Medium Tips | Book Marketing | Book Authors | Blogging

Medium Is an Incredible Platform for Book Authors

Medium Is an Amazing Platform for Book Authors who want to establish an effective online presence for selling their books.

A few days ago I sent out a Book Marketing Stories newsletter about the value of blogging. After sending it out, I realized that many of the arguments I made for blogging are also true, of course, for Medium stories and publications.

Why You Should Write Stories for Medium

Be More Visible — Writing for Medium can help you jump-start your visibility, get more reviews for your book right away, and sell more books.

Build an Audience — Authors who write for Medium can get major publishers interested in publishing their books, because you have a built-in audience who would be interested in your book.

Network with Key Influencers — Writing stories for Medium makes it easier for you to network with other bloggers, Medium authors, and key influencers.

Discover Opportunities — Writing stories for Medium can attract incredible opportunities for you, including companies seeking you out to speak, advertise, or more.

Test Out Content — Via Medium stories, you can test out new book concepts. Ask readers for feedback on your new book content, book cover, book title, and more!

Change Lives — Medium stories can change the life of the author as well as the lives of the readers of your Medium stories. A great Medium story can even change the world.

10 Essential Tips on Starting a Medium Publication That Matters

While you should contribute to high traffic publications that other people have started up, you should also start up at least one publication of your own — one you can build up and then control the message.

Again, writing for other publications is important. Here, for example, is a story I wrote for The Ascent, a high traffic publication with a readership of more than 100,000. The story has had 112 views and 60 reads in 12 days. The story was an original story written especially for The Ascent.

And here’s a story I wrote for Illumination, with a readership of more than 15,000 (and growing fast). This story has had 30 views and 11 readers in three weeks. This story was an expansion of a story I originally wrote for my Book Marketing Stories publication.

10 Essential Tips on Starting a Medium Publication That Matters

Now here are some tips on how to create your own publication and begin to build the readership and influence for it.

1Select a topic that you are passionate about. It should be incredibly important. It should be something you love. It should be something you’re good at. It should be something people will be interested in (and pay for). My Book Marketing Stories publication fits these criteria.

2Brand your Medium publication name. A great brand is memorable, is intriguing, stands out from others, is descriptive, and has an available URL, such as https://medium.com/book-marketing-stories. Note how I’ve branded my key topic of book marketing into a Book Marketing Stories publication.

3Design is your first impression. You need a design that stands out. With blogs, you have two options: Hire someone to create a great design, or do it yourself. With Medium, you have a great design right off the bat. Add great titles, subtitles, kickers, and graphics and your Medium stories and publications will look incredible.

4Promote your publication via social media. Here are four reasons why social media is important:

Establish your expertise.

Test out content.

Connect with other bloggers, Medium authors, and key influencers.

Drive traffic to your Medium stories.

5Launch your Medium publication. A launch is a one-time event, so make it a big splash. The Field of Dreams technique doesn’t work here (If you build it, they will come). You have to create a big splash at some point in the first month or two of your publication. Create an event that gets Medium readers talking about your publication (and sharing it!).

6Share epic content: The material you publish in your Medium publication should go over the top, rising above the noise on the internet and on Medium. There are no exceptions to this rule. Great content is the minimum. Epic content is the standard for incredible success.

7Make friends. It is the most important action you can take in building a Medium publication that matters (after epic content). Find out where great Medium authors, bloggers, and key influencers hang out. Make friends on Medium and the internet, and they will help you to find other partners.

You need to make bonafide friends, people you share an outlook with, people you would really be friends with if they lived down the block.

8Keep on promoting. Ask for viable links from other Medium writers. Use social bookmarking websites like Reddit. Do interviews (interview others and have them interview you). Write guest posts and stories. Many of the most successful Medium writers spend as much time on promotion as they do on writing stories.

They podcast. They create videos. They social share over and over again. They create content that is published elsewhere.

9Be different. Have a unique viewpoint and unique stories. People will ask: Why should I spend time on this publication’s stories? Be good enough that readers want to come back. And they want to tell other people about your publication.

10Invite other writers to write. Your publication will grow as other writers find out that your publication is worth reading — and worth writing for. Make it clear how they can be invited to write for your publication.