The “Thirty over Fifty” Editor is a Nominator for the Boost Program
Level up your writing on Medium to get boosted
In February 2023 the Chief Executive Officer of Medium, Tony Stubblebine, announced a pilot or test “boost programme.”
This pilot (also called a beta programme) is about Publication Editors searching for and finding “boost worthy” stories across the Medium platform.
Up to 20 stories, at the rate of 5 per week, are submitted by nominators to Medium’s internal curation team for consideration of being boosted.
To be boosted a story must meet five criteria, described in Medium’s Help Centre here. Currently nominators are mainly Publication Editors. To qualify as a nominator you must be in the Medium Partner Program.
I am grateful for being selected as a nominator. I started in this role on 1st June 2023 after applying in February when the pilot programme was announced. For “insider tips” on writing a boost-worthy story, please click here.
This Publication “Thirty over Fifty” (30 O 50) is for writers aged 50 or over to get their stories published, that meet the content guidelines published for 30 O 50, for readers of any age. The “thirty” in the title refers to the likelihood that around 30% of all writers on Medium are aged 50 or above.
You might like to BOOKMARK this article because I will dynamically update it and add links to official Medium posts about the boost programme over time!
Here are some FAQ following with information about the boost programme that nominators are permitted to give out publicly.
Why have the boost programme?
With thousands of stories published on Medium each day, Medium wants help with “surfacing” or finding and distributing “hidden gems.”
A “hidden gem” is an article on Medium in a Publication or that is self-published that meets the boost distribution standards.
Medium is aiming to show stories from personal experience or from experts with personal experience, that help readers improve their lives or increase their day-to-day understanding or awareness of issues that affect them.
Boosting increases the number of views and reads of your boosted story and reader interaction with your article within the week after boosting.
How impactful or long term the boosting is depends upon the further reach and usefulness of your boosted story as a consequence of it being boosted. For example, if readers of your boosted story recommend it to others to read, it could be read some time after the initial spike in reads occurs.
What makes a story boost-worthy?
Nominators find and nominate stories through searches across the Medium platform. Medium’s curators decide whether to accept a nominated story to be boosted or not.
At the time of publishing this, the boost distribution standards can be remembered by the acronym: COWMA .
- Constructive — [ Story Content ]
- Original — [ Story Content ]
- Well written- [ Craftsmanship ]
- Memorable — [ Craftsmanship ]
- Authentic — [ Author’s Experience ]
Having had a 75% acceptance rate over my first month of nominating stories in June, I can vouch for my observations regarding what makes a story boost-worthy.
Stories with affiliate links and self-promotional links are less frequently boosted than stories without self-promotional links. The emphasis is on the value of your content and messages to the readers.
A story with a lot of links to one’s own stories is seen by Medium to be aiming to drive readers to the writers’ content, with an emphasis on “profiting” the writer. Thus I recommend to have only one or two embedded links at the end of your story, if you really want to share a related read.
Medium has discontinued new Referred Memberships, so you should no longer have links to your referrals at the end of your stories (if you did).
Do you know who the Nominators are?
No, while I’m aware of who some of the nominators are, nominators are not required by Medium to publicly state or announce that they are nominators.
The CEO stated in his February 2023 announcement about the boost pilot programme that community nominators (as they are called) are expected to find writers through the boost-worthy stories that they write.
I believe that it is not Medium’s intention that writers approach nominators asking them to boost their stories. Having said all this, nominators are permitted to make it public that they are nominators.
The reason why I am declaring that I am a nominator is to incentivize new writers (aged 50 and over) to join “Thirty over Fifty” as long as they meet the content guidelines about allowable topics for 30 O 50.
I also want to encourage established writers of “Thirty over Fifty” to consider writing boost-worthy stories. And I want to support all writers on Medium with information about how boosting works.
If you do a search of “boost” using the search function at the top left of Medium’s home page, you may find stories written by nominators announcing that they are nominators.
You can read my LIST OF NOMINATORS who have publicly declared that they are nominators and read nuggets of advice by me on writing boost-worthy stories by clicking here.
Do nominators only nominate stories in their Publication(s)?
Definitely no! I have only nominated one story from 30 O 50 and this is because there have been very few active writers in this Publication. In June I nominated 20 stories and 19 of them were self-published or published in other Publications.
The monitoring of the boost pilot programme has shown that many self-published stories have been found and nominated by a wide range of current nominators!
Nominators are requested to search for stories in their niche.
“Thirty over Fifty” covers all niches, apart from the disallowed topics listed in the rules or guidelines for 30 O 50. So a 30 O 50 writers’ favorite interests or topics of writing can be covered by being published in 30 O 50 — keeping in mind that writers for 30 O 50 MUST be fifty (50) years of age or older.
Can you give examples of boosted stories?
Some Publication Editors that have gone public are showcasing examples of boosted stories, e.g. the editors of the Publications below.
Illumination — one collection of boosted stories
At the time of writing this, I have nominated one story from “Thirty over Fifty” that was boosted. My nomination for this story written by Curt Melzer included the following reason for nominating it.
“This is a very memorable and powerful message from the writer’s experience, about “reverse discrimination,” which levels up our understanding and exploration of racial themes.”
