avatarWalter Rhein

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Abstract

ar, “writing” has been the tag that I’ve used in the majority of my high performing articles. So you can imagine my surprise when I received this notification from Medium:</p><figure id="c463"><img src="https://cdn-images-1.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:800/1*KLY8fau97MXL0BkPP3JhlQ.jpeg"><figcaption>Image courtesy of Walter Rhein</figcaption></figure><p id="cadb">Travel?</p><p id="2203">Sure, I’ve done several travel articles. But as you can see from the image above, they haven’t exactly set the internet on fire. Their total view count stands at 83, 43, and 36.</p><p id="3e03">I’m quite proud of the ’50 Photos That Demonstrate the Beauty of Cusco, Peru’ article and I would love to see more comments on it. I think it still has the potential to grow some legs. Here are my travel articles so you can peruse them:</p><div id="a96f" class="link-block"> <a href="https://curiosityneverkilledthewriter.com/the-united-states-is-too-expensive-for-the-writing-life-62899087f48"> <div> <div> <h2>The United States Is Too Expensive For The Writing Life</h2> <div><h3>Living abroad provides you with the time you need to practice your craft.</h3></div> <div><p>curiosityneverkilledthewriter.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*UvO0Uz3zhfsH4eMt5PdgtA.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="1a31" class="link-block"> <a href="https://byrslf.co/50-photos-that-demonstrate-the-beauty-of-cusco-peru-e355042fe4"> <div> <div> <h2>50 Photos That Demonstrate the Beauty of Cusco, Peru</h2> <div><h3>Take a virtual tour of one of the world’s most popular tourist destinations</h3></div> <div><p>byrslf.co</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*csLW2HGTjBZvYdsTNKHs3g.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="d244" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/the-short-change-hustle-a39c22db0f16"> <div> <div> <h2>The Short Change Hustle</h2> <div><h3>Things can get weird fast when you don’t get the right amount of change</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*mLb9rNn4wDt2JUsBPfBm8g.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><p id="e9c4">Note that not one of these articles was accepted for curation, although the ’50 Photos of Cusco’ article was not behind the paywall as a condition of publishing with <a href="https://byrslf.co/">BeYourself</a> and was therefore ineligible.</p><h1 id="b3a1">What does this tell us?</h1><p id="5666">Becoming a top writer requires you to leverage the tags that you apply to your articles before publication. It’s really

Options

important to chose the best five tags for each and every article. Don’t waste one of them by including your name if you can’t reasonably expect anyone will be driven to your article because of that tag. If your name is Stephen King or Abraham Lincoln or something, tag away.</p><p id="cb93">One article I read listed the following keywords as the tags that can land you a top writer distinction. Here they are:</p><p id="8392" type="7">Advice, Architecture, Art, Artificial Intelligence, Bitcoin, BlackLivesMatter, Books, Business, Climate Change, Cooking, Creativity, Culture, Design, Diversity, Economics, Education, Energy, Entrepreneurship, Fashion, Feminism, Fiction, Finance, Food, Future, Gaming, Government, Health, History, Humor, Ideas, Innovation, Inspiration, Internet of Things, Investing, Journalism, Leadership, Life, Life Lessons, Love, LGBTQ, Mental Health, Movies, Music, Parenting, Photography, Poetry, Politics, Privacy, Productivity, Psychology, Racism, Reading, Relationships, Satire, Science, Self Driving Cars, Self Improvement, Short Story, Social Media, Space, Sports, Startup, Sustainability, Technology, Television, This Happened To Me, Transportation, Travel, Venture Capital, Virtual Reality, Women In Tech, Writing</p><p id="47f6">Note that you have to include the tag exactly. You can’t use “writer” instead of “writing” and expect to receive any benefit. However, if you want to include both “writer” and “writing” your article will still count toward your aspiration to become a top writer in writing.</p><h1 id="7ae4">The consequence</h1><p id="762c">I have yet to see if being added as a top writer makes your work more likely to be accepted for curation. I’ll experiment in the upcoming week and write a follow-up article.</p><p id="20c9">Being named a top writer in travel inspires me to break out some more of my old travel photos and pound out some article ideas that have been floating around in the back of my mind.</p><h1 id="b42e">Encouragement</h1><p id="4898">I’d like to especially offer some words of encouragement for those of you who haven’t yet been selected as a top writer in any category. Based on my experience, it seems to be something of a random selection process.</p><p id="2cdb">The best advice seems to be to just keep writing, producing great content, and applying the appropriate tags. With any luck, you too will soon receive a surprise email announcing you’ve been selected as a top writer in a category.</p><p id="08a8">Here’s arguably my best travel story (but I didn’t know about topics when I wrote it so I missed out on the tag):</p><div id="49d0" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/from-choquequirao-to-machu-picchu-a8de7e2284d5"> <div> <div> <h2>From Choquequirao to Machu Picchu</h2> <div><h3>Hiking the Inca Trail with Two Olympic Athletes</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*I4Rx1ughwwxSThssgY4bfg.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div></article></body>

