Gem Choice Guide – Episode

How to Use This Guide

Read through this doc from beginning to end; we’ll try to keep it concise!
Download this handy Gem Choice Checklist and use it as a reference as you write.
If you’re stuck and looking for inspiration, or you’re struggling to understand why one of your Gem Choices isn’t working, the Gem Choice Slide Deck might provide some useful pointers.

Writing great Gem Choices takes practice. We hope that this document will help you build your Gem Choice instincts so that you can make your story the best it can be!

Introduction

At its core, a Gem Choice allows readers to shape their story through interesting, diverse, character-defining choice moments. The strongest Gem Choices will:

Establish a sense of necessity (what is the need to pay for this choice?), urgency (what is the need to pay for it now?), and emotional resonance (why should readers care?)
Clearly advertise the outcome of each choice option (what will happen if I choose the gem option, and what will happen if I choose the free option?).
Deliver real value to readers— a reader should never reflect on a Gem Choice and think to themselves, “why did I pay for that?” A Gem Choice that delivers real value builds readers’ trust in the creator’s commitment to delivering high-quality, high-payoff Gem Choice moments. It should keep readers excited and coming back for more!

Gem Choices as a Way to Build Reader Trust
Builds Trust	Diminishes Trust
Gem Choice delivers satisfying emotional payoff.	Gem Choice promises one thing, but delivers another.
Free options are neutral or slightly negative.	Free options are excessively negative and/or punishing.
Gem Choice pricing is proportional to perceived payoff.	Gem Choices don’t deliver value proportional to gems paid (“I paid 27 gems for this?!”)
Gem Choice delivers exactly what was promised in the setup— or more.	Gem Choice promises content it doesn’t actually deliver.
The promised payoff happens in the gem branch and the gem branch only.	The promised payoff happens in both the gem branch and the free branch (“tricking” readers into paying for a Gem Choice they didn’t need to).
Readers have all the information they need to make an informed choice.	Readers only discover the consequences of their choice after they’ve made their decision (“wait, can we rewind? I didn’t realize that would happen!”)
Gem Choices charge readers for positive and worthwhile experiences; they never charge readers to avoid uncomfortable or triggering situations.	Gem Choices charge readers to behave in ways that are consistent with our Content Guidelines, and/or punish or shame them when they don’t.
Gem Choices are meaningful and have a lasting impact on the world and/or characters (avoid empty branches!).	Choice branches have nothing in them, and/or Gem Choices have no real consequences.
There’s a comfortable balance between Gem Choices and Free Choices (in general, there should be significantly more Free Choices than Gem Choices in every episode).	The story is excessively “pinchy:” it consists of only Gem Choices, or has noticeably more Gem Choices than Free Choices.

Takeaway: Whenever you write a Gem Choice, ask yourself: Would I pay for this Gem Choice? Would I feel good about that choice? If the answer is “yes,” you’re on the right track!

The Three “Golden Rules”

These are a few sure-fire ways to maximize your Gem Choice performance. We’ll call these the three “Golden Rules” for writing Gem Choices. They establish “best practices” for the three highest-impact areas of your stories: the number of Gem Choice moments, the number of unique gem options within those moments, and the pricing scheme for those Gem Choices.

The Three Golden Rules

RULE #1:

Aim for 3-5 strong Gem Choices per episode.

RULE #2:

Aim for 2 unique gem options per Gem Choice moment.

RULE #3:

Give each Gem Choice a clear pricing structure.

Too few Gem Choices and your story won’t be competitive. Too many Gem Choices and your readers might get frustrated and stop reading your story.

A few additional notes:

1. Episode 1 exception: For episode 1, consider fewer (2-3) Gem Choices, or pricing those Gem Choices slightly lower.

2. Prioritize strong Gem Choices over many Gem Choices. Fewer but stronger choices can easily outperform more but weaker choices, in terms of both gems and retention.

...And make sure each gem option is unique. Typically, one of these strategies works well:

1. Pair a highly desirable option with a different, slightly less desirable option

2. Write two options that appeal to different types of readers (e.g. a kind option, a sassy option)

If you can’t think of a second gem option, don’t worry! Some choices do work better as an either/or.

