Medium Story Formatting
How to Properly Use Links in Your Medium Stories
The definitive guide to links; affiliate and otherwise
Using links in your Medium stories can be a great way to support your ideas, tag other writers and their stories, promote a cause or provide additional perspective.
There are two general varieties of links; internal and external.
Internal links
These are used to tag other Medium members by using the @ symbol and their profile name. Using a tag in your story alerts the other Medium member (as long as they have notifications turned on) and provides a hyperlink directly to that person’s profile embedded in your story.
Other internal links are to other peoples’ stories or to publications within the Medium universe. You can choose to link to a story or publication by highlighting a word or words and clicking on the interwoven chain in the menu bar:
You can also insert a web address to a Medium story. Once you paste it into the Medium editor like this:
https://readmedium.com/how-i-format-my-medium-stories-every-time-1a70a783879a
Simply hit
External links
You can use the hyperlink button to add links to external sites as well. Reasons for doing this may vary, but the most common are reference links to support information in your article, a non-affiliated product recommendation, give credit to an outside source or author, offer connection links to social media pages, links to join a mailing list and affiliate links.
Affiliate links are allowed on Medium, however, according to Medium’s rules any affiliate links or outside payment received for writing a story MUST be disclosed somewhere in the story.
Here are a list of the “Do’s” and “Avoid’s” when using each type of link:
Internal tags
When you use a tag in your article, the person you tag will be listed like this Timothy Key and be informed of it in the site notifications.
And they will also get an email if they have the notification function turned on for their profile.
Tags are a great way to give credit to other writers on Medium or ask people to comment or engage with your writing.
Do: Use tags to credit other authors when they have inspired you or you just appreciate their work and want to alert others to it. You can tag several (or lots) of people in your articles, just be sure the tag is a welcome gesture and not an annoyance.
Avoid: Spamming a list of people in an effort to pull traffic to your articles when your tag is likely not a welcome event.
Internal Medium story links
Linking your stories to other stories you have published is a great way to introduce people to your work. If they liked the article they are currently reading, they may want to read more of your stories, so linking a few in your article is a good idea.
The storyboard version of the link is the most eye-catching as it gives the viewer a glimpse of the title and your story photo to entice them to read the story. However, too many storyboard article links can be overwhelming to the reader, and they may not follow any of them when faced with too many choices. One exception to this is when a publication lists all the current article links for the publication within a single story. In that case, the reader expects a long list of storyboard links.
Typically, 1–3 storyboard links work best in an article. You can spread them throughout or list them at the bottom. Either strategy has plusses and minuses, so it is up to you to decide how best to deploy these internal storyboard links.
If you are doing a compilation story where you want to link a lot of your work, consider a mix of hyperlink text and storyboards to make clicking on the links more inviting.
Also, consider explaining where the hyperlink texts goes and also consider explaining a little bit more about any storyboard links as well. As an example, in the paragraph above I have added a link to one of my stories. However, you wouldn’t necessarily have any idea where it leads based on the context of the paragraph.
A better way to do this is by explaining in your story that this link takes you to an article where I tell you what I look for as an editor when reviewing a story for submission to a publication. See the difference? Similarly, this is a story about what I would be doing if I wasn’t a writer:
See how the text invites the reader to click the link?
Do: Use storyboards for your article links, up to three. Consider mixing it up if you want to include more than three links. And, explain in your text where the link will take the reader when they click on it.
Avoid: Unexplained links to internal stories. Over-using the storyboard link type without explaining why.
External links as citations:
This is confusing to many. Authors that are accustomed to writing academic articles typically use common conventions to cite sources in their pieces. They may use MLA or APA formatting or something similar so that all the sources are cited in the same manner.
Medium is different. Generally, the stories are delivered in more conversational writing style and citation standards are much laxer. In fact, there really aren’t any standards. However, it is useful to make any citations as clear as possible.
Often, using the methods described above describing where the citation link leads will be the best practice. For example:
“There is a definite difference between micromanagers and effective leaders as demonstrated in this article by Paul Meyers, MBA.”
(Okay, the example is an internal link, but it works the same way for external links as well.)
Another way is to preface a series of links by saying something like, “All links in this story lead to online articles supporting the story premise.”
Do: Explain where the external link will lead the reader and why they will want to click on it. Otherwise disclose where the link leads either through contextual means or explicitly stating.
Avoid: Unexplained or arbitrary links to outside sources.
External links to products or services
This is where the waters get a bit murky with links. There are several areas of the Medium community rules where you can go awry by linking to outside sources.
Medium prohibits ads, promotion and marketing in general and also prohibits spam as well as paid, automatic, bulk or non-genuine interactions. The take home here is that Medium is not a platform on which to sell.
Links and/or stories that exist solely to point a reader to a different spot to buy something are not allowed.
That said, there are several organic and genuine ways you can reference, recommend or link outside products. One way is if your story is a comparison of different services like web site hosting. It is perfectly okay to write an article about your experience and place a link so the reader can go check it out. One oft-repeated message is that writers on Medium should use editing software to avoid spelling and grammar issues. Many people will recommend using Grammarly. This type of link is perfectly acceptable.
Medium tolerates some indirect marketing, such as allowing authors to place a link in their bio pointing to a web site or mail platform where people could then possibly buy a book or service.
Do: Link to products or services you can personally recommend as an organic part of a meaningful and newsworthy story.
Avoid: Links that are directly marketing a particular product or service as the main point of a story.
External affiliate links
Everything about external links as above applies to affiliate links as well. Affiliate links are allowed, provided that you disclose that the link results in a payment to the author.
Do: Use affiliate links as a personal recommendation or endorsement as an organic part of a meaningful and newsworthy story — be sure to disclose the presence of affiliate links.
Avoid: Direct marketing and undisclosed affiliate links.
CTA’s and links to social media or author websites
Medium allows authors to place a web link in their bio, as well as including footer information at the end of articles that may contain links to social media or email services. Mine is at the end of this article as an example.
Much like other external links, these need to be organic means for writers and readers to connect with one another and not direct marketing efforts. There are mixed feelings about whether writers should use a footer with social media and mail links, it is up to you if you feel comfortable doing so.
Do: Use social media and personal website links only if you are comfortable and only as a way to connect with other Medium users.
Avoid: Using social media or websites links explicitly for marketing and sales efforts.
These are the best practices for using both internal and external links within your stories. Links can greatly enhance the quality of your stories and I encourage you to utilize these best practices to bring out the finest in your writing.
If you enjoyed this article and want to see more like it, consider becoming a Medium member. If you use my link, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you, and you can read thousands of stories like this one for only $5 per month.
Timothy Key spent over 26 years in the fire service as a firefighter/paramedic and various fire chief management roles. He firmly believes that bad managers destroy more than companies, and good managers create a passion that is contagious. Compassion, grace and gratitude drive the world; or at least they should. Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, and join the mail list.
