The Fastest Way To Get 100 Followers
An effective strategy that doesn’t require publishing stories every day or trying to ‘Follow for Follow’
All new writers on Medium want to join the Medium Partner Program as quickly as possible. The requirements to apply for the program are:
- You need to publish at least one story
- You need at least 100 followers
After you fulfill those requirements, you can apply for the program. If accepted, you can now start earning money on Medium from your stories. Yay!
Most people can achieve the first task. The second is slightly more challenging for people that are new to Medium.
The good news is that I am going to share with you a simple and effective strategy to quickly gain new followers.
This method does not require you to publish stories every day and does not require you to ‘Follow for Follow.’
The Method
The secret sauce to getting to 100 followers quickly:
Engagement with the Community
What does that mean?
- Read other member’s stories
- Give those stories claps
- Write thoughtful comments
Members have a limit of 75 comments per day. I set a goal to read 30 stories each day, clap and write a comment on each of them.
When I started doing this last week, I was able to add 22 new followers after the first day and have been growing fast ever since.
I didn’t have to write a story. I didn’t have to endlessly follow completely random people in hopes that they would follow me back. I sat down for 1 hour, read stories, clapped, and commented.
Before you stop reading this story to run off and do those 3 things, let me say a few important points that are critical to those tips' effectiveness.
Do not clap and leave
When writers publish stories, you can think of it as a performance on the street. If you clap after the performance (after reading the story), it certainly makes the writer feel good.
But if you leave after clapping, you miss an opportunity for the two of you to connect. So if you think the performance was worthy of claps, it's certainly worth two minutes of your time to write a thoughtful comment.
Writing comments is the most effective way to build a connection with a stranger on Medium. To build an engaged community of followers.
When it's our time to perform and write stories, we don’t want 100 people to watch in silence and then leave without saying a word. We would much rather have 100 engaged people who are cheering and talking to us after the performance.
Write Thoughtful Comments
It's very important to write thoughtful comments on stories.
Comments are like gifts. The best part is that these gifts don’t cost any money, just a few minutes of your time to write. So be generous. Especially when you enjoyed the story.
Comments are not only gifts for the writer but also for every single person who reads your comment. I have gained as many as 6 new followers from one of my comments.
Like stories, comments are like seeds. As they mature, they continue to bear fruit all the time. So keep planting those seeds.
The more thoughtful your comments are, the bigger the gift you are giving to the writer. That doesn’t mean you need to start writing a story about their story in the comments section. Just two or three sentences will do.
Things to think about when writing your comments:
- Did the writer deliver what was promised in the headline or the introduction of the story?
- How effective was the writer at presenting the information?
- Did the writer provide you with new ideas that are surprising to you?
- Did the writer share something emotional that resonates with you?
- Can you see some prominent areas of feedback that you can share with the writer?
The typical format that I like to use for giving feedback is the “Sandwich Technique.”
The “Sandwich Technique” has 3 parts:
- Something positive about the story
- Your feedback or something you learned
- Something uplifting for the writer
An example comment:
Thank you for sharing your story, Mike. This is the best story I have read today! I have to try this out because it seems so much easier than trying to publish a story every day. Keep sharing more tips about this topic because its really helpful for me.
This methodology is actually adapted from Toastmaster's “Sandwich Technique,” which is a proven, highly-effective technique for giving feedback to public speakers and has been used for decades.
I have been a public speaker for over eight years. I have used the “Sandwich Technique” to deliver verbal feedback to over a thousand people at Toastmasters.
Trust me, this method works, and it’s highly effective.
Try It!
Even though I am still relatively new to writing on Medium, this methodology has proven to help me build a following quickly and build connections with wonderful people.
Remember to:
Read, Clap, Comment — To be engaged with other writers Comments are free, and they are like gifts to writers — So be generous Write Thoughtful Comments — It doesn’t take much time for you to write a comment, but it means a lot to the writers.
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