In Gem Choices with multiple gem options, aim for a high-medium-free or medium-low-free pricing structure.

High-high-free or med-med-free tend to be less effective.

IMPORTANT! “Gem Choices” are choice moments (as opposed to choice options). A choice moment is any point where the reader is asked to make a decision; choice options refer to the individual buttons readers can click on. So while we recommend 3-5 Gem Choice moments per chapter, there may be considerably more options than that.

Takeaway: When it comes to gems, your three most powerful tools are: 1) the number of Gem Choice moments, 2) the number of unique gem options within those moments, and 3) the pricing scheme for those Gem Choices.

A Step-By-Step Guide

Now that we’ve gotten the basics out of the way, let’s run through a sample editing process.

STEP 1: Open your data dashboard.

Open your data dashboard. To unlock the dashboard, your story will need to reach at least 300 reads in the past 30 days.

STEP 2: Understand your story metrics.

Click on Gems, then Compared to other stories. You’ll see a bar graph of your story’s performance compared to other community stories on Episode.

Table #1: Examples of Stories with Low, Medium, High, and Very High Gems
Low performer:	Middle performer:	High performer:	Very high performer:

This story is performing below average. You can tell because the orange bars sit lower than the blue and purple bars. Time to spice things up!	This story is doing well- just a tad lower than the average community story. You can tell because the orange bars sit well below the purple bars, but only slightly lower than the blue bars.	This story is doing great- comparable to some of our highest performing community stories! You can tell because the orange bars are roughly the same height as the purple bars.	This story is doing extremely well- even better than our top community stories. You can tell because the orange bars sit much higher than both the blue and purple bars. Nice!

Which bar graph does your story most closely resemble? Don’t worry if your story isn’t performing as well as you’d hoped— this guide will help you address that!

Now scroll down to How do my choices compare to other stories? Make sure to sort by Episode (Ascending).

This will give you a list of every Gem Choice in your story, arranged in chronological order. What’s your average star rating? Again, don’t worry if you’re seeing mostly 1s and 2s— we’ll address that in the next section(s).

Take a moment to review the numbers and get a feel for how your story compares to other community stories. Now you’re ready to...

STEP 3: Make a game plan.

You’re ready to start editing! Here are some general recommendations:

Always start with episode 1. Episode 1 is your biggest area of opportunity, and should always receive the bulk of your attention. Episodes 2 & 3 are also fairly important; episodes 4 onwards deserve some attention, but don’t get too bogged down making extensive edits. You’ll likely achieve the highest lift in episode 1, 2, and 3.
Don't be afraid to add choices, especially to episodes that have fewer than the recommended 3-5 Gem Choices. If your story has no Gem Choices, consists only of a “Support the Author” button, or has fewer than the recommended 3-5 Gem Choices per episode, consider places where you can add Gem Choices to your story. If you’re having trouble, you can always read through the Gem Choice Slide Deck, or read through some of your favorite stories for inspiration.
Focus on Gem Choices with the greatest potential for improvement. It’d be excessive (not to mention time-consuming) to revise every Gem Choice in your story. Instead, identify the Gem Choices with the most room for improvement, and focus your time on editing those!
Don’t be afraid to cut choices. Don’t waste time editing a Gem Choice if you’re not sure how you can improve it. Just cut it and move on (or add a different Gem Choice elsewhere).
Don’t lean too much on “Support the Author” choices. “Support the Author” choices are almost always the lowest-performing choices in a story— so if the only Gem Choice in your story is a “Support the Author” button, there’s simply no way it can compete with a story that has 3-5 story-based Gem Choices in every episode. Instead of “Support the Author” Gem Choices, let your fans show their appreciation by paying for Gem Choices within the story itself.

STEP 4: Start with episode 1.

IMPORTANT! Episode 1 is the most important episode in your story. Before we even start to think about buffing up those Gem Choices, make sure your episode 1 is strong from a story standpoint. The purpose of this guide is Gem Choices, so we won’t focus on how to do that here— but keep in mind that a story with the best Gem Choices will still underperform if the story itself doesn’t keep readers engaged and excited to see what happens next!

