How do I know if I've written a good answer on Quora? There seems to be little correlation between what I think is good and the number of upvotes.

Someone can have written what amounts to a thesis on the ‘Origins of natural colour dyes used in Upper Mongolian Basket weaving’ → It could be in-depth, insightful and cited… yet it’s (sadly) unlikely to receive much in the way of attention or upvotes because people read and upvote posts that interest them specifically and to the best of my knowledge, there’s not yet a fandom for Upper Mongolian basket weaving techniques.

There’s also a difference between ‘good’ and ‘entertaining’. An answer can deliver excellent information which categorically junk punches the question, but if it’s a boring answer, people will skip right past it. To hit the golden zone, an answer has to be compelling (preferably factual) *and* entertaining.

Image source: Me → What are the latest Quora memes?

When it comes to understanding whether you’ve written a decent answer, the only real metric worth using is your level of happiness with it or feedback from people that the answer made a difference to.

Like it or not, the number of upvotes that an answer has, can often be more of an indication of how much people liked or were entertained by it as opposed to a critical judgement of the content.

If you’re relying on upvotes to give you feedback on answers… you’re gonna have a bad time.