Writing and Editing Excellence
Five Questions to Increase Curation Chance and the Number of Loyal Readers on Medium
Critical questions serve as a self-editing checklist for writers
Introduction
Dear New Writer,
I start my story by asking three questions to you, as my goal is to answer them based on my experience.
Do you want to increase reading times for your stories?
Do you want to convert your followers to your regular readers?
Do you want to increase the number of your regular readers?
If your answers are yes to these questions, you found the right resource to inform, educate, and motivate you.
In this story, I share my reading, writing, and editing experience by simplifying the critical factors under five main headings.
I converted these headings into questions so that you can use them as a checklist while self-editing and before submitting your articles aiming to be distributed to topics.
When developing these questions, I wore my reader, writer, and editor hats.
1 — As a reader, these points help me choose and consume content from curated collections.
2 — As a writer, I have been asking these questions to self-edit my content over three decades.
3 — As an editor, I use these points while assessing the submissions for acceptance, particularly for adding stories to a curated collection.
The purpose of asking these questions is to improve the quality of articles and increase the chance of curation. As a byproduct, self-editing by asking these questions can dramatically increase the readability of your content. The primary purpose of curation is to give confidence to the reader.
This list is not exhaustive on purpose but covers almost 80% of critical items. My focus is only on significant points which can make a considerable impact on enhancing the quality of your content.
If you can afford to hire an editor, it can be ideal.
However, not many writers can afford to hire an editor. As an alternative, the best approach is to self-edit by asking the following five questions after completing your story and proofreading it yourself.
Then, if possible, I recommend conducting peer reviews of your content. Casting different eyes on your content is a proven quality improvement method.
Here are the questions that you need to ask when self-editing your story.
Question 1 — Is my content easy to read?
The choice of words makes a big difference in readability.
You can check whether you are using common words instead of difficult words, which may confuse your readers.
Your first paragraph must be clear and precise for the message you want to convey.
It is the first paragraph that attracts the attention of the reader to continue to read. If you lose your reader in your first paragraph, your story loses a chance for this reader.
If you are lucky to have good readers, perhaps they may skim through your bullet points or jump to the conclusion paragraph.
Your goal is to make the first paragraph compelling so that the readers are motivated and feel obliged to read the rest of your story.
Some readers start reading from the conclusion section. After the first paragraph, you must focus on the last paragraph.
Your conclusion should provide important takeaways with not too much detail. You can craft your conclusive remarks in a way that your readers are motivated to read the details of each point you mention in your conclusion.
Question 2 — Does my content give distinct value to my readers?
People are busy. Their time is precious. Nobody wants to waste their time. They want to be educated, entertained, or informed. Readers usually choose to read an article for the following reasons:
to learn something new,
to validate their beliefs,
to stimulate their mind,
to gain inspiration and motivation.
You need to ensure your content provides one or more of these values.
Readers enjoy new perspectives, not repeated and recycled ideas.
The critical point you need to focus on is whether your content is novel.
Novelty, in this context, means fresh ideas and unique perspectives.
You write for your reader, not for yourself.
Question 3 — Is my content interesting and unique?
It would be best if you could find ways to make your story interesting and even exciting.
Readers would not spend their time on tedious and dull stories. Your style plays a vital role in making your stories enjoyable and attractive.
Choosing interesting words and metaphors can be helpful in keeping the attention of the reader. Humor is another factor in maintaining reader engagement.
Question 4 — Does my content meet editorial standards and guidelines?
When you are reviewing your story from an editorial point of view, you can consider the following key points.
The first item for editorial standards is the accuracy of language. Your content must be grammatically correct with no spelling errors or typos.
The second item is your narration, effective use of words, and logical flow.
The third item is clarity. It would help if you used explicit language with no cluttered statements, which may confuse your readers. When reviewing for clarity, ensure that you remove unnecessary words and sentences.
The low-hanging fruit to meet these requirements is using one or more editing tools. The most commonly used tools are the Hemingway Editor and Grammarly.
If you are submitting your content to specialized publications, you need to read their standards and guidelines. There may have extra editorial requirements.
Question 5 — Is my content appropriately formatted?
Our goal is to increase readers by giving them quality, engaging, and informative content.
You start checking the format of your stories from the title, subtitle, and kickers.
Your title and subtitle should use an established convention.
Keep your title and subtitle as short as possible. Short titles are essential not only for readability but also for search engine optimization.
While the title attracts the attention of the reader, the subtitle should give clues about your content. You can use the kicker to inform the reader about the focus of your topic.
It would help if you used your title, subtitle, and kicker in an integrated way.
Remember, your title is the first factor for readers to decide to read your story.
Then you need to check the format of the content. One critical point is the size of your paragraphs. Based on reader feedback, the shorter your paragraphs, the more enjoyable the reading experience can be.
Formatting of visual elements such as photos, videos, and other embedded objects must align well with the body of the content. A pleasant look gives a good reader experience.
Many readers don’t enjoy stories with cluttered symbols and emojis. Use them sparingly when needed. I prefer not to use them at all.
