How To Get Your Stories Boosted

7 tips that include 39 boosty publications, 30 boosters, and more…

Is this the formula that I’ve used to boost myself the fuck into the stratosphere? No, I’ve never been boosted. Medium can suck it, I’m twatwaffling my way to success here without them (and I’m too cool for them). First pro tip: probably don’t use the word twatwaffle.

You’re wondering why you should listen to my punk-ass advice then?

You clever minx — here’s why: I know several boosters, I’ve done more research into it than I’ve seen anyone else do, and…I spent the better part of my afternoon today speaking with a Medium staffer about the boost (about the overall program success and trajectory — not insider details).

I’ve put together a fairly kickass resource here to get boosted. This includes: pubs with boosting powers, people with boosting powers, their actual ‘guidelines’, and my read-between-the-polka-dot-lines analysis.

Will this guarantee that you get boosted? No, the only guarantee in life is that you won’t make it out alive. But, this significantly increases your chances of being boosted. Like using loaded dice in Vegas (but without some douchy hippotwatamus named Vinny breaking your legs).

Capiche?

Why Getting Boosted is Important

Views for non-boosted Medium writers are down across the board. Like, a lot. Boosted people seem to be the only ones doing well (well, and the boosters themselves) stats-wise.

Medium is moving to a human curation model. If you’re looking to build an audience, get views/reads, make money, etc. The boost is the best way to do it.

Once you get boosted you get on the radar of a booster — and they are stacking their rosters, like a baseball team, of their go-to writers to boost. So once you get boosted, it’s more likely to happen again.

If that boost nominator gets you approved more than once — hot diggity dang. It shows them they’ve got good odds in using you for one of their 20 monthly nominations. They only get 20 nominations per month, and only make money when an article they nominate gets boosted. So nominating writers the Medium team (who has to approve their nominations) likes is a smart decision.

Sounds good?

How To Increase Your Chances of Being Boosted

So, I’m going to break this clusterfuck of info down into 5 categories, each with a bunch of tips. Again, these don’t guarantee you’ll be boosted — even if you check these off a list like motherfucking Santa himself. And missing any of these doesn’t disqualify you either. But the more boxes you check, the more ‘boostable’ you become.

1. Actual ‘Guidelines’

You may have seen the actual Medium guidelines. They include stuff like this:

• Is it Constructive?
• Is it Original?
• Does the author speak from Relevant Experience?
• Is the story Well-crafted?
• Does it feel Memorable?
• Don’t be a dick (Ok, this one is my words, not theirs) — no AI, linkfarms, hate, stolen images, etc.

Do you feel like that is vagueness wrapped up in a riddle, cloaked in an enigma? Yeah, me too. But if I didn’t include it, Ariel Meadow Stallings (head boost mammajamma) would put itching powder in my caftan.

2. My Advice on How To Do It

Since the above is vague fuckery, here’s what I’ve figured out by talking to boosters and looking through over 100 boosted articles:

• Formatting: this matters. Make your posts pretty. Use headings, subheadings, reasonable-length paragraphs, images, bulleted/numbered lists (when appropriate), etc. Don’t however randomly put text in bold font (I’ve heard they don’t like that…I don’t think many like that to be honest). I’m aware I’m telling you not to bold random words like I am doing right now…but this article won’t get boosted since they don’t boost meta Medium content.
• Shorter paragraphs. I know, I know — I said this already. But I didn’t see one boosted post with super-long paragraphs. Long paragraphs are harder to read, and a nightmare reading on mobile.
• Get Grammarly (or Hemingway). Use it. No, you’re not too good for it. Are some corrections wrong? Yeah. Don’t take every suggestion it makes, but it can catch things your tired eyeholes miss.
• Source your images. Link to the site and photographer they came from and make sure you have the legal right to use it (this is important). Unsplash and Pexels are two common spots, but there are others. You should be doing this anyways.
• Don’t spam link. The Boost Gods aren’t likely to boost stories with tons of links to your other stories, links to your Ko-fi, affiliate-marketing links, etc. I’ve seen very few boosted posts with self-promotional links. Research links are encouraged though, where appropriate (but also don’t overdo it and link every sentence).
• Expertise. They want you to have some. This isn’t relevant per se to every topic, but if you’re writing about psychology, finance, etc. (you know — fancy, hard things) they’re more likely to boost people with education and/or work credentials.
• Personal story. Here is how you get around issues of ‘credentialism’, using personal stories. You’re an expert in you! They really want stories with a human side. A story only you can write. Really dive into personal experiences and stories — they’re looking for stories with details that can elicit emotion from the readers.

Adding personal elements to your story (ideally that elicits emotion) is super important to being boosted. Most boosted posts I reviewed had a personal narrative weaved in.

*Note: Posts going back 6 months can be boosted. So if you feel you have a previous story that you could revise to add more personal elements, improve the formatting, etc. you can update it. Then figure out a way to wiggle it in front of a booster.

3. Look At Other Boosted Stories

The best way to bend your brain bucket around the type of stories they are looking for is to look over a bunch of them. I put together a list of 84 boosted stories you can check out.

I think as you look over the stories that have been boosted you’ll see patterns. Patterns like their clean-looking formatting, elements of a personal story woven throughout, lack of spammy links, well-researched, and overall just something interesting.

