How I Achieved a 100% Curation Rate on Medium

Every single story I wrote and published on Medium since 2020 has been curated — one took 8 months.

Every single article I have published on this platform since last year was chosen for further distribution. Ironically, by writing this piece, I will most likely break my curation streak. After all, Medium does not curate articles about Medium.

I joined the partner program back in July last year while I was still working as a full-time regional journalist. I published only rarely as my day job sapped most of my writing energy. But I work in a different field now and, since February, I’ve been writing on Medium consistently.

I have published 12 stories in various publications and all of these stories were curated eventually. I say eventually because one took eight months.

In the interest of transparency and because I don’t expect you to take me at face value, I have included screenshots from my stats pages within this article.

One more disclaimer — in 2018, I imported a couple of posts from my old blog to Medium. These have since been unlisted. I am not sure if curation was around then, but these stories were not curated. The focus of this piece is on stories I wrote and published on the platform after I started writing specifically for Medium’s audience.

I genuinely believe a high curation rate is not out of reach as long as you’re a half decent-writer and you follow Medium’s Distribution Standards.

Without further ado, here are screenshots of all the stories I’ve published so far with the coveted ‘chosen for further distribution’ note underneath the headlines.

The curators passed on my first story initially — it was probably the clickbaity headline

I’d explored Medium before and loved the content — it’s amazing how often Google came up with thoughtful long-form features from Medium. Paying the $5 membership fee to enjoy more beautiful writing was a no-brainer for me.

Prior to writing my first story for Medium, I did everything you should do when you join a new platform:

• I poured over the guidelines published by Medium itself
• I read lots of stories from authors who had found success here, including J.J. Pryor’s Feedium work — specifically this article.
• I experimented with various ideas and drafted and re-drafted that first article I ended up publishing.

But, alas, none of this was enough.

I didn’t know much about publications at the time, so I self-published my first piece and waited for the views to come pouring in. Now, while I didn’t get 0 views, it wasn’t exactly the viral hit I had hoped it would be.

In two weeks, the dreaded message appeared in my stats — my story was not selected for further distribution. It was painful, being rejected. I was a journalist after all — I wrote stories for a living!

In hindsight, the tabloid-style clickbait headline I chose for my article initially is what probably caused curators to pass on my piece. Medium does not look favourably upon clickbait, and this could easily qualify:

English Is My Second Language but I’m a UK Based Journalist — You Can Do It Too

When I started writing seriously on Medium last month, I changed the headline and made a few little tweaks to my first story. Nothing substantial, though. Then, I left it and focused on other stories.

A few weeks later, I was looking at the stats for this old piece and I noticed it had been distributed! Eight months later, my story was chosen for further distribution by the curation gods.

Then, The Startup picked it up.

This piece wasn’t curated initially, but it still ranked highly on Google. It was found by a journalist working for JournoResources and I was interviewed for an article for that website. So curation isn’t the only way to receive recognition for your work.

All my stories have been curated since — here’s why I think this happened

I wrote another two stories in 2020 — one was curated and picked up by the Startup, and another was curated after being accepted by the Ascent. Then, I started writing actively in February this year in hopes of getting a bit of a ‘side-hustle’ going.

So why did I get curated every time I published an article?

• I followed the rules. I didn’t assume I knew everything there was to know about content writing just because I’d worked in a newsroom. In fact, my prior experience in journalism taught me that there is always a learning curve where you get to know your audience and publication.
• I provided value but put in my personal experience as well. For example, after I lost my job in September, I was in a pretty dark place. I started journaling for mental health reasons and wrote about my experience for the Ascent. I supplemented my experience with research-backed facts about the benefits of journaling and suggested ways people could apply this themselves.

• If I couldn’t write about my experience, I wrote about topics I was genuinely passionate about. For example, after I found out most adults in the UK didn’t read, I wrote about the benefits of reading, once again using research-backed data. It was a simple, fun article to write but it hit the right boxes.

• I joined as a reader first and only wrote sporadically. I genuinely love the content and enjoy going through my Reader’s Digest. I spend more time reading and interacting with others’ work than I do writing. And right now? That’s important. I’m still finding my way here and I can’t hope to be successful if I don’t read high-quality stories that do well here.

To sum up, Medium’s curators seem to like well-formatted articles written by half-decent writers who inject their personal experience into their pieces. Ensuring the articles provide value for their audience, as well as research-backed facts, won’t hurt either.

Those are my observations, in a nut-shell. What’s your experience with curation been like?

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