What We Can Learn From My Top Earners — A Summary of 2021

This was the year I started to earn for real

It’s been one hell of a year. And no, I am not even talking about the pandemic. I am talking about my life. Like where I lived, what I’ve done, which courses I did, and what new things I learned.

I started out the year living in Africa, spent the summer over in Europe and now I am in Asia. In case you’re asking yourself if I am a nomad — I’d say yes. I’m a traveler by heart and take opportunities with both hands.

But let’s get to the point…

Why do we do yearly reviews and summaries from the past?

Good question.

We want to learn from our past. That is number one. We want to see what has worked for us and what failed. We also want to share with others where we came from, what we’ve done and where we are standing now.

Reviewing your work or your lifestyle can help you plan your future. To learn from previous mistakes one must review them first. To do mistakes is alright but it is important to never do one mistake twice.

And when we are talking about writing there’s plenty to review and analyze. Many writers review their daily work and share their lessons learned on a weekly basis. Stats and other insights do help but also distract us from the actual process of writing.

While I would be lying if I’d say I don’t ever check my stats, I do admit I don’t check them as thoroughly as others. What I do have noticed, of course, is that writing about writing sells.

There are many writers with fewer Followers than me who get a lot more traffic on their work simply because they write about writing. And therefore they earn more. Like a lot more.

But I am not here to complain. I also do know that many of those writers have a better language and simply write better than me. But that is not why I am here. To write about writing. I love to write about so many other things.

I write about photography, travel, nature, and the beauty of life.

So while I do share from time to time an article on writing I don’t do that out of the greed for money, but simply to share some insights out of my writer’s life. The life of a writer who doesn’t primarily write about writing.

I like to share insights into a life of a travel writer. During a pandemic. How it is to still step on flights, how it is to set up your working station in different locations, and what struggles I do fight with.

So here I am. One year later and a lot wiser. 2020 was the year I started to write for real. I became a Medium member in May and for the first time in my life, I wrote outside of my personal website. I published a book (in German) and began to realize people do like to read what I write.

2021 then turned into the year where I started to earn through my writing. Like for real. With the combinations of writing on two American platforms, base pay, bonus payments, general earnings, plus the income of my published book I managed to keep myself and my husband afloat for about 6 months from almost exclusively the income of writing.

While the pandemic affected our work as skydiving instructors being dependant on the tourism industry, I was very happy and proud I could carry us through those tough months with my writing.

As a yearly review, I’d like to look at every month’s highest earner and share the insights of my stats. I hope there aren’t just the articles up there where I wrote on writing out here. I wish there are some of the articles where I wrote on something I was passionate about.

But let’s see…

January

And as I am talking about why we do write early reviews I find the article from last year right on top of my list. “The Year I Started to Write for Real” was my review on 2020 and the highest earner in January 2021.

The review wasn’t just about my writing journey but also about the community on Medium, people that have helped me along the way, and friends that I made.

A close runner-up was an article of a collection of “The Most Beautiful Wildlife Pictures I Ever Took” of which I was sure proud of. It didn’t make it to the prime spot but got also lots of traffic since I pinned it on top of my profile for several months.

The winning article was published in Illumination. A heavily discussed publication on the platform. Most established writers avoid the site or even refuse to read from them. New writers love the pub on the contrary because they publish quickly and pretty much never reject a piece.

I’m not going to judge on it here. It was the publishing platform of this piece:

February

“Two Scorpions after Breakfast” won the race of stats in February. While this one was written while traveling through the wilderness of Namibia, it was sure the title that got this piece the prime position in the end.

The article is a photo essay on a walk through the desert. It describes how I encountered two scorpions walking in the sand and finally decided to turn around because two were one too many.

This definitely shows the importance of titles. While I must admit, often I do not spend much time thinking about the title but if I do and come up with a creative one, it does make a difference in the stats.

And the runner-up of February is the same one of January. My readers surely like the collection of wildlife captured across the African continent.

“Two Scorpions after Breakfast” was published in SNAPSHOTS, my favorite photography publication having the only downside of limiting my articles to 750 words. Those who know me have realized I love writing essays and often struggle to stop talking.

