Does Medium Allow Multiple Accounts?
In short, yes. Here’s why I run 2 Medium Partner Program accounts.
- Can you have multiple Medium accounts? Yes.
- Can you run multiple Medium Partner Program accounts? Yes.
- Why should you consider using multiple Medium accounts? I’ll explain in more detail below.
Why It’s Okay to Have Multiple Medium Accounts
If any of the questions above pertain to you, you’re in the right place. After browsing Medium’s terms of services and FAQ’s, it’s safe to have multiple Medium accounts. Doing a search of Medium’s help center doesn’t show anything prohibiting using multiple accounts.
In order to use the Medium Partner Program in different accounts, you will need to use a separate email address and phone number when registering with Stripe. Otherwise when registering in a new account, you will be told that the account already exists. When linking payouts, you can link both Stripe accounts to the same bank account. To get around the separate phone number, I just used my brother’s phone number. You can also use a virtual phone number for registration purposes if you would prefer to go that route.
Why I Decided to Make a Second Medium Account
As a bystander watching the number of “how much I make in a month” Medium articles steadily grow, I realized I wanted in. However, I have different niches that I’m passionate about. There are also certain topics that I feel freer posting under a separate persona.
I published my first article to Medium in the summer of 2018. The article did pretty well on its own and quickly rose to the top of Google search results. Even two and a half years later, that article still regularly receives hundreds of views a week. Regrettably, I didn’t monetize that article until October 2020. It doesn’t make much, but it pays for the occasional Amazon purchase I make.
My original Medium account is extremely inactive. It has a total of three articles posted in a span of three years. When I decided recently that I wanted to explore writing, I felt really self conscious posting to my original account. That account, though inactive, was already pretty deep in topics that I didn’t feel like writing about as much.
Reason 1: Separating Targeted Niches
I decided to set up this account to stand in for all the other niches I like to write about. After registering this account at the end of 2020, I began a much more regular rhythm of posting on Medium. In the few months I’ve been writing, I have already published 12 articles, a stark contrast to the 3 stale articles on my other account.
You can see that my earnings from January are already significantly more than my other account. It’s not much, but it’s a good starting point. I expect the earnings disparity to only increase as I try to increase in my consistency with this account.
This account here has a focus on personal storytelling and finance, topics that I don’t plan to delve into much in my original account. Many of my published articles and planned posts have to do with the stock market. It is a topic that I recently became passionate about, and I enjoy sharing the things I learn with a broader audience here.
Reason 2: Remove Writing Paralysis
For some reason, on my other account I’m pretty afraid of publishing content. By starting afresh, I feel a lot less unencumbered to write what’s on my mind. Since this account is smaller in the number of followers it has, it makes me feel safer trying out different things.
For that reason, I have started a number of publications on this account. While they are mostly inactive, I’m going to try out publishing to them and seeing if they gain consistent traction. Maybe if they become established enough, I’ll consider publishing to them with my original account as well. We’ll have to see though.
This is definitely a personal factor, but having this second account has made a massive mental difference for me. I have so many unfinished articles in my queue waiting to be published, and I’m really excited to get them out for you all.
Reason 3: Compare Analytics
Since my two accounts are operating in different niches, it’s nice to be able to compare the overall statistics from my stories against each other. This will be more useful as I post more content on my original account, but I can see a difference in reading time between the two accounts.
For example, my original account’s viewership predominantly comes from search engine results. Even though I regularly get thousands of views a month, I don’t earn much from the Medium Partner Program since most of the visitors are external and not paying subscribers.
This account has significantly lower traffic. Very little of my traffic comes from search results, something I’m working on changing. To offset those differences, I signed myself up to become a writer on various publications. Whenever I publish to a publication, there’s a trickle of Medium subscribers who will read my article. Although this has a tendency to die off within a few days, that initial readership contributes to most of my monthly payout.
Are You Considering Using Multiple Medium Accounts?
If you are and have any other questions that weren’t answered, feel free to leave them down below. I would love to hear the reasons you have for making separate accounts to publish on the platform. There’s so many good reasons to do so, and I know I’ve only scratched the surface here today.
