MEDIUM

You can Send Old Medium Stories to New Readers

Here’s how it’s done

I love my 11.6K followers. But I adore my 233 subscribers. Why? Subscribers are the readers who care enough about your work to make sure they get an email notification every time you post.

Although I appreciate every single reader, I’m especially grateful to that core group of readers who want to make sure they don’t miss a single story, rather than relying on the algorithm to put it in their feed.

Because sometimes? The algorithm doesn’t.

I’ve been on Medium since February 2019. I’ve published 758 stories, most of which my subscribers, many of whom came late to the “Reading Roz” party, have never read.

But there’s a fix for that! I recently learned that you can send “vintage” posts to your current subscribers. So when I haven’t published anything new in a few days? I’ll send out a story that may not be new, but is new to them.

Not one subscriber has responded with, “I love this story but it was published in 2019! Stop sending me old work.”

Most readers don’t seem to notice. A few have thanked me for sending them a post they missed out on the first time.

And since most of my subscribers are Medium writers themselves, many have responded with, “How are you sending me old stories? I didn’t know you could do that! I want to send old posts to my subscribers too! What’s your secret?”

So I’m sharing that secret with you now.

It’s easy.

(1) At the top of each published story, there are three little horizontal green dots.

(2) Click on them and you’ll get a drop down menu.

(3) The third item on that menu is “Email to subscribers.” Select that option and you’re done.

Except? If your subscribers have already seen this particular story? Medium won’t resend it to them. Instead you’ll get a little message telling you that you’ve already sent this story to your subscribers.

What criteria do they use to determine this? I’ve been publishing stories on Medium for over 4 years and subscribers have been signing on to read them for almost that long. If just one of my 233 subscribers has already been sent a story, does that mean that Medium won’t let me send it to any of them? Does the story have to have been sent to a critical mass of readers before it gets denied? Is the whole thing time sensitive? Anything written before 2020 is okay, but newer work won’t fly?

I have no idea.

The stories I wrote in 2019 and 2020 are usually safe, although occasionally Medium will veto one of them too.

Why? Who knows?

I’ve never understood the Medium algorithm and I’ve learned not to try. So when I get this little notification, I just choose another vintage Medium post to send out.

Now that I’ve told you how to send old work to current subscribers, I look forward to reading your vintage Medium stories.

And now that I’ve told you how cool it is to subscribe to a writer so you won’t miss a single story, I’m confident that every single person who reads this piece will want to subscribe to me. Just click on that little green circle with an envelope in it on my profile.

Thanks! I really appreciate it. You’re the best!

I’ll see you in your In Box.

Writing Coach Roz Warren, who writes for everyone from the Funny Times to the New York Times, can help you improve and publish your work. Drop her a line at [email protected]. (That’s Ros with an “s,” not a “z.”)