avatarJohn Grisham

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Abstract

The all-in-one workspace for your notes, tasks, wikis, and databases.</h2> <div><h3>A new tool that blends your everyday work apps into one. It's the all-in-one workspace for you and your team.</h3></div> <div><p>www.notion.so</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*bh6IclNzsum8A4GX)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="9720" class="link-block"> <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/onenote/digital-note-taking-app?ms.url=onenotecom&amp;rtc=1"> <div> <div> <h2>Microsoft OneNote Digital Note Taking App | Microsoft 365</h2> <div><h3>Microsoft OneNote has your digital notebook needs covered. With OneNote 2016 we've made our notebook organizer tools…</h3></div> <div><p>www.microsoft.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*a3huJDEC5fj34Sok)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><p id="dd90">Be sure to check them out and use the one that works best with your style of writing. Another underestimated way to improve clarity in your writing and deliver top-notch content to your audience is to improve your formatting.</p><h2 id="b9de">Make your stories skimmable</h2><p id="60d0">This might seem counter-intuitive because you want your readers to, you know, actually read your story but the fact is most people skim. And Medium partner program writers get paid based on how much reading time is spent on your article. But readers just don’t have much time every month to read all the stories that get recommended to their account. You need to help them out by formatting your writing so they are free to skim and still get the point. One way to do this is by using Mediums simple formatting tools. You can format most text by highlighting it and choosing the font size and heading. <b>Make important sections bold</b> to catch your reader’s eye and drive your point home. You can also add things like blockquotes and link embeds like the ones above to make your stories pop.</p><h1 id="ac69">Write on topics that are relevant to your audience and interests</h1><p id="2a66">Do you have an idea for your next story on medium? Good, now take that idea and scrap it. Because your readers don’t care about the story you want to write; they care about the story they want to read. Every article you post on your account should be something your audience is looking for.</p><p id="353a">Did you type “Medium Partner program” or “get paid as a writer” into Google and click on this link? Congratulations, you are my target audience! Medium articles go unread by 90% of their readers every day; this can be attributed to how general they are. Your story shouldn’t just casually touch upon a topic that could interest millions of readers it should be focused on your niche.</p><h2 id="6a5d">Find your niche</h2><p id="d693">So what type of content should you be publishing? To know what kind of content your audience wants from your blog or business, it’s best to know who they are first. Are they moms with young children in the house? College students looking forward to graduation day? Retirees living in Florida who enjoy playing golf every chance they can get at the local course? Once you have that information figured out, it will be much easier to know what type of posts will attract and engage these members.</p><h2 id="d9a3">Deliver the story they want</h2><p id="de08">This doesn’t have to just be a marketing technique. Just like people of different cultures speak different languages your audience has their form of speech. If you don’t speak the language, then they’re going to be uninterested and simply leave your post without reading it. This has the added benefit of improving S.E.O for your stories and by extension your account and publications (More on this later). So make sure that whatever story or piece of content you are publishing is written in a way that can be easily understood by those who read it.</p><p id="e927">Take some time to visit Facebook groups and other communities that your audience frequents. These online communities can even be adjacent to your true target audience. For example, if your target market is mothers in the suburbs you could search for Facebook groups about parenting or local mom’s clubs. From there, it will be much easier to see what type of content is being shared among these members.</p><p id="aaa3">Remember the goal here is to just understand your readers. You aren’t trying to sell them anything yet so avoid posting too much at first. After doing some research and taking a look at other Medium articles related to your topic you should have an idea of what to write about.</p><h1 id="069b">Use the right keywords in your title, tags, and description</h1><p id="e05b">Now that you know what kind of story to write, it’s time to make sure that search engines can find your post. For someone searching on Google or another engine to be able to find your blog article, they need to know what it’s about. You can do

