5 Secrets to Share Your Articles with Little to No Subscribers

How to Get More Eyes on Your Work in 10 Minutes a Day

So you just wrote your article and hope to get thousands of visitors, but hours go by and it’s like crickets. You check your stats and there is barely anyone checking out your article. You spent so much time working on the article which you think is one of your best pieces you ever wrote. You can’t figure out why few people are reading your article.

Yes, we have all been there. The life of a writer is tough. It can be the worst feeling.

The days of writing have changed so much especially over the last decade or so. Instead of writing for a newspaper or a magazine, you are writing on this thing called the World Wide Web. You figured writing would be easy and you’d get hundreds to thousands of views but instead, you’re only getting a handful every time.

Now that you have written your article, you have to put your marketing hat on and market your work. You’re thinking what? I have to market my own work? Unfortunately, you do. Unless you’re J.K. Rowling or Stephen King, you have to build a name for yourself and market your own work.

This sounds hard but it’s actually not. The hardest part is you need to dedicate time to market your work after you’ve written it. I’m going to share five ways you can do this and give you some tips.

My 17,000 Followers

I never took a marketing class or a social media class but over the years I have built a good following of over 17,000 followers on the social media sites I am going to mention. I didn’t do all of this overnight but have constantly shared information whether I was marketing something I’m working on, a family picture, or I’m sharing a little story.

In the beginning, I was sending friend requests but now I rarely do that. If someone wants to connect with me, they do. I don’t need to chase people down since I have a pretty good list of followers.

At a minimum, I share articles I write every single day to at least 4000 followers several times a day. Let me repeat that. I share articles, note the plural, I wrote every single day to at least 4000 followers several times a day.

So, yes, this takes time. But if you block out time in your schedule, you can do the same and get new followers as well.

I am not a social media master but will share a few tips that have helped me. Some sites I use better than others which you’ll see. Let me share a few secrets that you can use today to get more views on your articles.

Connect with Groups — Facebook

Facebook is the largest social media platform on the planet. Mark Zuckerberg’s little hobby in college is now one of the most recognized companies and you can use it to get eyes on your blog.

Medium writers who are not directly related to the company itself have created Facebook groups where Medium writers can share their articles just about every day. These groups have hundreds to thousands of people who are sharing their articles. If you are not in one, I encourage you to join them. Just search for Medium or Medium writer in the Facebook search engine and you’ll see several sites pop up.

Each of these groups has its own rules and requirements. Yes, it stinks sometimes but I believe it helps the group become too spammy like other Facebook groups which you may have seen. To find out which group or groups you like, join them, and share away!

My Tip — Share you most recent article or a popular article to get more views. Then make sure you reciprocate at least the people who do the same for you as they like, clap, or comment on your article.

A Busy Social Media Site or is it?— Twitter

With millions of users, Twitter can look confusing upon first look but can be powerful when used correctly. If you blink, you’ll see ten to twenty new tweets appear. A tweet is a message or post from a Twitter user. When I first opened my account, I didn’t like it since I had no idea what to do. After years of practice, I figured it out. If you are a writer, this a goldmine for you, and there is a lot you can do.

In terms of sharing your articles on Twitter, this is one area you have to do. There are so many writers on Twitter as well as Medium writers. It’s a great way to connect with them and get more views of your work. Then your article can also reach people searching for that topic. Twitter has a lot of real-time information so if your article is current, you could get a lot of views.

Make sure you read the last section of this article where I go more in depth on hashtags. So make sure you use the right hashtags on your tweet. Hashtags are used very frequently and attract people searching for that hashtag.

My Tip — share your articles on this platform every day. After you have a lot of articles written, then you need to come up with a system so you are not sharing the same article every single day. Your followers will get bored and may even unfollow you. You can share your most recent articles or share a certain topic on certain days.

Images Makes Sales — Pinterest

I use Pinterest but probably should use it more to share my blog articles. I have built a very popular site over the years on some themes I am interested in, fitness and BMWs. Because of that, I have a lot of viewers on pictures that I’ve shared. If there is a topic you like, share that often. When you share your blog article, your followers will catch something that may interest them.

Pinterest is an interesting site and many people view this site as a place where followers are looking to buy something now. Your article may draw interest from your followers or Pinterest users. I don’t have an exact formula or plan with this site but one day I want to give you more details in the future.

My Tip — share your most recent articles on this site.

Pictures Say a 1000 Words — Instagram

The Instagram market is catered toward the Millennials and Generation Z but there are some older users on this platform. So you know, I’m not a Millenial or a Gen X but have a built a pretty decent following. I’m not a videographer or create the best pictures but the key here is also using the right hashtags with your pictures.

Users on Instagram only spend a few seconds before they move on to the next picture. So your images are key and really need to catch your followers and potential followers. For this, you need to have the image from your blog post to share. I would also encourage you to add some words on the picture since many people are visual. A picture is good but the words on the picture could get your follower to stop, read your description and then read your article. This is a little more work, but you may get another person to view your article and a potential Instagram follower.

My Tip — If you use a phone to share your images, I recommend using the InShot app which allows you to create the words on your images. There are other apps but this is the app I use and like. It’s not hard to figure out and very simple to use.

The Professional Social Media — LinkedIn

On LinkedIn, you will see a lot of people who work or looking for a job. You could say it’s a little more professional. Depending on your followers, you will get more people to view your article.

Because of how LinkedIn is set up, sharing your article link may not always work. LinkedIn wants to keep people on LinkedIn. So sharing your article link may get fewer eyes on your post. So I’ll tell you what I do.

My Tip-When I share an article, I copy parts of the article and then share it to LinkedIn. LinkedIn will let you share 1300 words with an image before you reach your limit. So I may share a few paragraphs and then write, to view the rest of the article, click the link below in the comment section. Yes, this is also a little more time and work but you want to get more eyes on your article.

Using the Right Hashtags

Here is the bonus you’ve been waiting for. This is the key piece for people to find you on social media and possibly the most important part — hashtags. According to Digital Trends:

hashtag is a word or phrase that follows a pound sign (also known as a hash) and is used to identify specific posts on social media

No one can pick the hashtag for you, except you. Hashtag on social media are designated with a # followed by the word. For instance, #blog is a hashtag. Some hashtags do better than others depending on how popular they are.

Finding the right hashtag may take some time depending on the topic of your article. Focus on areas you are familiar with. Some of the top hashtags for 2020 are here.

My Tip-Some popular blog hashtags you should use are #blog, #blogs, #blogger, and #writingcommunity.

This is a lot of work and information but I can almost guarantee this is what you need to do to get more views on your blog. Writing the blog takes a lot of work but so does marketing your blog. You can’t always expect people to find you on Medium when there are so many other writers sharing their work as well. Sometimes you need to do something different.

Here are some other articles to help you with your blog:

Do you share your articles on social media?

Tom Handy is a top Finance, Investment, Bitcoin, and Parenting writer on Medium, and the father of two kids. He retired from the Army and sits on several non-profit boards. You can find him on Twitter @tomhandy1.