Reciprocity - 14 Benefits Feature Other Writer’s Story in Your Medium Post
The reasons why you should promote fellow writers' story
I like the image above. Feel surprised, happy and motivated! That could be a reaction when fellow writer find you have featured their story in your post! :-)
You might ever found a Medium story where the writer add some links of their own story at the bottom. Definitely, it purposes is to lead audiences to read their other pieces. But, Why don’t we do it to other people's story? Put simply, feature their story in your post is something like you listing or shout out someone’s video in your YouTube video. It’s a simpliest form of collaboration in writing world which has benefit for both you and the writers you feature!
Is it really beneficial for doing that? Yes! I sometimes having other people stories in my stories too and get its benefit in the long run.
You can see these little examples about how I feature or promote fellow Medium writers within my stories. And they really appreciate it! :-)
In this post, I feature Sharmarke Hujale's story about his introversion (relevant topic):
While in this post, I feature/promote different topics from other writers under my photopoetry:
Still not convinced?
Let me give you another real examples that some of writers in Be Open publication have even already been practicing this “reciprocity” form by featuring/thanking a publication or their fellow writer’s articles in their stories. Yana Bostongirl, Nick and Sahil Patel are just to mention some. You can see they are new writers and have quite succeeded with their writing career.
Their follower base are growing fast and also they have good earning! Yana and Sahil have even stated that they are now in $100 club! You can check out that their stories have gotten so much views, comments and claps. I bet their habit of featuring others in their stories have contribution on their achievement. Their readers really love them, appreciate their kindness of sharing other people’s works and showing honest gratitude to anyone who have supported them which then make them to have loyal readers plus continous new fans.
Besides the two authors above, here are some most successful Be Open's writer right now who I oftens seeing them doing this reciprocity habit; Omy, Victoria Gregg, Jerry Pompilio, Ruby Lee, Linda Kowalchek, Colleen Millsteed, Walter Rhein, Nicole Hilbig, Nick, Sharing Words, I. Trudie Palmer, Skippy von Alte Welt, Priya Tandon, Alexandria Radford, Orange Gildersleeve, JJ Sum, Dr. Preeti Singh, Brittany Nunez, Bassey BY, Damien Dsoul, Warren Brown, Nicole Waite, Pretheesh Presannan, Jupiter Grant, Dr. Preeti Singh, Ed-iT and a few other more!
Be Open feels so lucky to have them all! They are the real evidence that we can! In Medium, even with a little effort, we can still earn and grow smoothly. And if we work harder, we will be like them too! :-)
Go back to our topic! From story above, obviously, there are so many advantages of featuring someone’s else stories for the writers they feature, the sharer/featurer and the audience.
Here are 14 reasons why you should add fellow writer’s stories (especially in Medium's box link) to your posts and how they can benefit you in the long run!
They are visually appealing and more interactive
Let’s be honest, are you more likely to be attracted to a blog post that is just filled with text, or one with at least one picture or eyecatching link? Yes! Eye-catching links! Medium has story link that will turn into box with picture. It looks nicer than the inline text link, right? That’s what I like about medium link.
Visual elements such as videos, infographics, and of course, images (in this case, Medium link with image) are more important than ever in retaining the reader’s attention and improving their overall experience.
With that, it is safe to say that the box links with image in your Medium post are not just appealing to look at, but also can support the overall mood of the article, and as the link you feature is dedicated for someone’s else’s story, it will show your story is interactive as well as give good brand for you.
Bigger chance for visitor to recognize you and your contents
Some statistics reveal that pictures or box links have the ability to not only improve the overall reading experience but promote information retention as well. If the featured stories have relevant topic, they will set the tone of what the readers can expect in the content.
Yes they may click the link you feature and leave your profile, but both your profile and the writer you feature will stay in that reader’s memory as the provider of information they need. They will know what your content are about and would come back anytime.
Create better link-worthy articles
Links have always been a ranking factor for Google to rank a webpage and website as a whole.
So, any links, especially if they are crafted as illustrations to explain complex concepts or abstract ideas in your story are more liked by search engines.
Initiate and build relationship
Sharing someone else’s content can be a great way to start a relationship. Don’t miss out on this opportunity.
Be sure to include the Medium handle of the author that originally published the post as mentioning the source means they’ll get a notification! When people see you’re using their content, there’s a much better chance they’ll interact with you and might feature you back.