Options

this by editing the settings of your post. You’ll want to update the title and description with something descriptive but that includes those key terms that you should hopefully have gotten by studying communities within your niche earlier. But before you hit publish don’t forget to update your post tags so that readers inside Medium will be able to find your article easier. If you’ve been writing content for these types of readers before you should hopefully have more insight into some of these via the reader interest tags that sometimes appear on published stories.</p><p id="2200">If you have reason to believe that your niche will be reading this blog post then it should go without saying what kind of content to put in the tags. However, if there isn’t any link between your audience and popular tags on Medium then consider skipping this step. Not everyone who writes on the Medium partner program will have a large reader base within the platform and that’s OK, being conscious of S.E.O will attract outside readers from search engines. Just bear in mind that in my experience internal views within Medium seem to earn more compared to external ones.</p><h1 id="394e">Share Medium posts with friends and family</h1><p id="0924">Sharing posts with friends and family might feel awkward at first but it can sometimes give you the boost you need to reach that magic 100 follower count. I’ve always hated trying to convince people I know to follow me online. It almost feels like those annoying Farmville requests on Facebook right? The thing is if you focus on the quality of the writing then they aren’t following you because they know you, they’ve following because you’re now one of the thousands of talented writers on Medium!</p><p id="5721">Just make sure you aren’t too pushy and if you publish often consider how often you think they would like to get new posts sent to them, especially if you’re direct messaging, there’s such a thing as overselling. Don’t turn your partner program blog posts into annoying Farmville requests.</p><p id="b99e">Most of us can think of at least 100 acquaintances that might be interested in following writers like us. The hard part is converting them to medium members. But if you’ve followed my previous advice you should have less trouble getting them to join.</p><h1 id="24c2">Write engaging stories</h1><p id="1fa2">If you follow marketing advice you’ve no doubt read countless articles about engaging copywriting. But what’s behind an engaging post and as a medium partner how do you make one?</p><p id="124d">Well, there isn’t one answer to this question.</p><p id="0ef5">Since you’re writing on a platform that caters to writers and readers alike I’d say your best bet is to write the kind of story that engages both at once. People like to read things they can relate to and Medium provides a way to give them a constant stream of engaging stories daily. This is partly because Medium suggests new posts based on what you’ve already read but also because good writers in the partner program understand one thing.</p><p id="d643">Writers like this know that engaging writing isn’t just using the right words in the correct order, it’s understanding why that person is reading at all. And then delivering on that reason efficiently and enjoyably if possible. Good poetry is the best use of the least amount of words. And in our digital age every great writer, marketer, and blogger is a poet. That Tweet you wrote that everyone liked, was poetry too. It might seem weird to think about but if your writing invokes a strong emotion for someone then you have just written poetry.</p><p id="4c0b">If this part of the process is something you struggle with then I have good news for you because so do I. That’s why much of this post was written using artificial intelligence! I love using the A.I. Jarvis to help out with writer's block and I quickly became an affiliate. You can leverage this same technology and get 10,000 bonus credits with this free trial signup.</p><div id="ea7d" class="link-block"> <a href="https://jarvis.ai/free-trial?fpr=john14"> <div> <div> <h2>Claim your 10,000 words free trial of Jarvis</h2> <div><h3>Introducing the Pro plan which unlocks the new long-form content assistant to help you write blog posts, stories…</h3></div> <div><p>jarvis.ai</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*KUDsPnWmokfJv4NS)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><h1 id="a569">Conclusion</h1><p id="21c4">This has been my guide on the changes to the Medium partner program and some tips to improve your writing so that you can get your first 100 followers. I hope this guide has helped you in some way. I’d love to hear what you think about the article and if there’s anything else that should be added let me know! And I have a confession to make before you go. I haven’t been able to hit the 100 follower mark myself yet. So if this guide was at all helpful to you please take a second to follow me and I’ll do my best to follow you back. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get our first 100 followers together!</p></article></body>

Get 100 Followers on Medium: Here’s How

It’s not as hard as you think

Photo by Giorgio Trovato on Unsplash

Medium is a great platform for content distribution and the Medium Partner Program has been a huge part of that. This month Medium announced some changes to the program that will affect smaller accounts going forward. One of those changes includes the stipulation that members need to have at least 100 followers by the end of 2021 or they might get booted from the Partner Program. I know Medium has been a great way for me to syndicate my content to my niche so I’ve put together an article with tips on how you can get more followers on Medium!