If you do a search of “boost” using the search function at the top left of Medium’s home page, you may find stories written by people whose stories were boosted.
UPDATE: January 2024 ~ “Thirty over Fifty” has a gallery of boosted stories too!
You can see which stories in 30 O 50 have been boosted by clicking here.
How can I become a writer for Thirty Over Fifty?
30 O 50 has strict content guidelines and this is because one person, me, runs it. I have had my fair share of experiences with political conflicts, illnesses, trauma, and violence, and am therefore not going to read any submissions graphically related to any of these and more (as in the Guidelines).
If you want to write about a disallowed topic and you’re 50 and over, you will have to find another Publication to apply to write for.
If you are a writer for 30 O 50 it’s okay to generalize, i.e. to refer to an illness or a disorder; but we don’t want the details. So if you need to give details of an illness or its treatment to make your story understood, 30 O 50 is not for you. General overall information is okay.
While some may say that a list of disallowed or unaccepted topics or themes is exclusive, it is a Publication Editor’s choice of what is accepted into her or his Publication. If you’re 50 and over and want to write pieces that 30 O 50 doesn’t accept, you can start your own Publication or find another Publication to apply to be a writer for.
Even with some content not allowed on “Thirty over Fifty” you could still write a boost-worthy story, as Curt Melzer did.
Other examples are to write a unique or memorable and exciting or interesting personal story about your retirement, jobs, education, family activities, travel, culture, hobbies, skills or relationships.
Keep in mind that the mass readers of your boost-worthy story must get a lot of use from your story. This can be done by you making a strong point about something that helps them get through their lives or adds to their understanding or knowledge about something little known.
To apply to be a writer for 30 O 50, you must be at least 50 years old.
Sign up on the Guidelines page by clicking here.
How do I become a nominator for the boost program?
If you are an Editor of a Publication on Medium and in the Member Partner Program head over to the Medium post below. Scroll through to the 2nd paragraph where you will find the part that gives a link to a form to fill in to apply.
Ariel Meadow Stallings, Medium’s Director of Publisher Growth, has openly stated that only applicants who are accepted into the program will be contacted. I submitted my application straightaway in February.
In March 2023 I received an generic email below from Ariel stating that there were over 450 applicants. Ariel also stated that the program was in its very early, very experimental phases, and while in such a phase, Medium’s systems weren’t yet built to accommodate hundreds of nominators.
She said that at that phase Medium’s priorities were:
• Publishers whose publications feature high-quality stories • Ensuring we’ve got many different story topics represented (yes, that includes art, poetry, history, and fiction!) • Publishers from a range of diverse backgrounds
Ariel finished off with stating in her email that applicants will hear from Medium if they fit what Medium was looking for in this first wave of the beta.
Then in May I received an email from Ariel inviting me to join the Boost programme! Currently I am one of 62 nominators across Medium, still learning how the programme works as it is tweaked or refined.
As stated, I am revealing that I am a nominator to incentivize new writers to join “Thirty over Fifty” and submit boost-worthy stories. But that doesn’t mean that I won’t be nominating stories outside of this Publication!
How do nominators find stories to boost?
Speaking for myself, I search for boost-worthy stories using Topic names within a big range related to personal development, mindfulness, mental health, experiences of older people, culture, happiness, kindness, diversity, inclusivity, and more.
I also look at Publications other than my own for boost-worthy stories.
These search methods are supplemented by what I call my “spider work” which means one thing leads to another. For example, I may look at the comments of a story that I have read and my curiosity may take me to a commenter’s profile page. There I may find a story that I want to nominate for boost. It takes hours for me to find 2 or 3 stories to boost.
To be boosted you need your story to be found.
Having said that I request that you do not ask me to look at your story to consider boosting it. Any notes or comments asking so will be ignored.
I don’t have time to attend to requests from writers across the platform asking me to read their stories with a view to nominating them to be possibly boosted. What you think is boost-worthy may not be (sorry).
Make yourself found (through other means than sending me a private note or asking me in a comment, to be boosted), is my nugget of advice.
Please read the information in the pages below. You can always ask Medium any questions you have about boosting by going to the Help Centre and submitting a ticket under “I want to submit feedback.”
Importantly, it’s not as easy to write a boost-worthy story as you may think. What you think is boost-worthy may not be (sorry).
Based upon my experience as a nominator and my being a reader, writer, and Publication Editor on Medium since 2018, I have written a helpful Guideline on how to increase your chances of your story being boosted, available here.
How do I know that my story has been boosted?
Check your Stats on Medium and it will show a label “boosted” if your story is boosted. Also, check your emails because you should receive an email from Medium if your story is boosted. Make sure that you have set up your Medium “account” for receiving emails via Settings — Notifications.
Below is a screenshot of what the email looks like currently, though I have whited out the name of the writer and of the story.
Keep in mind that a nominator is not required to tell you that she or he has nominated your story to be boosted, whether it is accepted by a curator of Medium or not.
Also, at the time of writing this article, there’s no way for readers to tell if a story other than their own has been boosted.
For tips on increasing your chances of your story getting boosted, whether you are a writer for “Thirty over Fifty” or not, click here.
