Small Changes Lead to Big Results

My new publishing concept in process

I’m always on the lookout for ways to improve my productivity. In the past, I’ve tried to publish 2–3 articles per day. However, over the last few months I’ve found that it’s taxing to concentrate both on getting your writing done and ensuring that it’s published.

My simple solution is to cut out my focus on the publishing.

Over the last couple weeks, I’ve made it my goal to write 2–3 articles a day, submit them, and be content that they’ll be published at the editor’s discretion. The result is that some days I might have no articles published, and other days there might be 5 or 6. In this article, I’d like to go through how the process works using today’s published articles as an example.

Big publications

With recent changes to Medium, the big publications have only increased in importance. For October, Medium seems to have radically altered its model, and the ramifications of those changes are still coming clear.

The biggest thing is that authors no longer get notifications that their work has been selected to be curated. To this point, I’m rather disappointed with this change. I used to love to get those notices, and I think curation went a long way towards driving traffic to my work.

To date, my views have been down this month, but I’m not sure whether to attribute that to Medium’s changes, or the changes I’ve implemented in my personal writing process.

For now, I’ve resolved to make an even bigger effort to be featured in the big publications where my articles have already been featured. I might even brainstorm a few article ideas for the major publications that haven’t published anything of mine so far.

The Ascent

I enjoy writing for The Ascent, although I find that there can be a week or more delay before the editors get back to you. Perhaps this will change as my profile increases both on Medium in general and as a writer for The Ascent in particular.

Today, the Ascent published a piece that I wrote about a week ago. I’d originally titled the piece “Paying Off Your Mortgage,” which is a poor and bland title. Yesterday I changed the title to “A Top-10 Day in Your Life” and received a notification that the article had been accepted within about 10 hours.

I think the takeaway from this experience is that writers should listen to that inner voice and not be afraid to change a title even after the article has been submitted for publication. Sometimes the best title doesn’t come to mind until a few days later, so don’t be afraid to make the most of it when inspiration strikes.

An Injustice!

This is one of my favorite publications on Medium. The theme covers a lot of ground, and much of what I’m inclined to write about has to do with injustices of one form or another. Also, I think the higher-ups at Medium pay a lot of attention to this publication. My most lucrative article was published there and has made me $800 to date all on its own.

Today, ‘An Injustice’ published this article of mine:

One of my other articles remains in their queue.

The Writing Cooperative

The Writing Cooperative, or TWC as I sometimes refer to it, is a wonderful resource for all things writing. I enjoy the people that I meet there and the sometimes spirited debates I get into.

The article they published of mine today is a “response article.” I’d done an article about writer’s block a few days ago, and I received a comment on Twitter that inspired me to write a whole new article. Here it is:

There are a few lines in that one that I’m particularly proud of.

Make it Personal

This is a wonderful publication that allows you to be a little more creative, but also write about literature. They’ve published three of my articles and I appreciate @mattblack42’s insightful editing suggestions.

In fact, this article was inspired by one of Matthew’s pieces:

Illumination

Finally, this article you’re reading now will be featured in Illumination. Illumination always makes an effort to get your work out promptly. That can be very valuable when you’re writing about something topical.

With the political situation changing at a lighting pace in the US, sometimes you can’t afford to wait for an editor to look at your work and publish it in a day or two. The writing might no longer be relevant.

A big day

Sometimes it takes your articles a day or two to make an impact, even when they are featured in a major publication. It’s a good day when you have five articles featured, some of which instantly qualify for further distribution.

Today is an atypical day, but as I continue to focus on writing rather than publishing, I find that I have energy left over for an extra article or two. Again, there will be days when none of my articles are picked up. However, the lean days are infrequent, and the big days create enormous momentum.

Best of luck to all of you in achieving your writing goals for the day!