story-short-scan: Short Web Novel Ranking Scan

Core Philosophy

Principle 1: The short story market is an emotion-driven market

Principle 2: The vitality of short stories lies in dissemination

Principle 3: Short story trends rise and fall quickly

Ranking Scanning Process

Phase 1: Confirm Platform and Direction

• User has a direction → Conduct in-depth ranking scan for that direction
• User has no direction → Provide overall ranking overview + identify trends
• User wants cross-platform comparison → Conduct platform comparison analysis

Phase 1.5: Determine Data Sources

• Zhihu Yanyan Stories: Search "Zhihu Yanyan Stories Popular/Highly Praised {Current Year-Month}"
• Tomato Short Stories: Search "Tomato Novels Short Stories Bestseller List {Current Year-Month}"
• Qimao Short Stories: Search "Qimao Short Stories Rankings {Current Year-Month}"
• Xiaohongshu: Search "Xiaohongshu Stories Viral Popular {Current Year-Month}"

• Ask the user to screenshot or copy-paste ranking content
• If the user provides a link, use WebFetch to crawl page content
• If the user only provides a list of story titles, proceed directly to analysis

• Load

  references/real-market-data.md

  (Cross-platform Writing Differences Comparison)
• Clearly inform the user: "The following analysis is based on historical trend data. It is recommended to verify with real-time rankings."

• If agent-browser CLI is available, connect to Chrome via CDP to obtain platform data
• Example:

  agent-browser --cdp 9222 open "https://www.zhihu.com/column/c_123456"

• Can reuse the user's logged-in Chrome session to obtain complete ranking data
• Suitable for data that requires login to access (Zhihu Personal Center, Tomato Bookshelf, etc.)

Phase 2: Data Analysis

Zhihu Yanyan Stories Analysis Dimensions

Tomato Short Stories Analysis Dimensions

Universal Analysis Dimensions

1. Emotion Type Distribution: Which type of emotional pull is currently most popular (sad romance/plot twist/suspense/healing/face-slapping)
2. Theme Hotspots: Specific settings/scenarios that repeatedly appear
3. Length Distribution: Word count range of popular short stories
4. Opening Pattern: How the first paragraph/sentence of popular short stories is written
5. Ending Type: Proportion of HE (Happy Ending)/BE (Bad Ending)/Open Ending
6. Title Pattern: Naming rules of popular short stories
7. Character Model: Repeatedly appearing protagonist types

Phase 3: Output Ranking Scan Report

# Short Web Novel Ranking Scan Report: {Platform Name}

## Market Overview
- Scanning Time: {Date}
- Core Finding: {One-sentence Summary}

## Emotion Heat Ranking
| Rank | Emotion Type | Number on Rankings | Trend | Representative Work |
|------|--------------|--------------------|-------|---------------------|
| 1 | {Type} | {N Stories} | ↑/→/↓ | {Title} |

## Theme Hotspots
| Theme | Heat | Competition Level | Threshold | Representative Work |
|-------|------|-------------------|-----------|---------------------|
| {Theme} | High/Medium/Low | Fierce/Moderate/Blue Ocean | High/Medium/Low | {Title} |

## Key Data Insights
- Word Count Range: Popular short stories are concentrated in {X}-{Y} words
- Opening Pattern: {High-frequency Opening Pattern}
- Ending Preference: {Proportion of HE/BE/Open Ending}
- Title Features: {Naming Rules}
- Character Hot Words: {High-frequency Protagonist Types}

## Trend Alerts
- 🔥 Emerging: {Theme} — {Basis}
- ⚡ Upcoming: {Theme} — {Basis}
- ⚠️ Soon to Saturate: {Theme} — {Basis}

## Recommended Writing Directions
1. {Direction + Emotional Pull Method + Feasibility}
2. {Direction + Emotional Pull Method + Feasibility}
3. {Direction + Emotional Pull Method + Feasibility}

## One-sentence Takeaway
{Incisive Summary}

Phase 4: Topic Recommendations

• Recommendations for beginners: Plot twist, face-slapping genres (clear routines, learnable structure)
• Recommendations for experienced authors: Suspense, sad romance genres (high technical content, strong competitive barriers)
• Recommendations for revenue pursuit: Intersection of current hottest themes + themes the user can write

• Emotional pull > theme innovation (short story readers value emotional experience more)
• The first 3 sentences determine 80% of retention
• Plot twists are the core weapon of short stories; short stories without twists are hard to go viral

Platform Characteristics Quick Reference

Next-step Recommendations

/story-short-analyze

/story-short-write

/story-long-scan

Reference Materials

Language

• Respond in Chinese if the user uses Chinese, respond in English if the user uses English
• Follow Chinese Copywriting Typesetting Guide for Chinese responses