When formatting your photos, always ensure that the images are captioned with correct source links and that these images are copyright free. You can safely use stock images. Many stock photo sites provide copyright-free images. The most popular ones are such as from unsplash.com, pexels.com, and pixabay.com.
Here is an article on captioning images properly in Medium stories.
Increasing Your Followers and Fans
I provided practical tips for developing your followers and increasing your supportive audience in the following stories.
Conclusions
Following a set of criteria for writing articles not only make it easy to complete but also can help you improve the quality of content and its delivery efficiency.
Your ultimate goal, as a writer, is to gain the confidence of readers and increase the chance of reading time for your content.
Quality is a subjective notion. However, these five points cover commonly accepted quality criteria aiming to improve the readability of your content. The more readable content you produce, the more fans for your content you can gain.
Besides, asking questions is an effective method to detect issues before submitting your content for acceptance.
These five questions can serve as a practical checklist to enhance the quality and acceptability of your articles for curation purposes and give a pleasant reading experience to your readers.
Each question is important. Skipping even one of these questions can adversely affect the quality and readability of your content.
Use these simple yet effective questions to increase your curation chance, gain the confidence of your readers, and increase the number of your fans.
Here is a checklist to improve the quality of your stories.
I also provided guidance on writing viral stories which might bring you significant income.
Here is an article that might help you become a top writer quickly.
How to Become a Top Writer in Three Months on Medium
A Practical Guide for New Writers
How to contact editors for mentorship
Our editors work on our Slack workspace. Some editors enjoy line editing and support our writers. Their input can increase your curation chance. I highly recommend you find mentors from our editors on Slack. Here is a list of editor profiles to give an idea about their background and writing styles.
Meet Dr Mehmet Yildiz — Dr Mehmet Yildiz Chief Editor and Owner
Meet Dr John Frederick Rose Dr John Frederick Rose
Meet Dr Preeti Singh — Dr. Preeti Singh
Meet Dr Michael HENG, PBM — Dr Michael Heng
Meet Arlo Hennings, PhD — Arlo Hennings, Ph.D.
Meet Jennifer Geer — Jennifer Geer
Meet Bill Abbate — Bill Abbate
Meet Sufyan Maan — Sufyan Maan, M.Eng
Meet Josh Balerite Acol — Josh Balerite Acol
Meet Maria Rattray — Maria Rattray
Meet Brooklyn Muse — Brooklyn Muse
Meeet Lawson Wallace — Lawson Wallace
Meet Michael Patanella — Michael Patanella
Meet John Cunningham — John Cunningham
Meet Neha Sandhir — Neha Sandhir S
Meet Julius L. Evans — Julius Evans
Meet Vidya Sury — Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles
Meet Helen Müller — You, Me and Happiness
Meet Bryan Dijkhuizen Bryan Dijkhuizen
Meet Krishna V Chaudhary Krishna V Chaudhary
Meet Ntathu Allen — Ntathu Allen
Meet Aldric Chen — Aldric Chen
Meet Arthur G Hernandez Arthur G. Hernandez
Meet Kristina Segarra — Kristina Segarra
Meet Michael Nagy — Michael Nagy
Meet Sumera Rizwan — Sumera Rizwan
Meet Agnes Laurens — Agnes Laurens
Meet Britni Pepper — Britni Pepper
Meet Karen Madej — Karen Madej
Meet Chelsea Mandler — Chelsea Mandler MAT
Meet Kasey Harrington — Kasey Harrington
Meet Aamir Kamal — Aamir Kamal 🚀🚀🚀
Meet Steve Alexander (Alex) — The Wordsmith™🏳️🌈🇺🇸
Meet Carrie Alice Kelly Carrie
Editorial Profile of Dr Gabriella Korosi Dr. Gabriella Korosi
Meet Dr. Yogesh Haribhau Kulkarni PhD Yogesh Haribhau Kulkarni (PhD)
Meet Raymond M.E. Aguirre: Raymond M.E. Aguirre
Meet Annie Wegner on Medium Annie Wegner
Meet Poornima Verghese-Ram Poornima Verghese-Ram
Meet Rob Hourmont on Medium Rob Hourmont
Meet Gareth Willey Gareth Willey
Meet Sobaan Saeed Sobaan Saeed
An Interview with Annelise Lords on Medium Annelise Lords
Meet Benito Bartolo Benito Bartolo
We will add more editor profiles soon. Thank you for reading the profiles of our editors. You can find their profiles in the attached collection for future reference.
We will add more editor profiles soon. You may also bookmark this collection managed by ILLUMINATION-Curator so that you don’t miss when we add new profiles. Collection of Editor Bios: Meet Editors of Illumination Integrated Publications. Thank you for reading the profiles of our editors.
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The Joy of Selling 1,000+ Books In A Month With Minimal Investment
What I Learned After Publishing 1,010 And Reading 100,000 Stories on Medium
Short-Form Stories Not For Income But For Visibility. Think Of Them As A Tripwire
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Sample Humorous Stories
Finally, After Burning Her House, Georgia Found Enlightenment
Hilarious Tips to Prevent Brain Atrophy and Keep the Gray Matter Giggling
8 Psychological Points I Had to Unlearn and Relearn the Opposite
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