No Medium account or out of free stories? Sign up here!

How the medium partner program works

Before we get into tips for improving your writing and getting your first 100+ followers on Medium let’s look at how the new Medium partner program works. As a member of the partner program, you can choose to put your blog posts behind a paywall. This means your content is no longer free, but that you will earn more if you can convince free members to convert into paid accounts just by the quality of your story. Along with the follower requirement, another change to the partner program allows you to earn money when a reader joins Medium via a special link just like the one I included above. Not only will you earn money based on reading time you’ll also get half of the subscription fee for any new members that join this way!

How much can I earn from Medium?

In 2019 Medium paid over $6 million to over 30,000 writers. Most medium partners make less than $100 a month. Megan Holstein made $10K that year. Shaunta Grimes of the Viral Nation wrote an earnings report with average weekly earnings of over $1000. Just like other platforms that pay affiliates for content and engagement the sky is the limit. It just depends on the quality of your writing, how many eyes are on your content, and how long members spend reading. If you want to get the most out of the program you need to put in time on Medium. Now that you know a little more about the Medium partner program and how it works let’s get started with some writing tips to gain followers and get paid.

Keep your writing clear and concise

Have a clear vision for what you want to write about. The clarity that writers put into their stories is important no matter where you publish. You need to not only understand your audience but also provide them with a clear vision of what your writing is about and articles on Medium are no exception.

Take notes

Before you get ready to write, make sure you have all your ideas and facts that support them nearby so you can pull from these when you write your article. That’s why I recommend taking notes before you even begin writing your articles. Taking notes ahead of time helps me in two ways.

  1. I get a good idea of the structure my post should take
  2. It keeps me from rambling

Just make sure to not rely too much on these notes. You’re still trying to get into a flow and allow the creative process plenty of room to work. You can think of your notes as a train track, they give you just enough of a guideline to not go off the rails. There are a few tools you can use for note-taking here are a few. (I’m not an affiliate of these)

Be sure to check them out and use the one that works best with your style of writing. Another underestimated way to improve clarity in your writing and deliver top-notch content to your audience is to improve your formatting.

Make your stories skimmable

This might seem counter-intuitive because you want your readers to, you know, actually read your story but the fact is most people skim. And Medium partner program writers get paid based on how much reading time is spent on your article. But readers just don’t have much time every month to read all the stories that get recommended to their account. You need to help them out by formatting your writing so they are free to skim and still get the point. One way to do this is by using Mediums simple formatting tools. You can format most text by highlighting it and choosing the font size and heading. Make important sections bold to catch your reader’s eye and drive your point home. You can also add things like blockquotes and link embeds like the ones above to make your stories pop.

Write on topics that are relevant to your audience and interests

Do you have an idea for your next story on medium? Good, now take that idea and scrap it. Because your readers don’t care about the story you want to write; they care about the story they want to read. Every article you post on your account should be something your audience is looking for.

Did you type “Medium Partner program” or “get paid as a writer” into Google and click on this link? Congratulations, you are my target audience! Medium articles go unread by 90% of their readers every day; this can be attributed to how general they are. Your story shouldn’t just casually touch upon a topic that could interest millions of readers it should be focused on your niche.

Find your niche

So what type of content should you be publishing? To know what kind of content your audience wants from your blog or business, it’s best to know who they are first. Are they moms with young children in the house? College students looking forward to graduation day? Retirees living in Florida who enjoy playing golf every chance they can get at the local course? Once you have that information figured out, it will be much easier to know what type of posts will attract and engage these members.

Deliver the story they want

This doesn’t have to just be a marketing technique. Just like people of different cultures speak different languages your audience has their form of speech. If you don’t speak the language, then they’re going to be uninterested and simply leave your post without reading it. This has the added benefit of improving S.E.O for your stories and by extension your account and publications (More on this later). So make sure that whatever story or piece of content you are publishing is written in a way that can be easily understood by those who read it.

