How to Write for Dev Life Digital

Strategies That Improve Audience Size

If you’re reading this, it means you’re probably interested in sending in some of your work to Dev Life Digital to be submitted to our publication… I’d like to take this moment to thank you. The inspiration behind this publication was to build a better developer community, share our experiences and grow from each other symbiotically. So, in short, it wouldn’t be possible without you.

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Let’s move forward and talk about some things you can do to ensure that your articles get accepted and published for the world to see. A few things the editors will be looking at are:

1. Spelling and Grammar — This is pretty self-explanatory. Spelling and Grammar are two things that will automatically take credibility points away from your character, even if you write the most expertly-crafted piece of work the world has ever seen. With plenty of tools such as Grammarly and spell check readily available within Google Docs (It’s free!) at our fingertips, this is a no brainer. This rule also goes for pretty much anything in life that you type. Misspelled words have a subconscious effect on the reader (of putting you in a *slightly* lesser category of intelligence or preparedness. It sucks, but it’s the truth, sorry!)
2. Formatting — Medium has a great text editor availble on their desktop website. It is wonderful and should be celebrated. It also has one on mobile…. that one… exists. No need for celebration. It’s useful in a pinch to write some ideas down, but half of the editing features are missing and it can make a 10 minute editing session last an hour as you’re trying to highlight things with your fingers. I’ve wasted my time, so you don’t have to waste yours. Just get on a computer and format it quickly.
3. Headings — What do people who like listicles (list articles), people who can’t see fine print, and impatient people have in common? They all hate GIGANTIC WALLS OF TEXT. Spacing is important, headings are important. If your reader is trying to skim your article for a specific piece of information, they will appreciate the convenience and thoughtfulness of a heading. If you hand someone a piece of paper with a giant wall of small text, they will more than likely give you a look that asks “Why are you doing this to me? Are you mad at me?” Medium has several styles of blockquotes and even has dropletters for the first letter of a paragraph. It looks great, and adds visual interest to your story. Take advantage of these features… they are there for a reason! In order to pull up the formatting menu, simple highlight some text, and voila!
4. Proper tags — Now that the internet is literally one of our most precious resources as human beings (since EVERYTHING runs on it), we have to, as writers, adapt to search engine algorithms. If you do not tag your articles properly, the chances of them being read are, honestly speaking, slim to none. Medium depends on tags to match readers with their content. No one wants to waste their time… especially our writers. So ensure that you use appropriate tags so that your time spent writing your article was well-spent. After all, the whole reason we write is so that others read, right? Of course, sometimes it’s the catharsis of the act of writing that brings us to do it, but trust me: people want and need to hear what you have to say, otherwise you wouldn’t have said it.
5. Images (with Caption and alt text) — Images are also very important for your article to be accepted into Dev Life Digital. When your article gets posted to social media, or when it gets crawled by search engines, it needs an image to serve as a preview. If you upload 1 picture for the article, it will be the one chosen as the preview image, as well. You do have the option to have as many images as you would like on your articles, however, 2 things we require are: 1. A caption that states where the images came from. Copyright strikes are lame and should be avoided at all costs. 2. Alt Text. If you don’t know what Alt Text is, you will fail to realize the importance of it. It is the text that shows up when an image doesn’t load on a page. It describes the image. It’s wonderful to be able to see that sentence when the picture doesn’t load. It’s also used by screen readers to describe the image to the visually impaired. They depend on alt text in order to use the internet.
6. Fact check. FACT CHECK. Did I mention…Fact check? We generally have no problem with opinion pieces on Dev Life Digital as long as you’re not trying to join forces with evil and take over the world and have decided to use Medium as a way to attract followers to your cult, we should be fine. However… one thing that will definitely get your article rejected is if you present an opinion as a fact. For example, if you explain how you love Visual Studio Code, and lists reasons for it, then it will be accepted. But if you don’t give any reasoning, then the reader doesn’t learn anything from it besides that you love Visual Studio Code. This translates to them not clapping for your article, and your article not gaining traction. People are generally pretty keen to seeing things like that jump out at them. Your readers are smart, so give them an explanation besides “It’s just, like, really friggin awesome and I love it so much.” This is a soft form of misinformation. Misinformation is also used by people to manipulate others and it’s probably one of the most terrible evils in the world. So be straightforward: Say what you mean and mean what you say. Have proof to back up any claims you make. “I LUV REACT nd I haaaaaate Angular” doesn’t tell me a single thing in terms of how those libraries are used. “They are both excellent libraries, here are some pros and cons…”

If you wish to write for the publication, please send an email to devlifedigital@gmail.com

Thank you for reading, we hope to see your work on here soon!

— Omar Imam Della Dominic and Nisali Kularatne