questions do you all have about these kinds of websites?