I went around with a bunch of incense sticks early in the heating season, and tried a bunch of things in my house. I have fans on the floor blowing toward the stove from various places in the house. I have an archway to the rest of the house about 2 feet below the ceiling in the room where the stove is, and a big ceiling fan in the stove room.
After smelling up the house for days with those incense sticks, I made a strange discovery. In my case, I got better heat transfer by just using the floor fans, and leaving the ceiling fan off! The ceiling fan tended to mix up the air in the stove room too much. With it off, I only had a five degree temperature change through the house, With it on, it was close to 8-10 degrees...