Summary

A writer reflects on their journey of consistently writing on Medium for three months, sharing insights on content curation, publication selection, writing routines, and the use of calls to action.

Abstract

The author has penned over 90 articles on Medium in three months, learning valuable lessons about the platform's dynamics. They emphasize the importance of quality and adherence to guidelines for content curation, noting that personal storytelling and proper formatting significantly enhance the chances of an article being curated. The writer also advises on diversifying contributions across multiple publications to increase the likelihood of article acceptance and audience reach. Personal experience underscores the benefits of establishing a dedicated writing time and the strategic use of calls to action to grow a mailing list. The author concludes that practical experience is the most effective teacher, surpassing theoretical advice found in articles and guides.

Opinions

The author acknowledges the emotional toll of article rejections but has learned not to take them as personally as before.
They admit to not having read Medium's curation guidelines, which may have contributed to a lower number of curated articles.
The writer believes that articles with personal stories and proper formatting, free of errors, are more likely to be curated.
They suggest being a contributor to at least five publications to manage rejections and maintain a steady flow of content publication.
The author has found that having a set writing time is more effective than waiting for inspiration.
Calls to action should be used sparingly to avoid overwhelming readers, with the aim of growing a mailing list.
Practical writing experience on Medium is deemed more valuable than consuming advice from external sources.

3 Months of Writing Consistently on Medium and 90+ Articles Later

Here’s what I’ve learned so far

Writing these types of articles is fun because they pair as memoirs. Many people write these kinds of articles, so I guess I’m not the only one that gets excited talking about what they’ve learned from writing on Medium.

I remember when I wrote one of these after my first month. It’s funny thinking about it because I still took rejections from publications personally — I still do, but not as much. Read that here. What was even worse was, the first publication I submitted that article to, rejected it.

It’s part of the process, though.

In the past weeks, I’ve been trying to learn what works and what doesn’t. In terms of getting your articles curated, the right publications to submit certain content, how to come up with content ideas, the best time of the day to write, the articles to leave call to actions, how often to publish, etc. It has been a significant learning process.

Getting Curated

I won’t lie; I have never read the Medium curation guidelines. Maybe that’s why I don’t have that many curated articles. I have about 15 articles curated out of 120 plus articles.

I’ve not cracked the curation code, but all I can say about curation is, if you improve your quality — and follow the guidelines, you would get curated. The articles people engage with the most are the ones where you bring out a part of you. The ones where you tell your story — or a story

Formatting is also critical. Use this title capitalization tool when writing headlines. Errors kill your chances of getting curated a lot. So you have to proofread your articles more than once. At first, I used to just write; then, I’d edit the article once, then publish it immediately. But you cannot spot all the errors if you edit your articles immediately. That’s why I wrote this article on giving your articles time to cook before you publish. You won’t get curated if you have errors in your articles.

Don’t be like me, read the Medium curation guidelines!

Choosing the Right Publication

When I started, I was only a contributor in one publication, and I only wrote articles that fit their needs. If they didn’t accept my article, I would leave it in my drafts or publish it without a publication, then having less than 20 views. Sometimes I feel like going back to punch myself.

If you plan to write every day, you’d have ideas on different topics to write about. And these topics wouldn’t fit in one publication. Many publications delay. So would if you plan on putting out content frequently, you should have different publications to submit to.

You should be a contributor to at least five publications so you can diversify. Some publications would reject your articles probably because they’ve seen the topic before, or it doesn’t match their quality. When this happens, you just have to make the necessary adjustments and submit them to another publication. If you continuously submit generic, poorly formatted, and error-filled articles, they would stop checking your submissions or even block you.

Find your writing time.

Everybody is different. We all have different times we get ideas. It may be morning to you, but for me, it’s at night. I handle my clients’ projects during the day; then, I write my Medium articles at night.

I learned that having a set time to write is way better than writing whenever you find inspiration because, with a set time, you would always show up to write at that time.

I write one article every day. And it takes me an average of 2hours to write an article. So I just sacrifice the 2 hours before I sleep for writing. Many times, during the day, I get article ideas and jot them down. So I use the day to gather ideas and the night to write.

Leaving a Call to Action

What’s the point of all these if you’re not growing your mailing list? It still feels weird leaving call to actions, but somehow I try.

I don’t leave a call to action for all my articles. I only leave them in two or three of my articles weekly. I see it as allowing my readers to have a breather from my plea for my newsletter subscription. I might have one of those “go back in time to punch myself” episodes, months from now because of what I’ve just said, but for now, I’m comfortable with this.

Final Note

There are lots of advice on how to get better on Medium. Reading all that is great. I read them when I see them, but nothing beats trial and error. You have to try things out for yourself to see what works.

You Don’t Learn to Ride a Bike by Reading a Textbook

No matter how many videos you watch, no matter how many blog posts you read, it can’t be compared to learning through practising. I’ve had a Medium account for way over a year — and was only writing when I felt like or had the inspiration. I only started writing every day three months ago, and I’ve learned way more about this platform in these 3 months.

So no matter how many of these types of articles you read, it can’t still be compared with the actual thing — writing