How I Made it to 100 Followers
It’s Been a Long Time Coming
I started my Medium journey with no prior knowledge of how to write articles, what topics I should write about, or how to even get a follower. That was almost 2 months ago.
What I gained were many invaluable skills that helped me climb to the 100 followers milestone. If you are on the same journey as me or new to Medium, this is a realistic look at the climb to 100 followers and everything I have learnt through trial and error.
Now if we look at my growth and history over the two months on Medium, this is what my follower growth looks like:
Yes, I have gained practically all of my followers in one month and if you’re new to Medium, this is a pretty realistic goal to strive for.
Don’t get discouraged by articles about how they gained 100 followers in only 2 days, they are few and far between.
One thing you should know about my situation is that all of my followers and views are internal, meaning they were Medium readers rather than coming from social media where you promote your stories. This transitions nicely into my first advice:
1. Promote Your Articles
This might not be applicable to everyone, but it’s a huge help if you could get 10 or so of your friends to follow you or promote your stories on social media.
The Medium algorithm will promote your article if you have lots of engagement in a short time. This means if you have friends that view, read, clap, comment, and follow; the algorithm will think it’s a hit and promote it to people’s recommendations.
This will build momentum where your stories will get seen by more people and if they’re good then they will engage with it, which then helps it be seen by even more people.
2. Write Frequently
This goes in conjunction with the previous tip, the momentum that follows an article will usually only last a couple of days, rarely more than a week. So you must write frequently. Especially starting out.
Quality over quantity is great, but not when quality takes a month to deliver.
Find the right balance of writing articles frequently that are also quality. One of my previous articles goes into more detail.
A good goal would be to write 3–4 minute articles twice a week. If you can write more then do so, it only helps you out.
Don’t take long breaks away from Medium, when you’re starting out, a two or three-week break from publishing could tank most of your momentum, but it’s usually not a big deal and can be recovered pretty quickly.
If you need to take a break from Medium due to burnout then that’s the best thing to do. You should write for the sake of writing and not because you have to.
Write as frequently as you can without sacrificing quality, just be consistent with it.
3. Good Writing is Only Half the Work
Let’s say that you wrote your best article yet. It is written in an engaging format, it hooks the reader and keeps their attention till the very end. You are proud of your story and when you decide to publish it you are disappointed at the lack of views. How could this be?
Writing a good article is only half of the story. No one will ever know how good your article is unless they click on it, and that can only happen if you have a really interesting story to tell, or you clickbait a little.
If no one ever clicks on your story, there is no point to it. Remember, good titles and thumbnails get you clicks, and engaging writing gets you reads. So it’s best to have both.
There are a few things you can optimize to make your article more likely to be seen:
- Title and Subtitle
- Description
- Tags
- Thumbnails
I can’t comment on how you can utilize all of these; some are dependent on what you’re writing and your goals, and others I haven’t even mastered myself.
Thumbnails
Thumbnails need to be different and engaging from the rest of the other thumbnails on Medium. This could mean finding images that have high saturation and colours that pop or going the complete opposite in hopes that it’s different from all the other thumbnails.
Here’s a test you can do, can you easily make out what your thumbnail is about when it’s only 3 cm in size at arm’s length, and does it stand out from the thumbnails in your recommendations?
Here are some thumbnails that I think were well done:
Title and Subtitles
For most of my cases, the title should:
- Affirm a reader’s beliefs
- Give new perspectives on preconceived notion
- Be a short introduction to your story that leaves more questions than answers
The subtitle should complement the title, not restate what the title says but comment on it.
Here are some titles that do this well:
The title introduces more questions than answers and engages you with the story.
Intrigues the reader by building them up and making them feel good about themselves, clicking the story will reaffirm this belief.
4. Join a Publication
I cannot understate how much this helped me.
Publications are very common on Medium and some of them will usually allow you to join as long as you abide by their rules.
Publications allow your work to be seen by people that scroll through the website. It can help give you that momentum as it provides the initial set of views before the algorithm thinks of recommending your story.
A big thank you to New Writers Welcome, they are a wonderful publication that as the name suggests, all new writers are welcomed. Usually publishing your article here results in it staying on the page for roughly 1–2 days, which is more than some other publications.
If you can, why wouldn’t you join a publication, your story will still be recommended to people and it will be on the publication’s website.
This was probably the biggest contributor to helping me cross the milestone.
Thank You To Everyone!
I want to thank everyone that ever followed me, ever responded to an article or comment by me, ever clapped, ever read, even if you just clicked on a story and clicked away I’m still thankful for all of you. My journey on Medium has been filled with amazing people and great communities, and the journey has only begun.
Write what you love and love what you write.
