Is It A Waste of Your Time to Write and Publish Daily?

The results tell the answer

The question has popped up a few times recently: whether it is really helpful to publish daily or not?

I have to be honest, I have had very mixed feelings about this.

I have personally published stories daily (on average) for 2 months now. In fact, I believe that I have even published a little over one per day on average.

Overkill?

Perhaps.

However, while it was difficult in the beginning to produce a finished piece every single day, it’s much, much easier now. And there’s a reason.

That reason is that it’s become a habit.

But…is it necessary?

What do the top writers do?

I was watching Zulie Rane and how she works, and I came to the conclusion that it isn’t necessary to publish daily.

She doesn’t publish every day. Instead, she works on a really well-researched and polished article and publishes it when it’s ready — which is every few days from what I see on her profile.

So, as I was reaching the end of the second 30-day lap of daily publishing, I started to think that it was time I slowed down on the quantity, and work more on the quality.

Which can’t be a bad thing, right?

However, I then decided to read some of Tim Denning’s recent work and saw that he, in fact, does publish every single day…at least. Sometimes more!

So, perhaps publishing daily is the right way? Oh, what a conundrum in my frazzled little mind.

What I realised was that the top writers, while being incredible teachers and a great source of inspiration, are at a very different stage of their writing journey than us newbies. For this reason, we can’t take their examples as our ideal path while we are trying hard to warm the algorithm and keep it warm.

If I can’t look to the top writers, then where can I look?

There’s one very clear sign I found that told me the answer. And then another couple of strong hints besides.

The clear answer was my own stats.

I did take a little step back for a few days. While I still published daily, I was only publishing short-form pieces for The Shortform 10-Day Challenge.

It so happened that, this particular week, my sister had come over from her home in France as a surprise for my father’s 80th birthday, and I was not prioritising writing in the slightest. I was spending no more than 20–30 minutes in total on each piece and not giving much attention to writing an attention-grabbing title.

My aim was to publish something for each day of the challenge and, as long as it was decent and read nicely, I didn’t care about much else.

None of these stories got much attention and nothing else was drawing people to my profile. And so, despite my views having been on a general increase for a while, the views began to tail. On average, that week, I was getting the lowest number of views all month.

The experiences of others

The next point of reference was seeing the experiences of others.

Now, while everyone’s experience is different, some people write viral (or semi-viral) articles in their first couple of months, others take longer to get an article out that gains a lot of traction. So, while the following example is not representative of the average experience, it proves that, when you have gained experience in writing, and aim for a high number of published articles per month, momentum is the natural result.

Jenn Leach has proven that a lot can happen in a few short months of daily publishing. In fact, she is publishing closer to 2 articles per day, but she also has years of writing experience behind her, and business experience that she can write about and gain readership through them being popular topics.

She also explains how she engages with everybody that comments and reads, claps, and comments herself, for this is an essential part of building engaged followers, reads, and working the algorithm.

I read a raw and honest story by Justiss Goode, in which she shared how she had written 440 articles in 6 months — yes, you read that correctly — but was not typically even hitting three figures per month in income.

And then, guess what happened? Yep, that raw, honest, and vulnerable article garnered so many views and supportive comments that I expect November is now going to look very different for her.

But, had she not been writing so consistently for this long, would that article have gained the same traction? Likely not.

Consistency versus stopping and starting

I then read the experience of another writer who had discovered exactly what happens when you write consistently and then take a prolonged break.

Delilah Brass had been writing very consistently and having her articles regularly chosen for further distribution, presumably since she joined Medium in March of this year. But then, she took a two-week break and her views took a nose-dive.

Her subtitle reads:

“I have been ghosted by the algorithm.”

Oh, the mysterious algorithm. Does anyone really understand it?

Playing algorithm tennis has to be the main occupation in any creator’s life, whether you hang out mostly on Medium, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. (I have even heard it said that those building the algorithm on LinkedIn don’t understand it because it gets changed so often.)

So, if you are hoping to find out exactly how the algorithm on Medium works, I advise you to give up right now and just know this one thing that I am gleaning from all of this:

It favours consistency and engagement.

What is the best practice, even if daily publishing is hard?

Consistency and daily do not equal the same. If you can’t publish daily, how often can you publish? Keeping a consistent flow is vital, and will gradually build into a nice library, or portfolio, of your work.

Writing every day, even if you don’t hit publish, is going to make your ideas come more easily, and the articles flow more readily. Committing to writing daily will build a habit and can, eventually, turn you into a content machine. Trust in the process.

Try writing short-form stories, which must have a maximum of 150 words. While it takes some practice to write something creative and articulate in such a contained number of words, it’s very rewarding and they are powerful little pieces on the Medium platform. Publications to join for this are The Shortform and Everything Shortform, among others.

Have a way to record topic and headline ideas. I use my iPhone Notes App, so no idea needs to be forgotten.

And, finally, be a good Medium citizen by reading, supporting, and encouraging your fellow writers. I may not understand the algorithm but every social media algorithm I know will favour you when you show up as an engaged member.

In summary:

• Publish consistently at your pace by setting a minimum goal and making yourself accountable for that. If four or five times per week work, then stay consistent with that.
• Record all new topic and headline ideas so that you have a central place to refer back to.
• Build up your profile as a portfolio where people can get to know you. Write an “About Me” story. Pin your best stories to showcase who you are.
• Show up daily to read, clap, and engage. Make references to other writers and help to lift and encourage them.
• Build a daily writing habit and don’t let a day go by without writing even 100 words. Read this article for inspiration.

These are the best ways to get started and you will, over time, build your readership and, even if it takes a while, an article that gains the traction to hit those higher-income months.

And, never stop learning new tips and growing your experience.

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