I Am Totally Overthinking Medium

And, probably, so do you. Here’s how not to.

Last week I published a long essay on Medium.

I see new writers who have only been a month on this platform post articles about how you should write. Well, after eight months of daily writing, I am still trying to figure out the best way to create content on this platform. And that essay was an attempt to do just that — in written form.

Did I figure it out? Not really.

The irony is, it took me seven full days to write that essay. I wrote a draft in the first two. I spent another five days editing, revising, showing it to my girlfriend, and making final improvements after her comments.

Then I hit “Submit.”

Nicole Akers said it was one of the best things I wrote for her publication. She’s nice. But I agree. I felt really good about that essay. I am also a big believer in feeling good about the work you do — even if nobody else agrees with you.

But even though I put in so much effort into one Medium piece (a rarity these days!) — it got “only” 500 claps so far. If you think that’s a lot, keep reading.

You see, I can’t stop thinking about that James Altucher post I wrote back in February. I spend thirty minutes on it before hitting publish.

It received 7,500 claps and made me over $2,000.

One. Fucking. Post.

It performed better than the 99 pieces that followed. In fact, since then, I haven’t had a single piece that went even close to that level of engagement. And did I mention that I write every day?

Even more: it was one of my “10 Lessons I Learned From…X” series, of which I had 10 in total with people like Seth Godin, Steven Pressfield, Naval Ravikant, and Paul Graham. But only the James Altucher one performed so well.

Why?!

Was it the “don’t pay your credit card debt” controversial advice? Was it because of James himself? Or was it because it was short, meaty, and straight-to-the-point?

I almost broke my brain trying to figure this out.

On one hand, I want to create meaningful content. I want to matter. I want to create art. On the other, I could really use a few more “James Altuchers” to pay some of my bills.

Of course, I didn’t start chasing the money trying to write more James Altuchers. I am better than that. But that experience got me thinking really hard.

Am I doing something wrong?

Yesterday I went on a run and listened to a podcast interview with the CEO of Patreon, Jack Conte. He created Patreon when he was 28 years old. Before that, he was a YouTube creator. He still is, actually. (And he’s a crazy dude. You can check him out here.)

In that interview, he said one thing that *really* resonated with me.

One of the first music videos I did, I worked on it for six months. I put it out and…nobody cared. And then I spend like a day working on this video, put it out, and it received more than a million views. It’s crazy how this works.

Boom. This is me! Yes, this is me.

And I bet, this is something many creators using platforms like Medium or YouTube can resonate with.

It’s the ultimate struggle of being a content creator.

Not knowing what will succeed. Creating into the void. And not seeing the right correlation between our effort and, well, reward.

This goes against everything we were ever taught.

Remember school? If we did a good job — or at least tried very hard — we’d get a pat on the back.

The teacher would come up to our desk, light a cigarette and say, “Good fucking job, dude! You nailed it!”

(Well, OK, maybe not like that.)

If we did a bunch of stupid shit at work (like make 3 different versions of the same Excel spreadsheet for a marketing campaign, just in case), we’re seen as thorough.

In short, in the “real world”, the more we tried — the more reward we got. In the form of grades, praise, promotion, or even compensation.

Well, I’ve got bad news for my fellow creatives out there.

With content, it’s just not the case. You can spend an entire month writing a blog post, but if you don’t have an audience, it will fail.

More than that: the “audience” — that number of followers you’ve got — doesn’t really mean anything anymore on platforms like Medium and YouTube.

The effort you put in creating content doesn’t necessarily correlate with the output your receive in the form of views, claps, follower growth, and even money.

These platforms are their own ecosystems. People come to these platforms to consume any content — not just yours.

Your followers are not really your followers, they are just people who liked your content and clicked “subscribe.”

Sometimes it feels like you’re borrowing an audience from Medium.

And that’s how it is. Your audience doesn’t belong to you. There’s no direct relationship.

If you create something outstanding that strikes a chord, you’ll be noticed. But that rarely happens. This is why, in 99% of cases, your content dies in obscurity.

I wish this wasn’t the case. I am a guy who believes that “quality has legs.” I am a guy who wants to create meaningful stuff and matter and change the world with my big ideas.

But that’s the truth. Quality is secondary. You can create a masterpiece and not be seen. By denying this truth, you just end up at a disadvantage to someone who accepts it.

Let’s say you have accepted this truth. Now, what should you do with it?

Glad you asked.

Create.

Make as much content as you can.

This doesn’t mean you should sit down and bang out 10 Medium posts in one sitting until your eyes bleed. No. This means: focus on creation. Focus on the output.

Just make cool shit and hit “publish”. Overthinking is the enemy of creative success.

You see, you become successful in content creation by doing a simple thing: showing up. It’s simple, yet so difficult for many of us.

People overthink. People are impatient. People think that if they wrote 10 posts or spent 10 days on a post that somebody should care about it.

But I always remind myself of something I read in Steven Pressfield’s book.

“Nobody wants to read your shit.”

Period.

And when you start with that thought, you increase your chances of creating something that people would actually want to read.

Let me just say it this way: no matter how well you can write or create content, you’ve got to show up consistently.

If you are a bad writer, show up every day. If you are a genius writer, this doesn’t mean shit in the modern world.

You still have to show up.

You can look at my James Altucher post success back in February and think to yourself,

“Well, he made $2,000 on that one post. This means that I can just write one post and make $2,000.”

But no. You’ve got to write all those other 99 posts to have that 1 viral hit.

Which is to say (again), keep showing up.

Learn from nature. Humans think that evolution doesn’t work. But they are just not looking at the right zoom.

Evolution creates a bunch of mutations, most of which (99.99%) end up to nothing. You can’t expect your kids to have a third leg. But once every millennium, a rare mutation happens that moves the whole species forward. (This means a sad truth: from the point of evolution, you’re most likely unnecessary.)

There is no secret, no tactic, and no lifehack. There is no such thing as “a perfect Medium post.” Nobody knows what will succeed or not. I repeat: nobody knows.

That’s why 99% of articles that tell you the “Complete Breakdown Of My $1,000+ Article” are complete bullshit. It’s called “survival bias”. And by copying what they say in that article (or by trying to emulate the ones that worked well for you), you’re confusing cause and effect.

I now have two publications. It’s a great pleasure for me to work with writers and to read their stories. And I often receive emails from them, asking for help. “What should I do?”

My answer, right here, a much simpler one then the one I gave in that essay: don’t overthink. Create as much as you can. Become better. And create some more.

There’s no tradeoff between quality and quantity. There doesn’t have to be. Make what you think about your writing your ultimate KPI.

Now go write something meaningful.

Every Thursday I send out emails about content creation and creativity, filled with tips on how to succeed as a content creator. If you want to receive them from me, just join here. It’s free.