Take some time to visit Facebook groups and other communities that your audience frequents. These online communities can even be adjacent to your true target audience. For example, if your target market is mothers in the suburbs you could search for Facebook groups about parenting or local mom’s clubs. From there, it will be much easier to see what type of content is being shared among these members.

Remember the goal here is to just understand your readers. You aren’t trying to sell them anything yet so avoid posting too much at first. After doing some research and taking a look at other Medium articles related to your topic you should have an idea of what to write about.

Use the right keywords in your title, tags, and description

Now that you know what kind of story to write, it’s time to make sure that search engines can find your post. For someone searching on Google or another engine to be able to find your blog article, they need to know what it’s about. You can do this by editing the settings of your post. You’ll want to update the title and description with something descriptive but that includes those key terms that you should hopefully have gotten by studying communities within your niche earlier. But before you hit publish don’t forget to update your post tags so that readers inside Medium will be able to find your article easier. If you’ve been writing content for these types of readers before you should hopefully have more insight into some of these via the reader interest tags that sometimes appear on published stories.

If you have reason to believe that your niche will be reading this blog post then it should go without saying what kind of content to put in the tags. However, if there isn’t any link between your audience and popular tags on Medium then consider skipping this step. Not everyone who writes on the Medium partner program will have a large reader base within the platform and that’s OK, being conscious of S.E.O will attract outside readers from search engines. Just bear in mind that in my experience internal views within Medium seem to earn more compared to external ones.

Share Medium posts with friends and family

Sharing posts with friends and family might feel awkward at first but it can sometimes give you the boost you need to reach that magic 100 follower count. I’ve always hated trying to convince people I know to follow me online. It almost feels like those annoying Farmville requests on Facebook right? The thing is if you focus on the quality of the writing then they aren’t following you because they know you, they’ve following because you’re now one of the thousands of talented writers on Medium!

Just make sure you aren’t too pushy and if you publish often consider how often you think they would like to get new posts sent to them, especially if you’re direct messaging, there’s such a thing as overselling. Don’t turn your partner program blog posts into annoying Farmville requests.

Most of us can think of at least 100 acquaintances that might be interested in following writers like us. The hard part is converting them to medium members. But if you’ve followed my previous advice you should have less trouble getting them to join.

Write engaging stories

If you follow marketing advice you’ve no doubt read countless articles about engaging copywriting. But what’s behind an engaging post and as a medium partner how do you make one?

Well, there isn’t one answer to this question.

Since you’re writing on a platform that caters to writers and readers alike I’d say your best bet is to write the kind of story that engages both at once. People like to read things they can relate to and Medium provides a way to give them a constant stream of engaging stories daily. This is partly because Medium suggests new posts based on what you’ve already read but also because good writers in the partner program understand one thing.

Writers like this know that engaging writing isn’t just using the right words in the correct order, it’s understanding why that person is reading at all. And then delivering on that reason efficiently and enjoyably if possible. Good poetry is the best use of the least amount of words. And in our digital age every great writer, marketer, and blogger is a poet. That Tweet you wrote that everyone liked, was poetry too. It might seem weird to think about but if your writing invokes a strong emotion for someone then you have just written poetry.

If this part of the process is something you struggle with then I have good news for you because so do I. That’s why much of this post was written using artificial intelligence! I love using the A.I. Jarvis to help out with writer's block and I quickly became an affiliate. You can leverage this same technology and get 10,000 bonus credits with this free trial signup.

Conclusion

This has been my guide on the changes to the Medium partner program and some tips to improve your writing so that you can get your first 100 followers. I hope this guide has helped you in some way. I’d love to hear what you think about the article and if there’s anything else that should be added let me know! And I have a confession to make before you go. I haven’t been able to hit the 100 follower mark myself yet. So if this guide was at all helpful to you please take a second to follow me and I’ll do my best to follow you back. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get our first 100 followers together!

Writing
Marketing
Medium
Partner Program
Better Writing
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