For Success, You Have To Treat Medium Like A Social Media Platform

In order to master Medium, you need to understand this

When I first saw people refer to Medium as a social media platform I was rather surprised. Medium is a place for writers to publish content and build an audience — no advertisement heavy Instagram or networking Facebook. But now, two months into my journey on Medium, I get what they meant.

Medium totally is a social media platform and it may be one of my favorites.

While it’s true that Medium is a site for writers and readers, they are also heavily focused on communication. Building a community, gaining followers, make interactions between members as easy as possible through likes and comments. Sounds a lot like social media to me.

Medium’s Interface

An Interface tells a lot about the motives of the creators behind a tool. For example, back in the day, Instagram's highest priority was to enable its users to like things and post pictures. Therefore, a Like only required a double tap on your screen and the button in the middle lets you post a picture. The Like stayed but the post button was replaced by a shopping bag. Wonder what Instagram’s focus is nowadays…

Medium’s motives are similarly obvious. Scrolling down an article you will notice immediately the bar that prompts you to follow, clap, comment on the article, and even save it if your heart so desires — Making sure that you don’t forget to interact with the piece you are reading right now in any given way.

Now, I will admit that the App doesn’t have this feature as said interaction prompts “only” appear at the end of an article. I personally consider the App far inferior to the Desktop version but I’ll give Medium that their App doesn’t quite follow the pattern. Still, my point stands I think; Interaction is still prompted as all important functions for communication got implemented.

Medium’s Searching System

Now, this is a far more interesting story as Medium recently made some changes to their searching system. I mentioned it before, I only joined Medium about two months ago. That means I am very familiar with the tagging system — in fact, it’s the only system I know! And if I wouldn’t have read about it in another article I wouldn't have questioned its existence.

It seems so natural to me — searching through a site and looking for posts about certain topics by using special tags. It’s the same way I use Instagram, Tumblr, and even Twitter.

And although the tags are killing publications, I consider them a great addition as I have no idea how I would have navigated through Medium without them as a new user.

Building A Following

Social Media loves building a following. Actually, I can’t think of one social media tool that does not have a follow button (And yes, I think “joining a group” like Facebook or hitting “the bell” on Youtube qualifies for building a following too).

Medium — of course — offers that feature too. On here, we can follow a single person or whole publications that are thematic interesting to us. An important feature for sure. And I am fascinated by the way Medium steps up their game again. Because Medium does not only allow for people to follow you on Medium, they also make it possible to subscribe to the writer's very own newsletter; something Medium gains nothing of except the goodwill of their writers.

What Does That Mean For Writers On Medium

To be successful on Medium, you have to treat it like any other social media platform. You need to know the tags that are used the most, the publications that bring the best results, and interact with others as much as you can.

Although I don’t think it’s just about social media managing skills, I am however convinced that no matter how good you are, you need to be willing to play the “social media game” if you want any substantial progress on here. Gaining a following is the goal of any social media platform and Medium is no exception to this. The more, the merrier.

To be honest, I have my fair share of problems with social media —with some more than with others — and I don’t know yet what this new realization means for my journey on Medium. But I stand by what I said: If you want to win, you have to play. Just because I hate the game doesn’t mean I am above it.

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