A Medium Publication Is Not the Only Way to Be Chosen for Further Distribution
It starts with your title
Here is a story on Medium curation, as such this will not be chosen for further distribution. Disqualifying story types, No meta — no stories written about Medium.
Writers for Writers
As a Medium writer, my success comes not from having thousands of followers or money in the bank, not yet.
In the movie, Field of Dreams, the character Ray Kinsella played by Kevin Costner, heard a voice whispering;
“If you build it, he will come”
For us writers, success will come only if we keep on writing, by building more stories.
Chasing Curation
It feels good, especially in the beginning when your inner critic tells you, you can’t write, or you won't be successful on Medium.
Before Medium changed its rules, you will see which topics you were curated for. You also get an email from them, and it was a validation for me to keep on writing.
The first time I got curated, a publication passed. One thing, a new writer here must learn quickly is to be kind to yourself, when you get rejected by editors. It isn’t personal.
I created my own publication, published it, and it got curated.
I shared the story and I got 10 followers from it. Medium sends you an email if your story gets 10 followers from a story, another incentive to keep on writing.
Medium changed its rules on curation, as it moves towards a more relational Medium, writers have talked about it, with hmms and ahhs.
My first article to be chosen for further distribution was for The Writing Cooperative.
You don't receive an email anymore. I wish they will bring that back, but you see in under your stats.
Now, there is no easy way to find which topics you are curated for, but I shared this with Dr. Mehmet Yildiz, who by the way, is instrumental in helping me overcome doubts about my writing.
Dr. Mehmet Yildiz is a writer for writers. If you are still looking for a publication to submit, he welcomes new writers, new voices in ILLUMINATION.
The other day, I found a hack on podcasting. I felt it was too good to share, again, a Medium publication passed. I published it on my own and got zero views.
I felt rejected, not only by editors, by the readers, and by Medium.
Until I read my title
How to Start a Podcast on Spotify in Under 30 minutes
And there it was, in my excitement, I used a clickbait, under Medium rules, no clickbait, and Tom Kuegler wrote about it here.
Clickbait is content that’s designed to entice a reader to click. It often shows up in the form of deceptive or manipulative story packaging (the headline, subheadline, and feature image) — a hyperbolic claim, a too-wide curiosity gap, a titillating image, etc. These stories do not follow through on their promise and often leave the reader unsatisfied.
Since I published it under my own publication, with no readers. I decided to delete the whole article and made a Medium experiment.
I changed the title, kept every word in the story, and published it again.
How to Start a Podcast With a Text to Speech Tool
Within a few minutes, it was chosen for further distribution.
Title matters and Medium is serious about clickbait.
One more thing
Being curated doesn't mean more reads, but it makes you feel good as a writer, it tells you to keep on writing, because if you build it, it will come.