Somehow, I Became a Top Writer In Travel

Despite the fact that my most popular articles are in other topics

Photo by Luca Bravo on Unsplash

I’ve had a Medium account for close to a year, but I’ve only really engaged with the platform over the last month. I’ve already posted an article about my first 50 articles, and done a tutorial on how to get accepted to publications, but I’d just started to do the research on how to become a top writer in a category.

Top writer in travel

I had literally just set my sights on becoming a top writer when I received an email from Medium informing me that I’d just made the cut. To date, my most popular article is one I wrote for The Writing Cooperative which has received over a thousand views in under a week.

By far, “writing” has been the tag that I’ve used in the majority of my high performing articles. So you can imagine my surprise when I received this notification from Medium:

Image courtesy of Walter Rhein

Travel?

Sure, I’ve done several travel articles. But as you can see from the image above, they haven’t exactly set the internet on fire. Their total view count stands at 83, 43, and 36.

I’m quite proud of the ’50 Photos That Demonstrate the Beauty of Cusco, Peru’ article and I would love to see more comments on it. I think it still has the potential to grow some legs. Here are my travel articles so you can peruse them:

Note that not one of these articles was accepted for curation, although the ’50 Photos of Cusco’ article was not behind the paywall as a condition of publishing with BeYourself and was therefore ineligible.

What does this tell us?

Becoming a top writer requires you to leverage the tags that you apply to your articles before publication. It’s really important to chose the best five tags for each and every article. Don’t waste one of them by including your name if you can’t reasonably expect anyone will be driven to your article because of that tag. If your name is Stephen King or Abraham Lincoln or something, tag away.

One article I read listed the following keywords as the tags that can land you a top writer distinction. Here they are:

Advice, Architecture, Art, Artificial Intelligence, Bitcoin, BlackLivesMatter, Books, Business, Climate Change, Cooking, Creativity, Culture, Design, Diversity, Economics, Education, Energy, Entrepreneurship, Fashion, Feminism, Fiction, Finance, Food, Future, Gaming, Government, Health, History, Humor, Ideas, Innovation, Inspiration, Internet of Things, Investing, Journalism, Leadership, Life, Life Lessons, Love, LGBTQ, Mental Health, Movies, Music, Parenting, Photography, Poetry, Politics, Privacy, Productivity, Psychology, Racism, Reading, Relationships, Satire, Science, Self Driving Cars, Self Improvement, Short Story, Social Media, Space, Sports, Startup, Sustainability, Technology, Television, This Happened To Me, Transportation, Travel, Venture Capital, Virtual Reality, Women In Tech, Writing

Note that you have to include the tag exactly. You can’t use “writer” instead of “writing” and expect to receive any benefit. However, if you want to include both “writer” and “writing” your article will still count toward your aspiration to become a top writer in writing.

The consequence

I have yet to see if being added as a top writer makes your work more likely to be accepted for curation. I’ll experiment in the upcoming week and write a follow-up article.

Being named a top writer in travel inspires me to break out some more of my old travel photos and pound out some article ideas that have been floating around in the back of my mind.

Encouragement

I’d like to especially offer some words of encouragement for those of you who haven’t yet been selected as a top writer in any category. Based on my experience, it seems to be something of a random selection process.

The best advice seems to be to just keep writing, producing great content, and applying the appropriate tags. With any luck, you too will soon receive a surprise email announcing you’ve been selected as a top writer in a category.

Here’s arguably my best travel story (but I didn’t know about topics when I wrote it so I missed out on the tag):

Travel
Writing
Self
Self Improvement
Inspiration
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