GotW Participation

What would you do to increase interest and participation in the Girl of the Week feature? I've included a few ideas to get the ball rolling.

Are we doing a girl of the year competition?

Keep the vote totals hidden. Sometimes it seems like there's not much point in voting when someone's way ahead.

Some of these may be good ideas, although I don't know how much they'd increase participation since people still have to click into the section. For instance, I don't really participate myself usually, and in fact I just forget to look at it altogether most of the time.

Some of the options in the poll used to be that way, but were then changed. You were limited to one choice only, but IIRC people felt that being able to vote for any number of options made it more fun and interactive. The number of nominees also used to be limited, but we ran into issues where people would abuse it and use multiple accounts to quickly fill up the nominations with just their own favorites.

My thoughts on these options:

Limit voters to one choice only

I guess this could be a good idea, however I've run multiple polls on this site and it seems that allowing multiple choice vs single choice has little to no effect on the outcome.

Allow up to three choices on a 3-2-1 points basis

Not 100% sure on what this means. I'm assuming the first vote gets 3 pts, then second vote 2 pts, and third vote 1 pt. This might affect the outcome, at least moreso that making it single choice.

Limit the number of nominees, e.g. 15 or 20 maximum

Chainer addressed this above, but my initial thought was that this restriction would favor the people who submit their nominations the earliest. This site is visited by people around the world, in many different time zones, so the restriction would be unfair to those in many countries.

Require that nominees have at least 25 or 50 images on the site

I have not tracked this, but from casual observation it seems that most, if not all, of the GotW winners have met this criteria anyway. Several have been nominated who don't, but GotW doesn't remember those who were merely nominated.

Use larger thumbnails to get a clearer view of the nominees

I'm not exactly sure why users are unable to just open the thumbnails and view the full size image...

Allow earlier winners to be nominated, perhaps a year or longer after their win

This would be the one I'm personally in favor of. I see no downside to this.

None of these. What I want is an indicator next to a girls name that she has been gotw, so I don't have to spend ages trawling through the list of winners before nominating someone.

^ I like that idea (tbf, I do think it's been suggested before, but I forget by whom).

I didn't even know that you could vote for it. I thought it was just hand picked by chainer

lol there is no way I'd actually keep that up consistently week after week.

Honestly? None of the above. I am using this side exclusively on my phone so I have to unfold too even see the Gotw. I hardly ever vote because I just forget this feature exists. I guess my answer would be to make it more obvious, tell people actively that the haven’t voted for this weeks Gotw.

None of these. What I want is an indicator next to a girls name that she has been gotw, so I don't have to spend ages trawling through the list of winners before nominating someone.

I went and implemented this since it was very easy to do.

I went and implemented this since it was very easy to do.

Thank you, brilliant! But it looks like there is a glitch. Vladislava Galagan has won under the name Slava Galagan, and Dianna Blanchard (diannalovesweights) has won as Dianna legkiller. Possibly girls who have changed names are slipping through the net.

I'll be honest, I only ever come here on mobile, so by hiding the GotW behind a details tab thingy (where I have to click to reveal it) I always forget it even exists.

If it was on by default, or has a header or something to attract my attention, I for one would participate. I wonder if this is true for others too

I'll be honest, I only ever come here on mobile, so by hiding the GotW behind a details tab thingy (where I have to click to reveal it) I always forget it even exists.

If it was on by default, or has a header or something to attract my attention, I for one would participate. I wonder if this is true for others too

Same for me

I saw GotW and I thought Game of Thrones Women!

Its not on the list but I would like to see themed GotW. From what I have seen of it so far people post a range of different kind of pics (gym pics, glamour pics, pics were you can only see the back, outdoor pics etc) and I think that people may vote for certain kinds of pics which particularly appeal to them rather than the girls themselves. Having themed GotWs every now and then where only certain kinds of pics can be submitted would counteract this.

I thought GotW was gone for a while because I only use mobile. It should be more prominent on the home page.

I thought GotW was gone for a while because I only use mobile. It should be more prominent on the home page.

Same here, I second the motion

Here's something from left field: randomize the order in which candidates appear. Otherwise a few candidates quickly rise to the top, and then get most of the votes from there on out. Usually by sometime on Monday afternoon/evening it's clear who the top few candidates are, and by Tuesday morning (if not sooner), the eventual winner is at #1 with a significant lead over #2. If the candidates are instead presented randomly to each visitor, that may encourage more votes for folks who would otherwise be overlooked at the bottom of the list.

Going even further into left field: don't show the vote totals until the end, so nobody has any idea who's ahead and who's behind. I can see arguments both ways for that, though.

Here's something from left field: randomize the order in which candidates appear. Otherwise a few candidates quickly rise to the top, and then get most of the votes from there on out.

I think that's a good suggestion. I also think hiding the results (much like how polls work on here) until the user has put in their vote could be useful.

Sorry, wilder, but another case of "if it's not broke, don't fix it."