4. Topics

Any topic can be boosted. However, I have seen certain ones that seem to be getting mo’ o’ that sweet, sweet booster juice than others.

The topics I’ve seen appear most often seem to be: AI, LGBTQ+, memoirs, personal stories, photography, social justice, aging, women, writing, and personal development/self-improvement. A quick glance over the topics of the boosted publications below, to me, kinda confirms this.

But again, any topic can be boosted. They also seem to boost totally random topics that are just really unique, like banana barons, perseverance porn, manspreading, crop circles, and for some reason…a pork chop recipe. Don’t look at me like that — I didn’t make these rules!

5. Length

There is no hard-and-fast rule about how long an article needs to be. But from my analysis, the cream-filled sweet spot seems to be around 5–6 minutes. They aren’t going to boost an article full of fluff though, so don’t stretch an article out for the word count though as I have seen 3-min reads, and longer reads be boosted.

If your piece is 17-minutes long — it better be danged interesting! Very few people read stories over 10 minutes, we have short attention spans. Oh, look — squirrel.

6. People Who Can Boost You

Will sucking up to someone with boosting juju get your articles boosted? Nah, they won’t give a shit (and will probably find your sycophantic arse annoying). BUT, being on the radar of a booster certainly can’t hurt!

The power of familiarity and name/face recognition is real. Those alone won’t get you boosted, but maybe if you comment very thoughtfully on their articles, and/or submit to their pub enough they’ll start recognizing you. Or perhaps after interacting with them, one of your stories pops up in their feed, they click on it and think it’s boost-worthy.

Again, no guarantees…but I’d say it’s better to be on their radar than off it.

If you know who they are — can you bribe them? That’s extremely doubtful, but who knows, empty your $100K in Bitcoin doubloons into their Ko-fi (I clearly don’t understand Bitcoin, or Ko-fi) or send them some tasteful nudes and see what happens?

Here are the boosters that I have sniffed out so far:

• Fabricio Teixeira
• Jeff Barton
• Nancy Peckenham
• Kristen Mulrooney
• Justin Cox
• Maia Niguel Hoskin, Ph.D.
• Adeline Dimond
• Ben Huberman
• Kimberly Fosu
• ADEOLA SHEEHY-ADEKALE
• Debbie Walker
• KiKi Walter
• Dan Owen
• Jason Provencio
• Patrick Stewart
• David Todd McCarty
• Graham Zemel
• Nassos Michas
• Remy Dean
• Robert Roy Britt
• Xinran Waibel
• Kevin Alexander
• Kelly Baldwin Heid
• June Kirri
• Linda Caroll
• Johnny Silvercloud
• Sadie Seroxcat
• Christine Schoenwald
• Debra Groves Harman
• Rodrigo S-C

7. Pubs That Can Boost You

Stories in any publication can be boosted — and self-published stories too! However…to think boosters aren’t proactively looking hardest in their own pubs would be naive.

So, posting your stories in these pubs increase your chances of being boosted (and I’ve put the boosters from above next to their pubs for sucking-up reference):

1. Bouncin’ and Behavin’ Blogs — by Jason Provencio
2. The Taoist Online — by Patrick Stewart
3. UX Collective — by Fabricio Teixeira
4. Runner’s Life — by Jeff Barton
5. Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age — by Nancy Peckenham
6. The Belladonna — by Kristen Mulrooney
7. The Writing Cooperative — by Justin Cox
8. ZORA — by Maia Niguel Hoskin, Ph.D.
9. Sybarite — by Adeline Dimond
10. Towards Data Science — by Ben Huberman
11. Scribe
12. Fanfare
13. Mystic Minds by Kimberly Fosu
14. Curious
15. The Generator
16. Modern Women — by ADEOLA SHEEHY-ADEKALE
17. Middle Pause — by Debbie Walker
18. The Memoirist — by KiKi Walter
19. The Narrative Arc
20. Frame Rated by Dan Owen
21. Ellemeno by David Todd McCarty
22. The Gray Area by Graham Zemel
23. Mac O’Clock by Nassos Michas
24. The Signifier by Remy Dean
25. Wise &Well by Robert Roy Britt
26. Data Engineering Things by Xinran Waibel
27. The Riff by Kevin Alexander
28. Symbiotica by Kelly Baldwin Heid
29. Black Bear by KiKi Walter
30. Bitchy by June Kirri
31. History of Women by Linda Caroll
32. The Wind Phone by Christine Schoenwald and Debra Groves Harman
33. Age of Empathy by KiKi Walter
34. AfroSapiophile by Johnny Silvercloud
35. Rainbow Salad by Sadie Seroxcat
36. Counter Arts by Sadie Seroxcat
37. In for a Penny by Christine Schoenwald and Debra Groves Harman
38. BetterHumans
39. Full Frame by Rodrigo S-C

If you’re looking to apply as writers for those pubs, I have another article with links to all of their submission guidelines and how/where to apply. I didn’t include it here because it’s ludicrously long.

That’s it, now…go forth and get boosted more than an Alabama football team (Roll Tide). That means ‘a lot’, in ‘Murican.

Oh, and if you don’t want to miss articles like this one — subscribe to me. And because this is a fuckton of info to take in, you may want to bookmark/save this article for future reference.

~Robin Wilding, reporting from…a basement full of 70s porn mags.