10 Things I Learned After 1 Year on Medium

My 1-Year Medium Anniversary

Hello Medium!

What a fun year spending time with all of you. I’m a lot like most of you. I love to write. I dream of being published. And I didn’t quite know what my next steps were. A friend recommended I sign up for Medium and it’s been quite the year.

I kicked off my first month of writing with 5 cents! Any of you feel me?! (No matter how much you start with, you’re getting paid, which means, you’re a professional writer, congratulations!)

I’m surprised at how much I have enjoyed Medium. I’m surprised at the amount of people I have connected with on here. And I’m surprised that no matter how much traction your stories get, it’s still hard to make money, haha. I’ll keep my dream of being published one day!

10 Things I learned after 1 Year on Medium

1 — Write What You Want and Love What You Write

I’ve got 10 things but really, everything is centered around this 1. Write what you want and love what you write.

When I was four years old, I started writing poetry and soon after that, I started writing short stories. I loved to write. I would go in and out of phases writing over the next 30 years. Sometimes, I’d get so caught up in schoolwork for years that I’d realize I hadn’t just sat down and written in a long time. It’s something I love but still something that I have to often discipline myself to do.

In my early 20’s, I decided to write a book. And as I was writing, I got some feedback that I should hold off until I had experienced some more of life. As much as I would have liked to have finished the book for my own sake, I think it was good advice. The book would have centered around my faith and that has continued to evolve over the years (which was the exact reason the person had recommended I wait).

So then I made it into my 30’s, still wanting to write. I had dabbled in blogs and garnered followings but never knew what to do from there. Eventually I bought a domain and started writing there weekly for the last 5 years (gospelof.org). Once again, great practice, great writing, but what do I do from there?

A friend of mine recommended I write on Medium. I’d read some articles on Medium but didn’t know if it was a fit for my style. Turns out I was wrong. Turns out, it is a fit for everyone’s style!…

2 — Write Your Style

When I started writing articles on Medium, I wrote them how I thought they should be written. I tried to follow the cues of other writers. I wrote what I thought others would read.

And then, something happened. I wrote an article about myself on ILLUMINATION and it was the most viewed and read of all of my articles.

I wrote another about myself and it quickly was the second most viewed and read. It surprised me that I could just write. Simply that, write. Write about my life, share my poems, write my short stories and people would read them.

3 — Write Because You Love It

It’s easy to get trapped in the vortex of Medium, just like it is any other social media outlet. When I first started on Medium, I was reading and clapping and tagging as much as possible. I used up every clap I had for the first several months.

The problem is, that can lead to burnout. Now, I’m still writing joyfully but I’ve learned to take some breaks. But what I have seen, is other writers coming and going on Medium, I’m sure of burnout. There’s a steady group of writers who are always there and then the others disappear and are replaced by newbies.

So for the newbies, find a sustainable rhythm. Love your own writing. Don’t try and do too much on Medium, you can burn out on it just like anything else.

4 — Be Careful with those Tags

I started getting tagged by other writers in articles I was writing and I enjoyed it. I read their stories and they read mine too. It gave me fun prompts to go off of. But then when I started tagging some other writers as well, not everyone liked being tagged. And I got one comment of someone reporting me to Medium and how unhappy they were with me.

I was like, ‘oops!’ I was just doing what other writers were doing and since I didn’t mind being tagged, I hadn’t considered that other writers may not feel the same way. I stopped tagging people after that. Tagging in general that would be. I think it’s much different to tag someone because you really enjoy their writing or want to recommend someone’s articles and for purposes such as those.

But for general tagging, just beware, people might have certain feelings about it.

5 — Finding a Publisher is Helpful

You don’t have to get published. You can publish on your own. And oftentimes, I publish stories on my own that get just as many reads as my other stories.

That being said, being published is helpful. Oftentimes, other writers find your work through different publications. You’ll find different prompts and directions from varies publications. And you may find ideas on how to start your own.

I have over 1.5 thousand followers but my stories still often get rejected by publishers. It always stings a bit. But I’ve learned to just move on. Try the next one, and the next one, and then publish on your own if you need to.

