Become a Better Writer
This 1 Super Simple Trick is Behind 90% Of My Success As A Writer
It’s only two steps!
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Competitor research is a vital part of any sort of content creation.
If you’re writing on Medium, you need to know who you’re competing against. By familiarizing yourself with other creators, you can learn a lot about the platform, like:
- What are the audience’s expectations of formatting?
- What tags are common in my niche?
- Which writers are doing really well? Why?
Simply put, if you want to do well on Medium, you need to do competition research.
What is Competition Research?
It’s a simple yet valuable process.
Essentially, there are two steps. First, you identify competition. Second, you (borderline) stalk them.
I promise you every creator with a following here has, at some point, identified their competition and (borderline) stalked them.
Who are Your Competitors?
There are a couple of ways to figure out who you should be watching.
To do competitor research, you have to have a niche you want to write in or are currently writing in. Then, think of any authors you read who write in that niche.
These will be your most valuable competitors. They are writers who, for whatever reason, have already captured your attention.
You can also look at tagged topic pages to see the top five writers on any topic. If your niche is writing, here are the top five writers in #writing.
When looking at someone’s profile, there are a couple of questions you want to ask before you add them to your list of competitors to watch.
- Are they getting the results you want? Would you like to have their engagement rates? Would you be happy to have their stats?
- Are they doing something you’d like to do? Is their content something you’d enjoy writing about?
- Do you enjoy reading their articles? Would you recommend them to a friend?
I suggest picking 3–5 people to keep a very close eye on.
How to Learn From Them
After you identify these authors, go to their profile. As you scroll through their feed, make a list of all the stories that capture your interest. This can be because of the headline, the subtitle, or the picture — it doesn’t matter. If you want to read it, add it to the list.
After the list is made, start reading through each story one by one. There are a couple of things you want to make note of.
- Why did their headline get your attention?
- What types of pictures do they use?
- What publications do they post in?
- How do they typically format their articles?
- What tags do they use?
- What about their voice and style makes you keep reading?
- What do you have that could add to the conversation they are creating?
- How do they format their call to action section at the end of their articles?
As you read more and more of their articles, you’ll get more of an idea of who they are as a writer.
How Does This Help?
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and no one steals like an artist does.
If you know why a specific writer works for you, you’re one step closer to becoming a writer who will work for other people. If you know what headlines get your attention, you’re one step closer to writing headlines that will get attention. If you know how they format their articles, you’re one step closer to writing well-formatted articles.
Simply put, if you are not paying attention to your competition, you are sabotaging your success.
How did I get 82 followers in my first 15 days on Medium? I spent three months researching my competitors in the teaching others to write on Medium niche.
Competition research is easy. It’s just two steps.
- Find competition
- Stalk them
Spend enough time researching, and your articles will write themselves.
Thanks for reading!
If you’d like to maximize your growth as efficiently as possible, sign up for my free 5-day email course here. I’d love to help you become the best writer you can be.