March

Showing incredible perseverance and endurance the article “The Most Beautiful Wildlife Pictures I Ever Took” finally made it onto the prime position of the podium.

Being published at the beginning of January, the article continued to earn income throughout the following months and was my highest earner in March.

The title of this piece came from the World Traveler’s Blog’s post on “travelogues that have not been written yet”. The list of creative headlines was incredibly inspirational to me for moments I didn’t know what to write about. I published several pieces with headlines out of the said article.

Just after I published the collection of wildlife pictures, I became an editor of the traveling publication. That surely did give a boost to my reads, but more than that, it taught me a lot about editing and proofreading.

I worked together with an incredible team of international writers and we were all devastated when we had to make the call to close the pub at the end of September this year.

Thank you once again to Cody, Glad, Alex (as Be Adventurer), and Georgie (as Sh*t Happens - Lost Girl Travel) for the awesome time with the WTB.

April

And guess what? Nothing changed in April. The same article was on top of the earnings list. I can’t remember how long I had it pinned to the top but this piece continued to earn the most of all my articles.

I am very happy to see this development since it does show and encourage me to get successful when I write what I am passionate about. This piece was both — it was about photography and travel. And the combination of these two passions of mine goes well together.

Not many articles of mine get enough internal views to show my readers’ interests. Well, this one did. And it does give me some interesting insights.

While my two top writer topics are taking the lead in my reader interests as well (I’m in the top 5 for Photography), the close runner-up is writing. The said topic that brings in most writers the piles of cash.

I have tagged a few of my pieces with creativity but might implement that tag a bit more in the future. Same as with lifestyle. I don’t recall ever using it. Apparently, my readers are interested in my lifestyle as well.

April was by the way also the first-month Medium handed out the bonus payment. This was a game-changer for me and my earnings, especially since it came totally unexpected but was completely welcome.

May

No, the article did not remain on top. I had removed its prime position on my profile plus — and here comes the point — I did publish an article on writing on Medium. And, of course, it did take the lead immediately. It was only published on the 29th of May but went straight to the top.

The piece “One Year and 250 Published Stories Later, I Reached 10,000 Followers on Medium” took some time in the making and got professionally edited and proofread by my former colleague from the World Traveler’s Blog.

Glad Doggett was so kind to offer me her service and give me insight into the work of an editor. It opened my eyes in so many aspects even though I might have forgotten many of them afterward. I am still thankful for the work she did.

While I did try to get into the bigger publications with this piece, I only received rejection and finally published it at “Writers’ Blokke”, a publication where I publish these days all my articles on writing.

The winning article this month is also a review of my journey on Medium. It talks about how I write, how I achieved a 100% curation rate, and how I managed to increase my followers. It also mentions where I submit my work and how I engage with my readers on this platform.

June

And since “One Year and 250 Published Stories Later, I Reached 10,000 Followers on Medium” only was published at the end of May and still made it the very same month to the prime position, it continued to gain traffic for the entire month of June.

And obviously landed on top again.

This gives me again the chance to look at my reader’s interests. While the tag of “travel” remained on top, photography disappeared, but this piece also wasn’t about the topic at all.

Writing moved up to the second position. Of course, this piece was about writing, so whoever clicked on the article is surely interested in writing on Medium.

The bottom three topics of psychology, mindfulness, and books are confusingly in this statistics. I’m not sure how people who follow those tags do relate to my work. Maybe mindfulness I do understand. But I never write on books or book reviews.

July

As successful as the article on my writing journey was in the previous two months, it did not show up in the top ten in July. A new article claimed the leading position of earnings.

“Natural Wonders From Around the World” was a response to the writing prompt on #naturalwonders from the World Traveler’s Blog.

In a collection of natural sites from around the world, I shared the most beautiful places I’ve visited. In this article, I included my reader’s interests in travel and photography once again. Maybe one of the reasons why it performed so well.

