Fanfiction has been around for a while. What “a while” means is debatable, but since the advent of Archive of Our Own in 2007, fanfiction has gained popularity, amassing over thirteen million works and over seven million users on AO3 alone. Unofficial surveys done by AO3 user centreoftheselights shows an increase in many of the key actions users can do between 2013 and 2024, such as “kudosing” (liking), commenting, and bookmarking works.  

What this popularity has led to is an increasing awareness of how fanfics are organized among a wide variety of readers, many of whom take their habits back and forth between AO3 and other fanwork sites and officially published books. According to the 2024 survey of AO3 users by centreoftheselights, close to 60 percent (or around nine thousand) of respondents viewed or filtered by “Other Tags” frequently or very frequently. “Other Tags” comprise everything tagged except relationships and characters, including many tropes that have come to define how readers can find the most interesting story for them. Some examples include genre tags, such as “Fantasy” or “Romance,” along with more fanfiction specific genres like “Fluff,” “Angst,” and “Hurt/Comfort,” which give slightly more specific expectations for the emotional state of the reader. 

In traditional book publishing, the book itself does not come with these tags, except perhaps a content warning, age rating, and genre. The additional information a book provides to interest readers primarily comes from the synopsis. For readers who are used to the tagging system of AO3, a synopsis is the equivalent of a summary, but there is no equivalent to tags . . . at least, not until recently, and not for many books. 

Readers of fanfiction expect content warnings, both as actual warnings for content they do not wish to engage with, and as advertisements to more niche events or characteristics that occur in the story. The challenge for marketers to engage these audiences then becomes a balance of revealing certain information about the book without necessarily giving the same level of spoilers commonly found in fanfiction. Would tagging a book as having “Major Character Death” like a fanfic writer might attract fanfiction readers? Or would spoiler-filled tags remove the suspense and drive away prospective readers? 

I would suggest that using fanfiction tagging vocabulary and styles can work to market certain books that do not rely on much suspense or mystery. As with fanfic, the easiest and clearest tags are based in romance tropes, but other genres also have signature tags, so to speak. These can draw in readers who are looking for something more specific than what might be mentioned in a broader genre or blurb.

For example, in “Fishing for a New Life” by Marina Villa, a short story found in the anthology Short Vigorous Roots, some tags that might draw readers in could be “Angst” and “Hurt/Comfort.” These subgenres or tropes are general enough to not spoil the actual plot but give the reader a specific idea of what to emotionally expect, allowing a reader to essentially look for a specific emotional outcome when finding books.

Booksellers and fans alike have begun to use some fanfiction terminology to increase interest in books, especially for the audience demographics that overlap with fanfiction demographics—primarily twenty-one to thirty-three-year-old women and girls. Now you might see a recommendation on the shelves at a bookstore for “Enemies to Lovers” or “There was only one bed.” While I don’t foresee publishers including fanfiction-based tags in their books, booksellers and libraries who most directly communicate with their consumers are likely to utilize some fanfiction terminology in their recommendations. 

Sources

Source: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-promise-and-potential-of-fan-fiction

Fact: Which work produced the “first fanfiction” is debated, with contenders including Star Trek and Virgil’s The Aeneid. 

Source: https://archiveofourown.org/

Fact: Count of how many users and fanworks are hosted on AO3.

Source: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56743726/chapters/144252088

Fact: Increase in popularity of engagement with AO3 and around 60% of respondents view or filter fanfiction by “Other Tags”. 

Source: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54011047/chapters/136726687

Fact: Age demographic information such as the middle 50% age range of respondents being 20.8-32.6 years old. 

Source: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54011047/chapters/137740564#workskin

Fact: Gender identity results of survey show overall frequency of “Woman or Girl” identification at 57.5%, with next highest being “Nonbinary or Enby” at 21.6%.