One of the first articles I wrote was published by The Startup.

I couldn’t belive it. I thought, wow, this is going to make a lot of money and get read so much. Turns out, I made a couple dollars and 90% of my reads came from LinkedIn. I followed with getting an article published in Better Marketing and the same story.

So once again, I learned, I have to love what I’m writing and share for the right reasons because even if it finds publishing and curation, that doesn’t mean great readership success.

6 — Getting Curated isn’t Everything

Getting curated is fun. I love getting the e-mail that says my article or poem has been curated. That being said, I’ve never seen it bump my numbers up much. It’s like being a Top Writer, someone may stumble upon you, but it doesn’t always do a lot for your numbers.

That being said, if you’re writing because you love it, if you’re writing because you want to help someone… that someone who stumbles upon you might just be the person you were trying to reach.

7 — Formatting, Grammar, and Pictures are Key

One of the first things I did when I started writing on Medium was to read other articles and read all of the How To articles on formatting.

Writing on Medium is different from writing on a Word document. There are all kinds of tricks and subtleties. And publishers are also often looking for different things. It’s important when submitting your work that you have read the publisher’s section of how they want you to format. And as you seek to improve your own writing, it’s fun to find new tricks of Medium as you go.

8 — Make Friends

Wow, friends are the best. It’s one of the things I didn’t expect to gain from Medium. I didn’t think I would start caring about people’s lives, and families, and marriages, and health from simply writing on the same platform.

So how do you make friends on here?

Commenting is key. That’s how you individually get to know someone. I likely over-commented when I started on Medium, but through that, relationships were formed, and friends were made.

Comment on articles you enjoy. Find people who are new to Medium and welcome and support them on their writing journey as well.

9 — Start Your Own Publication

Start your own publication because… it’s fun. But if you don’t want to, don’t! Become an Editor for a publication if they ask and you would like to. But if you don’t want to, don’t! Use Medium for you.

Publications are fun though. You can be as specific or as general as you’d like. And within that, it may give you the direction you are looking for. I’ve had a bunch of articles that I couldn’t find a home for and so I created a home.

I don’t overly advertise my publications but they’re always there when I need them or want to use them. And on that note, I’m gonna drop an advertisement, forgive me please :)

NBA Video 101

One of the reasons I started writing on Medium was to find a home to combine for love for writing and basketball. I work in the NBA which is a dream but that also keeps me from being able to write specifically about the NBA. So I found a way to write about my job and some inner-working without sharing any information that would be deemed compromising to the organization I work for.

When I was your age…

I did a bunch of interviews with people older than myself, simply to learn their stories. I thought I would put them in a book sometime but I think they work nicely on here. Now, it’s just a matter of getting the rough notes into a format worth reading, you know!

Letters to Myself…

Every year, I write a blog recapping my last year. I decided to import them and put them all in a publication, with the hopes that other people would share in this as well, writing and recapping their year. So if you would like to join, would love to have you!

And I also posted my most famous story of all in here… of my 104 year old grandmother. I think a lot of people met me through this story. About a month after I wrote it, my grandmother passed away having lived a full, beautiful, and hard life.

10 — Use Your Social Media Outlets

When starting your writing on Medium, it can be challenging to get a following. But I would text the link of my stories to family and friends. Often, I wrote articles about them. In turn, they were sending those articles out to their family and friends.

I’d post articles to the social media outlets I used: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

And then I found a hidden gem, people on LinkedIn loved my articles, one amassing over 10,000 views.

So obviously, I added LinkedIn to my rotation of where I would link my articles.

That being said, I thought about YouTube, Snapchat, TikTok… I even dabbled in Quora but what I learned… if you’re not feeling it, if it becomes another place you have to post and more work for you, don’t do it. Remember, burnout is easy. Write and post because you love it. Don’t make additional work for yourself if it’s going to take away the enjoyment for you.

Okay, well, I am sure there are SO many other things I’ve learned. But if you’re new to Medium, I hope this will help you with some of the things I’ve learned in my first year.

In short, write because you love it. Find a rhythm that works for you and doesn’t burn you out. Make some friends. And follow the path that will ultimately lead you to what success means for you!