August

In August I jumped back to the topic of writing when I published “I Contacted Medium to Delete Fake Followers From My Profile” in the publication “Writers’ Blokke”. It was around the time when Medium was cleaning up its platform and removed countless fake accounts.

Many writers and even publications had lost several thousand followers and while I was expecting the same to happen to me (since I had gained a significantly high number of followers), I didn’t even lose one follower.

September

September was the month the winner of the Medium Writer’s Challenge was being revealed. While I didn’t know yet I had no chance of winning since all winners were American citizens, I still submitted two pieces to two different topics.

“The Reason Why I Won’t Get a Real Job” didn’t win the MWC but it won my earnings list in September. The article on my life, work, and lifestyle did draw quite a bit of traffic during the month.

It faces the question I often get asked about getting a “real job”. My answer is rather straightforward and honest.

This article is the first one that has been self-published and made it all the way to the top. Things seemed to change on Medium and several publications were closing down which is why I chose to self-publish. And I did not regret it.

October

This month’s top leader was in September already in the top 3 despite being published only three days before the end of the month. I was curious to see how it would continue to perform and was excited to find it up here.

In 2021 I had to watch my Grandma diminishing. After she got diagnosed with a large tumor in her brain she decided against treatments and finally fell asleep in her own home.

In the weeks after her passing, I surely dealt with grief. I wrote about her which helped me process it all. “Longlife Remedies From my Grandma” was just one of many articles I published about her life and her wisdom.

The exciting part of this article was it had been published in the Medium publication of “Curious”. It was my first one with them and even though at first it didn’t draw much traffic, it continued to get views over several months.

November

Published on the last day of October, “I Gained Almost 10,000 Followers in One Month and I Wish I Didn’t” received a prime position in November. Once again I wanted to share some insights into my writing journey on Medium. And it took off. Or at least as far as my stats are concerned of traffic.

The article is about my writing journey on Medium. In specific it’s about the increase in follower numbers and how it all of a sudden got out of hand. I am also talking about the algorithm and how I try not to focus too much on my stats.

This article was published in the publication of “Writers’ Blokke”.

December

And I’m finishing the year with an article about my time in Ghana, experiences, and mistakes I made along the way, and what we can learn from it. Published in November, “The Reason Why You Shouldn’t Volunteer in an Orphanage” really picked up momentum at the beginning of December and kept on drawing traffic throughout the month. No other post had a chance against its earnings.

The piece was published in Age of Awareness, a large publication on Medium where I’ve sent before a handful of articles on education, environment, and other topics on awareness in life.

Summery

Now, you can see all kinds of topics can make it to the top. An attractive title is for sure the key to success. But then it helps as well if you write on what you’re passionate about. I had only three months where articles on writing won.

Topics on travel, photography, and even relationships did take the lead in other months. I mainly write about what I’m passionate about. And while not every article on photography will bring in a lot, a handful does.

None of these top earners are short-form posts. The shortest piece was 4 minutes long. All the other articles except for one are 8 to 15 minutes long. While sure, it is important to keep it short and not stretch your work, but in the end, reading time is what pays. And therefore my longest articles often did earn me a decent amount of money.

As long as you avoid unnecessary words and boring paragraphs, there is nothing wrong with writing longer articles. Keep your audience curious and they’ll stay on your work.

Last but not least 2021 was the year Medium announced to move away from publications and support self-published writers more. While in the first half of the year I had no posts being self-published but distributed in various publications, in the second half I actually had top earners from self-publishing.

So here is my take-away:

• An attractive title is the key to success.
• Write what you’re passionate about. Any topic can draw traffic.
• Write with passion. Your audience loves authentic writing.
• Professional editing is a game-changer.
• Longform articles do earn more if written well.
• Publications are not needed anymore to succeed.

This was it. I hope you enjoyed the recap of my writing year and could take something out of it. Keep following your passion but continue to work on the quality of your writing. That will bring you to your most successful writing year.

I would like to thank each and everyone for joining me. I appreciate the silent ones who only read but don’t leave a mark. But I also appreciate every single one of you who claps, highlights and always has something kind to say. Thank you.

Happy New Year!

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