Showing respect to the writers you feature will strengthen your online presence and help you create long-lasting relationships.
More promising for visitor to read your content
That’s always why pictures and custom graphics such as infographics, diagram and links with images are always well-received. They make an article more valuable.
If you link to articles and resources that you truly believe, interesting or valuable, it will help your readers to get a better understanding of a subject.
Encourage others/readers to share your stories too
The huge effect of sharing is that it’s contagious! If you share/feature someone’s story in your piece, your readers will appreciate that you’re sharing more than your own content. They will love you and will perceive you have authority and see your profile or your content as more trustworthy because you’re focusing on more than just self-promotion and as a result, they will share that your content!
To trigger more of this sharing action, a simple CTA can make all the difference. Be sure to ask readers to share that content. That way your profile and another pieces of your works get in front of an even larger audience and of course you’ll gain views.
It help you deliver the messages with the support of the featured story
Let’s see the possible case; You might be the biggest expert in fitness and gym area, but you may not have the expert level knowledge about everything related to healthy foods. You will need source of health foods to support your fitness content.
Coming up with fresh and full detailed blog post (Medium story) can be difficult sometimes. Or no matter how much you know about something, there will be someone out there who knows more than you. There are some great posts out there you can take inspiration from by just borrowing their link and add it to your content.
It can enrich your content
By featuring different topic in your story, readers will have various choice from your profile (for unrelevant featured story, it’s better to list it at the bottom as sole recommendation story).
The more information you can provide in each of your story to your audience, the more they’ll trust you and come back for more.
It will provide readers the different perspectives
When you write about a particular topic and reference readers to other writer's opinion/article about your topic, you and the readers will get to see the world from that writer's perspective as each person may have their own opinion about something, or have their own style in delivering their thoughts that will make your content more interesting.
To express your passion to help other
Share/feature story could also be used to make people aware of great but neglected stories.
Sometimes we may find a story that was good in quality, written neatly, has great message and very inspirative, but doesn’t even get attentions from readers. We may feel sorry for the writer as thinking they deserve to be seen by as many people as possible. If you enjoy the Medium community and want to make being here as valuable as possible for as many people as possible, you can just give that writer a little help by featuring it in your story.
Readers will love your kindness, You will get claps!
If you still see the claps more fascinating, it good things to do featuring someone story in your post.
Readers love the writers who support others. They will likely claps your stories for your kindness after seeing you have promote others story.
And also, if you feature good content to your blog and they like it, the need it, they will click the clap button thanking you for giving/recommend stories they need.
You might find a reciprocal opportunity and new backlinks
As have been said before, after you feature someone’s story, the writer or other writers may possibly reach you to feature their other stories too.
Or you yourself can invite them again if they have other stories for you to feature. If this your simpliest collaboration performing well, you can collaborate with them for any project in the future.
When they ask to add a link with you, agree to it (assuming the content is high quality), then ask if you can do the same on their post. You’ll reach their audience without having to seek out new writers to collaborate. Also, they will give you a backlink in the near future. It will strengthen your authority. Through your spreaded links, readers will automatically come to your site to read further.
Earn more
Did you now, even the title and subtitle in that box of Medium story link still be counted to your words post thoroughly? By the texts and its visual image, it can add more seconds to your earning. So, the more stories you feature, the more you earn (if you still appreciate the additional 1 to 10 seconds reading times :-) I often getting some bucks even there re only seconds reading time (it usually happens in older stories and have quite good views).
Or imagine another scheme; The writer you feature was still not joining Medium membership, and after getting featured by you, they feel happy with the good and supportive community of Medium writers, so they decide to upgrade to Medium membership that will automatically give you that $1.63 as a referral earning from Medium! I have gotten this bonus repeatedly! :-)
Also, by getting share or featured back, you will earn more from that following effects. There are many possible opportunities to earn money from the promoting other people's stories. You can search by yourself! :-)
Expand Reader Base
All the following opportunities have been written above, at the end will help you building following base.
Simple measure; Your featured writers may have fans of his/her own. So, when they feature you back or share that post to their followers, you will attract their fans too. Therefore, you will end up having more traffic and subscribers! :-)
Final Thoughts
Featuring someone story (of fellow Medium writers) is a great way to build relationship and possibly opening other opportunities with them. When you feature other’s stories, they may feature you back and also it can show good presence of you to your readers. The audience will love the featurer when they get new knowledge.