Why you shouldn’t quit Medium

Eventually it will pay off

I’ve been writing on Medium since July 2019. Currently I have around 320 articles published and 270 followers. A lot of those articles are poems, which translates into very short reading times and very little money. The most I’ve ever made in a month is just over $300 and for the first 12 months I made just about nothing.

An extra $300 a month might make a difference to people in some countries, but in the West (I live in London), it is a paltry sum. Despite all of that, I have never been tempted to quit Medium. And I don’t think I ever will be tempted to quit.

Am I crazy? No. I know it’s easy to get discouraged, and I know that the earnings I’ve described are pathetic compared to what you can read in the articles by authors making tens of thousands of dollars a month on this platform. I’m nowhere near that level, yet. So should I just quit and find something else to do? No! No way. There are far too many good reasons to write on Medium, even if you’re not getting any reads or any money yet.

Writers write

A lot of my friends have talked about becoming writers. Some of them are amazing storytellers, some of them are experts in their fields, some of them have had incredible experiences that could certainly make for some fascinating reading, but none of that matters. The only thing that matters if you want to be a writer, is that you write. If you’re not writing, you’re not a writer, and you’ll never be a writer.

I’ve wanted to be a writer for years, and sometimes, Medium has felt like life support for that dream.

I could write in notebooks, or on my laptop, but what’s the point if nobody ever sees it? I’ve just completed my first novel (and it’s been accepted by a publisher), and the writing muscles I strengthened on Medium over the last year and a half definitely assisted me in that process. The fact that anybody I submitted my work to can Google my name and see me come up as a writer (because of the work I have done on Medium) probably also helped.

Medium is a treasure chest

Everything I write on Medium gets saved, either it’s published, or it’s in my drafts. When I was writing all the time in books, I would tear out and throw away pages all the time. That never happens with Medium, which means I end up finishing much more.

A few weeks ago I realised I have over 170 poems published on Medium. That’s enough to publish a collection! If I didn't have Medium to write on, or I was able to tear up and throw away everything I wasn’t satisfied with, I’d never have been in this position.

Poems aren’t the only thing. There are a lot of articles I’ve written on here which have actually been developed into ideas for books. Medium is a treasure chest for your ideas as writer.

Medium has taught me the value of patience and perseverance

I’m not one of those writers who made it big quickly on Medium. In fact, I haven’t even made it big. What I consider big is a long, long way from where I am now. But I’m convinced it will arrive, and just for that it’s worth staying on this platform.

This isn’t rocket science. The more you write, and the more followers you get, the more you will earn on here. It might happen quickly, but I wouldn’t bet on that. It will definitely happen eventually (barring acts of God, natural disasters, or Medium deciding to stop paying….). If you had 1000 articles on here, and 1000 followers, you’d definitely be making some money, and a lot of it would be from articles that you wrote ages ago. I have less than three hundred followers and just over 300 articles, I’m making some money. Imagine what the writers with 100,000 followers or more can make on here. Nobody is stupid enough to imagine those 100,000 followers came from nowhere are they? The writers who have them have worked hard and worked consistently. They have been patient and tenacious.

Writing on Medium is like having compound interest working for you.

Compound interest only works over a long time. And writing on Medium seems to be the same. Warren Buffet, often called the greatest investor alive, has been investing for nearly 80 years, and has made the vast majority of his money in the last 20. That is to say, it took him 60 years to start getting really, really, really rich. It took him 20 years to get rich.

Writing on Medium is a bit like that. In my first year, I earned more than $10, only once. Then suddenly, after about 15 months of writing I got paid $80, that was a big jump. Then the next month was over $200, and the next over $300. They were big jumps. I know there will be big jumps. Where $10 eventually became $300, that could eventually become $1000, and then several thousand a month. I totally understand that now. The only thing that will prevent it will be me deciding I’m not going to write anymore.

Warren Buffet has stated that most of the money he has made investing came from only seven to ten of the companies he has invested in. Some investments lose money. Nothing you write ever has to lose you money though. If you write enough articles, you might have something go viral, and that can make you lots of money. Just like the seven to ten great picks that Warren Buffet has made in his eighty year career.

Warren Buffet would never have been as wealthy as he is if he’d been in a rush or given up. And you’ll never make it big on Medium if you’re in a rush or you give up.

The joy of going viral

I haven’t had any of my stories go viral yet, but I read stories about people who have, and the thought that it might happen to me puts a smile on my face. One Medium writer made $19,000 dollars from a single story. Whatever you earn from your job, making $19,000 from a single piece of work you did, once, has got to feel good. That article has probably earned that writer a lot more by now.

I might never have an article go viral. It doesn’t matter, my articles can still make thousands of dollars a month, eventually. But I admit I’d like to go viral, and every single time a write I story it increases my chances just a tiny bit.

Because it’s a better use of time than….

I write on Medium in the time I used to spend watching YouTube videos and staring at my phone. That really didn’t do anything for me. Writing on Medium develops my skills as a writer, and it makes me money.

Time is more valuable than money, so I’m very aware of how I use my time. Jim Rohn said “Do the right thing with your time all the time and it (improving your life) doesn’t take long.” I agree with that. There are articles I’ve written on Medium in less than an hour that have had lifetime earnings of several hundred dollars. I don’t make several hundred dollars an hour in my day job! So money you make for the time you spend on Medium can be very, very good.

Writing on Medium can lead to other writing gigs, and other benefits

This isn’t one I’ve experienced personally but I’ve read about other writers who’ve been offered paid writing gigs based on the articles they’ve written in Medium. Maybe that will happen to me one day too, and there are probably other benefits to writing on Medium that I don’t even realise.

I’ll never know what they are if I don’t keep writing on Medium. But like I said, that’s not going to happen. There are other platforms out there, and I might start writing on them too, but cessation of my work on this platform will waste all of the effort I’ve put in so far. You reap what you sow, and Medium is arable land, so I’m going to keep sowing.

If you’ve been writing on Medium for a while and you’re tempted to give up, or take your wares elsewhere, maybe this article has convinced you otherwise. I’m not writing this because I’m in love with Medium, I’m writing it because success takes patience and consistency. Pick a platform (whatever platform that may be)where people are succeeding, and stick with it.

Good luck with your writing.

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