18-Month Review on Medium

Summary

Susie Kearley reflects on her 18-month journey as a Medium writer, evaluating the platform's financial and professional impact compared to traditional journalism.

Abstract

After a year and a half on Medium, Susie Kearley has amassed 2800 followers, published around 600 stories, and earned nearly $3700. Despite the platform's potential, her earnings average a modest$ 6 per story, and the time invested has raised questions about its value relative to pitching to magazines. While she enjoys Medium and has made valuable connections, the financial returns are significantly less than her traditional journalism work. Kearley's recent success in pitching to magazines, securing £1300 in commissions over three days, contrasts sharply with the less predictable income from Medium. She acknowledges the challenges of the changing magazine industry, with some of her best-paying clients closing down. Kearley plans to continue both types of writing but must balance her time to prioritize more lucrative opportunities in traditional writing.

Opinions

Kearley is optimistic about Medium but acknowledges it is not a 'get rich quick' scheme.
She questions whether the time spent on Medium could be more productively used pitching to magazines.
The unpredictability of magazine work is noted, with periods of high productivity followed by slower times

Earnings, stories, what next?

The end of October marked 18 months on Medium for me. It’s been a time to take stock and decide on a plan going forward. I’d hoped to make Medium a significant part of my day job, and now I’m analysing whether that’s looking like a good plan, or not, because it does take time away from my traditional journalism work.

My monthly income remains less than the bonuses issued to top writers when I started here, so it’s certainly not been a ‘get rich quick’ scheme. But I’m enjoying it and remain optimistic.

One of the tricky questions is, would my time on Medium be better spent pitching to magazines, who may or may not give me work? It’s a very difficult question. Let’s look at the stats…

In 18 months on Medium:

I’ve reached 2800 followers

I’ve published about 600 stories (and deleted some of them)

I’ve published over 8000 comments!

I’ve earned $3664.98 in total, which averages about $6 per story

I’ve made some great contacts and read some interesting stories!

But boy, is it swallowing up a lot of time!

At the moment, my earnings for magazine journalism are similar to this time last year. The first half of the financial year is often quieter because of summer holidays, so hopefully things will pick up, but I do question to what extent the time I spend on Medium is to the detriment of my freelance magazine writing career.

I often receive a splurge of freelance commissions towards the end of the financial year (January-March), which improves the overall income for the year. I’m hoping for a spurge again this year, because if it doesn’t happen, the total will look a bit bleak!

A number of magazines that I used to work for have closed in the past year. One of them was my best paying client — gone. Shame.

There have been many closures of print magazines in recent years, and I’ve not had a lot of luck pitching to online magazines, who seem to have a greater proportion of the market these days.

So, if I stopped spending so much time here, and instead spent more time pitching to magazine editors, would it pay off? Let’s see… Last week, I spent about 3 days pitching to magazines and I’ve received four commissions as a result. The value of those commissions is about £1300, so yes. It paid off. But it doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes I pitch for days and only get one £80 commission. That’s when it might be more productive to spend my time writing on Medium.

Also, it’s not all about the money. Pitching into the void is soul destroying. But I enjoy Medium and find it quite addictive, so it’s easy to get embroiled in conversations when I really should be working. I must not lose sight of the importance of pitching to magazines for the day job.

I think there’s room for both types of writing, but I’m earning a lot more from traditional writing than from Medium at the moment, so I need to ensure I don’t get my priorities mixed up.

I’ll review the situation regularly. My freelance writing career has been looking more and more fragile with every passing year! So, discovering Medium last year seemed like a great opportunity.

I’m definitely spending less time on stock photography than I was before, so what is Alamy’s loss, is Medium’s gain.

If only we all had more time, so we could do everything!