My Highest Earning Story Got Its Start in a Small Publication
How size matters, or not
When I started writing on Medium, one of my goals was to get into as many “big” publications as possible. When I was researching the website, I read that you have a higher chance of “being chosen for further distribution” or even getting more views on your stories. While this may be the general rule, there are a few exceptions.
In the beginning, when my stories didn’t get accepted by certain big publications, I would take the situation personally. I felt as though it was a personal attack on my writing. I struggled with my confidence and my writing skills until I came to the realization that, maybe, my writing wasn’t bad, we just weren't compatible.
Though most writers on Medium are niche-less, publications are the niche that we don’t have. They allow for specific people to follow them based on their overall interests and as writers, that’s a good thing. When trying to grow my audience, it has been better to explore different topics. Whether it's true crime, marketing, writing tips, or relationship advice, there are certain publications I lean towards that I know will appreciate my work. After over 3 months on Medium, I am still by no means an expert; however, I’ve come to realize a few things.
Give small publications a chance
During my early days on Medium, I had about 5 publications to choose from when I wanted to publish my work. They were small and back then, I didn’t think they would get me to the place I wanted to be.
I refused to continue publishing for them and went on to look for bigger publications. I began getting accepted into the big ones and to my surprise, the articles that were getting accepted into them weren’t going nearly as well as I thought. This came as a big shock given all the advice I had read before.
To this day, my 2 biggest stories have been in relatively small publications. The timeline of this story’s success is one of the many things I appreciate about writing on Medium.
I published this story on March 1st and for 3 weeks, I had nothing. A mere 10–15 views every day but nothing out of the ordinary. On March 21st, I checked my stats early in the morning and I already had 1000 views. This was by far the most views I’d ever gotten and it didn’t stop there. The views and reads were growing exponentially and I finished off the day with over 5000 views. The next day, I had over 6000. After March 22nd, the story had hit its peak and slowly began declining.
This publication was a new one for me. I had never published with them and I am so glad we both gave each other a chance.
They have roughly 3000 followers which although is not small, it’s not comparable to the other ones I was reaching out to that had hundreds of thousands. This story and its success taught me a valuable lesson about Medium and that is if your story is good, informative, and the algorithm gives you a little push, it doesn’t matter where you published it.
Don’t be afraid of self-publishing
My account on Medium has almost 200 followers. I have been able to organically gain them through the months I’ve been here and I would say most of them are loyal to my stories.
As my writing style changes, I’ve found that certain publications just aren’t made for me anymore. Not only that but if I want to write about a certain topic that has already been covered, odds are, they won’t accept my story. Though I understand this, I still want to share my own thoughts and I’ve found that self-publishing is a good place to start.
I had a recent experience where I wrote a story that I thought was perfect for a publication but turns out, they rejected it. I had published in that publication more than 10 times but still, this story just wasn’t what they were looking for. I decided to self-publish and something good came out of that, too.
Whether we believe it or not, editors on Medium are constantly looking for good stories that stand out and that can be added to their publications. Self-publishing gives them the opportunity to look for good pieces that were chosen for further distribution but don’t have a good home yet.
Final Thoughts
While I still don’t have a clear understanding of what it takes to “make it” I’m doing my best to stay true to myself while also finding new ways for my stories to succeed. After this month, I have come to the realization that while big publications can give you a head start and provide more readers to read your story, it is 100% possible to succeed in smaller publications.