Why people think Medium is good for Blogging?
“What is Medium?” and “Why should I use Medium?” Yes, those were a few questions some people asked recently.
Honestly speaking, I didn’t know anything about Medium until last year. I thought it to be a website which accepts and publishes guest posts by different writers. But you can start your blogging journey there, I didn’t know.
However, when one of my connections invited writers to join a new Medium publication to grow his/her portfolio, I started reading more about Medium. Soon I logged into the site, shared my profile details with that connection, but never shared a story (Medium’s term for article) with the publication. Why?
Because I had no compelling enough reason to do that. But, by the time I joined Initium Publication, I had enough info to get addicted to this minimalistic blogging site. And what else? You (and anyone) can get started within minutes.
By the way, you know what, I publish more articles (oops, stories) here than I do on my blog. So, time to explore Medium.
What is Medium?
Medium is like a social media platform where writers can follow other writers. When you log into your account, you see the posts of the writers who you follow. You will see their latest articles in your feed as and when they post. But that’s only a part of it.
Medium also allows you to follow categories of your interest. It offers you a range of categories to choose including Productivity, Startup, Podcasts, Art, Social Media, Science, Religion and whatnot. So, when someone publishes a story in the category that you follow, Medium will present it to you.
“Medium is a social media website for writers.”
I guess you already got a vague idea about how revolutionary can Medium be, in exposing your writing skills.
So, here are the five reasons why you should use Medium for blogging –
More viewership
Admit it or not, every writer is looking for some recognition. Even if s/he writes because s/he loves to, somewhere in the subconscious mind, not having an audience hurts.
“Am a writer… A bit of attention keeps me fueled.”
— The Lazy Writer
And that’s where Medium comes into the scene. It helps to create a new audience for you. Anyone who follows the categories or clicks on the tags you included in the story, gets your story in their feed.
They wouldn’t have found your post if you posted it on your blog (unless of course, you are a celebrity blogger). This new set of audience can now “clap” or leave a comment on your story.
Engagement-centric algorithm
Apart from sending your content to the followers, Medium also features the high-performing stories on their homepage. That means when more people engage with your published story, Medium’s algorithm picks it up. Thus, the bloggers and writers who consistently provide good quality content will continue getting featured.
And this helps them to get noticed. It paves the way for them to be picked by reputed Medium publications. A Medium publication provides you with space where you can submit a story. Then, the followers of those publications also, will see your story, giving you more visibility.
Detailed stats
It’s all in the numbers, and Medium shows you a variety. Medium stacks up the stats side by side along with each story you posted. It makes the analysis easy. You get to know how many people viewed the story, how many of them read it till the end and how many people liked (clapped) it.
Also, you can see from where your readers are coming to read the stories — Medium, social media websites or any other place where you shared the links. This way, you can find which platforms you need to work on.
Ease of use
I know, like any other website, getting used to Medium will take some time, but you sure won’t fumble for long. Medium takes the minimalistic approach to help you pour out your thoughts into words. It offers only the basic formatting options — bold, italic, underline, quote, link — and not tons of tools to customise your experience.
So, if you are trying to take your first step into blogging without going through complicated SEO processes, Medium it is. Publish your story, and Medium will take care of the backend work to improve your visibility.
Republishing existing content
And this one’s probably one of the most important reasons to be on Medium. If you already own a blog, you can publish the content again on Medium and Google won’t regard it as duplicate content.
You can either use the inbuilt import tool or copy and paste the content yourself. You can then customise the title, modify the text, change the images and with a little hard work, the story is ready to be (re)published. In the end, ensure that the link to the original article is included. A simple sentence like “This article first appeared on <link to the article>” will do. You can also put “Originally published on <link to the article>.”
I hope you have a fair idea now why you should use Medium for blogging. Not only does it help in increasing viewership, but also brings traffic to your existing blog. And it’s fast and easy. So, when are you joining?
