I’ve Earned $4,460.34 (So Far) From One Medium Story

I hate these kinds of articles, you hate these kinds of articles, but we all read them, so let’s get it over with.

On June 17th, 2020 I posted a story that has earned me $4,460.34 as of today.

It laid pretty flat for about a week, then someone at the The Startup (the old one, not the rebranded one) left me a private note asking if I’d like to submit it and run it in their pub.

Sure.

It exploded.

Let’s cover a little history of getting into publications based solely on my experience, then talk about writing in general.

Spoiler alert: there’s no secret shortcut to earn a lot of money on Medium.

What used to work?

There used to be a little trick to getting into those big publications: write killer stories, get curated, and wait for someone to reach out to you. This is always how it worked for me. Any story I submitted to these monster pubs rejected me unless I’d already been contacted my someone and let in the back door.

But that’s life right? I mean, the real world no shit world of work. It’s about doing good work, getting noticed, and someone reaching out to you.

Here is how I think all of that behind the scenes editorial stuff went down.

An editor would watch the streams for stories that got curated under tags that aligned with the content that the followers of a publication were interested in reading. I think this method is still used, but publications aren’t what they used to be.

A lot has changed. There was a migration from a seemingly welcome attitude at a lot of publications to one that was more serious, grown up, and editorial. I think a lot of these people took it a little too seriously and turned down a lot of stories from writers that were new, but had stories people wanted to read.

Anyhoo, I’m rambling.

Publications aren’t what they used to be. Although there are still a few holdouts that are good for distribution if you can get on their radar.

What do I think still works?

Your mileage may vary. Take everything I’m writing here with a grain of salt. I’ve been around for a little while, made some killer acquaintances, and have managed to turn Medium into a nice income stream.

Do good work. Write killer stories, or at least ones that you think are good. That’s why you’re here right? To write. If you just want to crank out keyword laden bullshit you can write for a content farm for a penny a word. See how long you like that. No, you’re here for something else, and it’s not to make money.

The money you earn from your creative work is a direct reflection of the value you provide.

So stop fucking around and get to it.

Don’t overthink it. This isn’t a real job. If you don’t perform you aren’t going to get fired. There are no hard deadlines. I mind fucked myself a few times because I had a few stories hit it and earn a ton of money. I tried to repeat whatever in the hell I did when I was writing new stories. That doesn’t work, most of my stuff falls way short of the mark. Magic tricks are just that: tricks. The real magic is putting everything aside, opening your mind, and letting whatever it is that flows through creative people start flowing, and hope your fingers can keep up.

Hit publish. I’m obviously not here to compete with The Atlantic. If I was a good writer I would submit there. I’m an OK writer in that I can tell stories that some people like, and some people hate (which can be pretty good too). I write like I talk, I try to be real, and that resonates with a lot of people. I do any significant editing while I’m writing the story, will do one quick read from top to bottom, then send it.

Take your work here seriously, but remember that it is yours and you can turn this into anything you’d like.

Niche down. I write about a variety of topics, but have had the most success writing about business related topics. I have over 20 years experience as a professional software developer and product manager so I think future articles are going to be trending that way in order to promote my consulting services. Write about niche interests that you have, or if you don’t have one, develop one. Health, wealth, and sex always sell.

My first real moneymaker

I wrote How I Became A Millionaire in less than two hours. It’s just a story that talks a little about my background and how I started a computer consulting/staffing company with a few friends back in the 1990's.

I cranked it out, read it through, and hit publish.

It’s not fancy, and only provides surface level guidance on how you can do the same thing if you want.

I think what it does though is provides hope. I mean honestly, if a moron like me can stumble his way through life and still come out OK anyone can. Seriously.

I used to read and respond to the comments, but I stopped doing that a long time ago. Turns out some people hate you if you talk about success, no matter how small of one it was.

There are a few others that also did well. But when I tried to write something that was going to do well it never did. When I just sat down and let the words flow they usually do OK.

The bottom line.

Don’t walk away with the impression that I don’t think you should take your writing on Medium seriously, because you should. But you have to find your thing.

There are many successful writers on Medium, each with their views on what works and what doesn’t. I personally trust a handful, two of which offer the only class worth taking to learn everything you need to know to position yourself for success on Medium.

I offer my story for reference only, so you can see the possible.

There are many others on Medium doing way better than I am.

Let that sink in, then get to work.

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