Writer newsletter: The follow button redesign now sends ~30x more readers your story notifications
Plus Medium Day 2025, a free writing challenge, and how to use topics on Medium
Dear writer,
I’m trying out a new format to give the highlights and updates in an easy, scannable format, with more reading for those who are interested. Let me know what you think of this!
– Zulie @ Medium
TL;DR: This month’s highlights
- Remember how we tweaked the follow button design to also easily include subscribing to new story notifications? We’re now seeing ~30x as many email + notification subscribers to writers across the platform, up from 7x when we first launched.
- Medium Day 2025 is happening on September 19, 2025. Register here! Click here to read this section.
- Want to develop a writing habit? Join our Just Start Writing challenge. We launched earlier this month, but it’s not too late to sign up! Click here to go to this section.
- How to use topics on Medium? I made a video explaining how and why. Click here to read this section.
- The new home for all Medium educational content: The Medium Handbook is now live. Click here to read this section.
- How publication editors edit your stories. Read this if you want to apply some of their best editing tips to your work (or want to be inspired about how much effort editors put into polishing the writing in their publications). Click here to read this section.
- 37 shoutouts to publication editors. Writers wrote in to shout out to editors, and these are all the responses. Read these to see how much love, lift, and effort Medium publication editors put into your writing in their publications. (Or if you’re interested in working with a new editor.) Click here to read this section.
- Reminder: We host a Writing Hour twice every Thursday. Join for dedicated chill vibes, body-doubling writing time. Click here to read this section.
OK, let’s dig into those topics.
Register for Medium Day 2025
Join us on September 19, 2025, for our annual Medium Day!
Medium Day is a free, live, online conference where we’re bringing our amazing community together to celebrate the power of writing. We’ll be hosting it on Zoom Events, which will house dozens of livestream sessions and activities throughout the day.
Our theme this year is Just Start Writing. Expect to learn how Medium writers wrote their most popular stories and how they found real-world opportunities through their work. You’ll also discover how publications offer a home for your work through their supportive communities of passionate readers, writers, and editors. And you’ll hear from Medium Staff in a variety of behind-the-scenes sessions showcasing our tools, case studies, and new releases.
Just start writing: a Medium writing challenge
We’re also in the midst of hosting a month-long writing challenge to help you develop a writing habit. Commit to just fifteen minutes (or less!) per day; at the end of the month, you’ll have a story to publish. Every day, we’ll send an email with that day’s prompt.
Sign up here. Catch previous emails here if you want to catch up. And if you want to watch me work through Day 9’s exercise live, catch the video here!
How to use topics on Medium
Topics help make sure your story is shown to readers who will be interested in it. When you publish a story, you’ll have the option to add up to five topic tags to help readers and our system know what your story is about. Fun fact: over half a million readers browse the topic pages every month, looking for stories to read!
But how do you choose the right topics for your story?
I made a video explaining what topics are and how to use them here:
TL;DR: If you want to help maximize your story’s reach, choose accurate topics that are popular and broadly about your topic.
For example, in your story about how you adopted your cats, choose `cats` rather than `a-cats-life`, because cats is broadly more popular, but don’t choose `tech` even though it’s a very popular topic with readers, because your story isn’t about tech. And use all five topics!
The Medium Handbook
Wondering where to get advice on how to use Medium, case studies, explanations on new product features, and more? We’re launching The Medium Handbook to answer all those questions and more.
What to expect:
- Tips and tricks on how to use Medium
- Basic explanations of how Medium works
- More complex explanations of how Medium works
- Advice on how to use new features
- Case studies of writers and editors who have been successful on Medium
- Challenges, prompts, and places to virtually meet other writers and editors
What not to expect:
- Generic writing advice. Medium is full of great writing tips already! We want to keep this focused on how to write and edit on Medium, specifically.
- Get-rich-quick tips. (There’s no formula for success on Medium!)
- Product updates. Get those from the Medium Blog!
If you want to hear more, follow The Medium Handbook on Medium.
Editor(s) Spotlight
Last month, I asked you to let me know which editors had improved your writing on Medium. Reader, I got too many incredible responses to pick just one or two to feature. Find all the responses to the survey here. I grouped them into common themes below, if you’re curious about what writers appreciate most from their editors.
Writers appreciate Medium editors for plenty of different reasons, not just a spell check.
- A sharp editorial eye. Editors help with title crafting, grammar, clarity, formatting, and tightening prose.
- Developmental editing. Editors don’t just make changes but encourage growth and help writers discover new depth or potential in their work.
- Editing with readers in mind. Editors make changes to help the story better fit the publication’s audience.
- Promoting writers. Editors support, advocate, and help increase the visibility of stories.
- Emotional support. Last but not least, editors provide emotional care, encouragement, and make writers feel valued and seen. Writing is hard — editors validate that and encourage writers to continue.
I also asked editors to share their process for editing stories. I compiled all their best practices and tips in this story about how editors improve your writing on Medium.
Join us for Writing Hour: Every Thursday!
If you’d benefit from a helpful and regular reminder to write, sign up for Writing Hour.
Twice a day every Thursday, we host a dedicated hour of writing time. No cameras, chill tunes, just focus on your draft.
- First hour: Thursday, 9:00 am EST (that’s 2 pm in the UK, 6 am PST
- Second hour: Thursday, 12:00 pm EST (that’s 5 pm in the UK, 9 am PST)
(Convert those to your local time here if you live in a different time zone!)
To sign up for weekly reminders for Writing Hour, go to our Writing Hour publication and click on “Sign up for our newsletter to get reminders.”
More questions? Here’s the Writing Hour FAQ. Hope to see you there!
