Essential Reading For New Medium Writers
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Intro
This is part four of a series of articles in which I share what I’ve learned from writing on Medium. I try to provide as much value as I can with no fluff. Hopefully, this is useful for you!
If you just got here you can find part one of the series here:
Now let’s get to the point.
Introduction
In this article I am covering Medium. Which is currently my main writing platform.
One of the features that differentiate Medium from other writing platforms is publications. On Medium you can submit your writing to existing publications that are already established and have a following. Or you can start your own.
As with most things in life, using publications has its benefits, but it also has some drawbacks. Today we are going to explore both. And we will also be looking at some other potential use cases for this feature.
Basic overview
When writing on Medium one of your top priorities as a writer is reaching as wide an audience as possible. But what you really want is to reach the relevant readers for your writing. And publications can help you achieve this.
But first, how to submit your writing to a publication?
To be able to add your stories to a publication, you first need to be added as a writer to the publication. This can be done by the owner of the publication or editors, through the publication settings menu.
And the process differs from publication to publication for this. For some publications, you simply need to leave a comment on an article. For others, you need to fill out a questionnaire or send out a draft for review.
A simple Google search with the publication's name + submission guidelines should help you find directions to get this done.
Once you are accepted as a writer, you can simply add your drafts to publications from the menu in the top right corner of the text editor.
Screenshot by HungryMinded
But what are the benefits of using publications?
Pros
1. Existing audience
Some of the publications on Medium have quite a large following. And publishing your writing through them can definitely bring your writing in front of more people. This might be especially handy if you are just starting out.
To find out how many followers a publication has, add /latest to the URL of the publication's page. Here’s an example.
Screenshot by HungryMinded
We will be looking at a publication called Mind Cafe for this example. If you go to the home page of the publication. You won’t see the number of followers anywhere. But if you add /latest to the URL, on the right side of the page, you will see an “About” section which includes the number of followers a publication has.
Screenshot by HungryMinded
But don’t judge a publication just by the number of followers it has. Sometimes smaller publications with a more active and engaged audience will serve you a lot better. You can get a grasp of this by reading a few articles from the publication and analyzing the number of comments and claps the articles get.
2. Specified topics
Some publications cover specific subjects exclusively. This will help you reach a more targeted audience interested in the topics you are covering. This could also come in handy if you tend to write outside of your niche once in a while. Or if you haven’t found your niche just yet.
3. Publications have editors
Not all of the publications do this, but some will help you grow as a writer by reviewing your work and leaving some pointers for improvement. Some of the editors are quite experienced and know exactly what’s expected of a writer not only here on Medium. Use this to gain more knowledge and find out in which departments you might be lacking.
4. External opportunities
Some of the editors or owners of publications also run other projects aside from the ones here on Medium. And if they like your work, you might just get featured on some other blog, newsletter, etc. And it might even turn into a job opportunity.
One of my articles published in The Side Hustle Club publication got featured in their newsletter which brought in quite a large amount of external views.
But what about the drawbacks?
Cons
1. You will have to be patient
Some of the largest publications get a ton of submissions each day. And it takes time for the editors to sort through them. Sometimes you will have to wait for more than a week, just to find out that your article doesn’t fit the editor’s vision. And even with smaller publications, you will still need to wait for someone to manually review your submission.
So if you are planning on publishing daily or planning a schedule, you are out of luck if you want to publish through publications.
This brings us to the next point.
2. Less control
When publishing through a publication you give away your power to choose when your articles get published. It’s all in the hands of editors. And even then you are left in the dark.
The only way to know if a story has been reviewed and scheduled for publishing by an editor is to use a chrome extension. I think Medium could improve the functionality here.
3. Medium is moving its focus away
It looks like Medium is shifting its focus away from publications. Earlier Medium used to financially support some of the largest publications. But those days are over. And it seems like the algorithm doesn’t favor publications as much as it used to as well.
But don’t get discouraged, this doesn’t mean publishing through an established publication won’t help you. It just won’t help you as much as it did in the glory days of publications on Medium.
These were the main pros and cons of using publications I’ve experienced, now let’s move on to other ways to use this functionality.
Other use cases
1. Starting a Newsletter
When publishing on Medium you can choose to send out your stories to your mailing list. And you can do the same for publications. You can basically set up a newsletter from inside Medium using this functionality.
2. Niche out
If you want to cover several topics, you can create your own publication for each of these topics. And you can have separate mailing lists for each one. This way the readers who prefer reading just one of the topics you cover, can simply choose to subscribe to the mailing list of the specific publication.
As a bonus, you will be able to check the stats for each of your niches this way. Publications have their own dedicated stats page.
It’s a win-win. Your readers won’t get discouraged from reading by receiving irrelevant e-mails. And you will get more data to analyze in return.
Closing thoughts
If you are writing on Medium definitely give publications a go. Find what works for you. I am currently mostly publishing my stories through my own publication Seeds For The Future, but from time to time I submit my stories to other publications. I do this to find an audience that fits the topics I am covering. And to grow my own network of readers.
If you enjoyed reading this article and learned something new. I think you should check out this list. I try my best to provide value and share everything I’ve learned.
Becoming A Medium Mastermind View list 4 stories
Stay curios and stay HungryMinded!
originally published on Medium