After completing any story edits, take a look at your episode 1 Gem Choices. Your data set will look something like this:

Open up your Gem Choice Checklist. Let’s run through these steps on our sample episode.

STEP 5: Apply the Three Golden Rules.

Remember the Three Golden Rules? The first step is to review the number of Gem Choices per episode, the number of unique gem options per episode, and the performance of each of those choices. How does our sample story hold up?

It looks like episode 1 has 3 Gem Choices — a two-pronged Gem Choice, an outfit choice, and a “Support the Author” choice — for a total of 4 gem options (as opposed to gem moments). The two-pronged Gem Choice is priced at high-high-free, which we recommend against— high-med-free or med-low-free is preferable.

The two options in our three-pronged Gem Choice — “Go on a date with Ken” or “Go on that date” — aren’t unique! The phrasing is a bit different, but you’re essentially agreeing to the same thing: go on a date with Ken. For Gem Choices with multiple gem options, we recommend making those options uniquely appealing.

Finally, Gem Choice #2 is performing well, but has only one choice option. As an outfit choice, there’s definitely room for more gem options!

In this case, we recommend:

Gem Choice #1: change the options to two uniquely appealing choices. Maybe you give readers the choice of where to go on a date (park or theater?), how to accept the date (emphatically or conditionally), or offer them two different experiential flavors (a romantic date or a fun date). Then change the pricing structure to high-med-free or med-low-free (depending on your assessment of the payof’s value).
Gem Choice #2: consider adding additional gem options. For outfit choices, we recommend including multiple gem options paired with one free option— that way, you’re giving readers a choice between multiple different styles.

Okay, now our episode 1 follows the Three Golden Rules. We can move on to...

STEP 6: Buff up low-performing choice(s).

Next, let’s identify the lowest-performing Gem Choice in our episode. In this case, it’s Gem Choice #3.

We mentioned earlier the “Support the Author” choices tend to be low performers— and it’s true. It’s almost always preferable to write a story-based Gem Choice instead of a “Support the Author” Gem Choice.

Here’s what we recommend:

You don’t have to cut the “Support the Author” Gem Choice, but you might want to throw in one (or more) additional Gem Choice to compensate for the lower performance of Gem Choice #3.

BONUS STEP: Look for opportunities to improve mid- and high-performing choices.

This step is entirely optional. Use your best judgment to identify mid- and high-performing choices with even more room for improvement. Consider these strategies:

Add nested Gem Choices to high-performing choices with long gem branches. If you have a gem branch that’s especially long — long enough to contain multiple choice moments — consider embedding a “nested” Gem Choice within that gem branch. If a nested Gem Choice doesn’t fit, don’t force it!
Phrase choice options in a way that makes them even more irresistible. Aim for BIG, dramatic language! Instead of “kiss him,” try something with more pizzazz, like: “Throw yourself into his arms and kiss him deeply!” or, “Give in already and KISS HIM!!!”)
For outfit choices, consider 2-4 gem options and 1 free. For story-based Gem Choices, we recommend 1-2 gem options and 1 free option; outfit choices are a little different. Consider offering multiple gem outfits in a variety of different styles, to capture the full breadth of your readers’ aesthetic preferences.

Now let’s identify the mid-performing and high-performing choices in our sample episode. In this case, the first option in Gem Choice #1 is doing comparatively well. Gem Choice #2 is also doing pretty well.

Here’s what we recommend:

Gem Choice #1: If this branch is particularly long, this might be a good opportunity to write in a nested choice. You could also try rephrasing the choice option to emphasize the drama (e.g. “Agree to the date I’ve been waiting FOREVER for!”).
Gem Choice #2: Like we covered in the last section, try adding more gem outfit options to cover a broad range of aesthetic tastes. The more variety you include, the more likely your players will find something that appeals to them.

Conclusion & Closing Thoughts

Now that you’ve edited your episode 1, do the same thing for episodes 2 and 3. Then do a lighter pass on episode 4 onwards, keeping in mind that you’ll achieve the highest lift in your earlier episodes.

Wait at least a week before revisiting your data to measure the impact your edits have made.

Congrats— you’re done!