Medium Partner Program Will Change in August

Here are some ideas and why I think it makes sense.

Have you ever wished to become a famous writer and make money with your writing?

Medium has earned a place in the writing community. The best site for new writers to build an audience is to improve their writing skills with constant publishing to an audience and make the first bucks with it.

The Old World

The old path was extraordinarily long and hard. Sit at home, write on paper that nobody reads, put together a novel, and sell it to a publisher. The problem in my eyes was the lack of feedback that helps to mold the writing process and style early on.

The initial audience of past writers? A limited number of decision-makers — the doorkeepers to the world of readers — the real-life publishing houses.

They do have their place in the value chain still, in my opinion, and I am the last one to criticize their excellent work. But both — writers and decision-makers — face one problem:

They don’t really know whether the reader likes the style or not.

It is just guesswork even if the publisher believes he knows the audience. All the past publishing was guessing that a book might resonate with the readers the publisher has built over time. And, of course, the value-added through quality control.

Medium — The New World

Then came the internet and blogging. Everybody who loves writing has a place to publish their ideas immediately.

The great thing is:

Immediate feedback once a piece is online.

This feedback in terms of comments, reads, and views helps to improve writing style and content. And yet, since the internet went public, it still was a long and challenging way to build an audience and get good ranks in search engines.

Medium fixed it. As an inexperienced writer, come to Medium, serve your ideas to a proficient audience, get feedback, and support Medium to increase your ranking as a writer—what a value package.

On top of that, you have an excellent chance to make your first money with your writing on Medium. It isn’t that hard for everybody who puts 4–30 pieces of content online every month on this platform.

Many writing beginners get proper training on the platform, and I genuinely believe that the pipeline for publishing houses gets higher quality writing in the future.

As a result, more proficient writers will enter into publishing houses than a few decades ago. It is an excellent addition to the value chain, not a replacement in my eyes.

Medium again works on improving the business model.

I entered Medium at the time when the payment was based on internal read time. Internal read time means that the read time of paying members of Medium counts towards the payment.

More read time higher payments.

Although Medium measures internal and external views and claps, comments, and replies to comments and maybe other hidden metrics, all these don’t count for payments.

Suddenly in April, some Writers said that surprisingly they got a 500 Dollar Bonus. Yet, nobody knew why and how. Some just got it, while others didn’t.

I perceived such payments as highly subjective, which I believe is inferior to an objective payment plan for motivation. Every writer must know what to do to increase their chances of a larger paycheck.

So far, the formula was simple:

• Write more
• Work on improving your style
• It results in more reading minutes
• You get more payment.

In June, Medium brought more light to this new bonus system. In an email, they state the following:

The first bonus was originally planned as a one-time surprise to thank top active writers in April. The response was so enthusiastic that we awarded a second bonus in May, and we’re thrilled to announce that we plan to distribute bonuses in June and July too.

Meanwhile, Medium shines more light on what writer can expect what kind of additional payment:

We’re keeping the same tiered structure that we implemented for May. We calculate rankings based on your monthly Partner Program earnings, which is a direct reflection of member reading time, and use the following tiered structure:

Top 1,000: $500 bonus

1,001–1,500: $100 bonus

1,501–2,000: $50 bonus

At least some insights into how the bonus is calculated.

I still wonder what the 500 dollar bonus for top writers should change. Some of those top writers have stated in articles that they make 5,000 to 10,000 dollars per month on Medium anyways.

Of course, nobody turns down a 500 dollar check when it comes in, but does it create an additional motivating effect? I doubt that.

The Changes I am Hoping For

Medium is a business, and the writers and the readers keep Medium’s business running. Top Writers need to be rewarded the most. They are the ones that keep readers engaged and bring along new readers.

While rookie writers need to be incentivized to keep the ball rolling.

What makes Medium special in my eyes is the sheer amount of novel ideas and perspectives coming from many different people. This was one of the reasons why I started consuming content on Medium. This USP needs new writers and new ideas that are different from other online magazines.

The thing is, measuring success only in read time benefits writers with an already established audience, as they can control this number easier than newbies. Just write, and your fans will read it anyways.

The algorithm that benefits read time only clearly drives more money to established people rather than new ones.

Also, Articles not only create internal read time but also drive people from search engines to Medium, which later become paying members. This counts as external views or read time.

Another unique feature is the direct engagement between reader and writer in the comments. In my eyes own of the things that make Medium valuable.

I don’t understand why Medium doesn’t include all those metrics in the payment scheme, which is

• Internal and External Views
• Comments,
• Engagement Rate with Comments,
• Claps and
• Read time (internal/external)

The second thing I don’t understand is why Medium stays away from an ad/ad-free model.

In such an extended model, new writers could quickly increase their value to the community by increasing their engagement with other writers' content and their small audience. It brings them followers and increases the read time. Including those measures into the payment calculation would help those newbies make money easier while making the community more vibrant.

Already established writers as Tim Denning can still focus on publishing three pieces of content daily and thrive on read time alone. Given his 179,000 followers, I believe it makes him decent money. Would he perceive a 500 dollar bonus as something that makes him write more on Medium?

Additionally, simply turning the membership version into an ad-free one, while people who don’t pay for Medium must accept advertisements in the content flow, would also bring more money to the table for both writers and Medium.

Medium — a great place for new and established writers. The changes I am hoping for in August are:

• Including all metrics into the payment model for writers. As long as the combination of quality content (higher views, claps, comments, engagement rate with comments, claps, and read time) and the quantity of articles increases the payment, I believe all writers will be fine.
• Having a clear picture of the actions needed to increase the payment will benefit all parties involved. Medium, Readers, and Writers
• Why not including ads in the “For Free” Version of Medium, similar to Youtube. With this bit of tweak, the internal read time would count, and the external read time, which is currently lost.
• With such an ad/ad-free model, automatically, the income of all writers would increase over time. Also, Medium would generate a second income stream for their business model. I genuinely believe that Medium has become an exciting place for advertisements, given its size.
• I think tweaking the metrics to increase the engagement between writers and readers would help Medium and the community become more vibrant while making the writers more cash flows.

Check out my other profiles or sign up for my weekly newsletter.