How I should make money with Medium.com
It has been almost a full month since I started writing on Medium.
To be honest, I was very optimistic from the start. And many here will know what I mean. Those YouTube videos about Medium writers (good on ya!) making thousands of dollars a month. I imagined I could do the same.
I checked my stats several times a day as I poured myself into writing about my life’s experience. I am encouraged by fellow “Medium-sters” reading and giving such positive comments and encouragement. The thrill when someone clapped or responded. When someone followed me, or subscribed.
And I always return the favour.
Now, my inbox is full of articles. Most of which I have read. And I have made a grand sum of $21.54.
Time to work a little differently
I will be honest. In the first week, with 4 articles published, I made just 21c. I have shared that it was the best 21c I ever made. I was so delighted that there were people out there who wanted to read what I have to say about me.
I started off with a blog, but it proved too hard to navigate through Wordpress. So when I discovered Medium, I thought this was brilliant!
But like most people, I have bills to pay.
So, I have been thinking about how I can leverage Medium, with my previous work experience, to generate more income for my writing. This will be my grand plan (see below).
Making money with Medium
I have read several articles that to make money on Medium, you have to write about making money on Medium. I thought that was strange initially, but I think it makes sense.
Most people here are professional writers or aspire to be a professional writer. We want people to read our work and like it. The only honest measure of value is the monetary rewards that come with each published article.
We also want to get better at what we do. So, we learn from those who have succeeded. And I really can’t think of a better platform to learn how to be a better writer than here on Medium. Not just articles about writing as a craft, but all articles. There’s always something we can learn from what we read.
So writing about making money on Medium with writing is the perfect niche for the audience here on Medium.
It’s the Audience
The key is the audience, specifically a paid audience.
I appreciate that Medium is a non-advertising platform. Advertising cause us to write for the algorithm instead of the people. We want Medium to remain ad-free.
But we need an audience. A big, big paying audience.
That’s also why we have to keep our work AI-free. Members have to know that here, you get the real deal. Real people sharing their knowledge, emotions, wisdom. Real lives unfolding with each article.
“There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.” Ernest Hemingway.
It is therefore in our interest to encourage our friends and social media associates to spend the price of a coffee a month to support all of us.
Practice and practice
I discovered in the last month that as I write; it becomes easier. I look at the last 2 months of writing as a kind of warming up. Although I had worked as a copywriter when I was younger, it was a long time ago, and writing advertising then was very different.
Using Medium as a platform to refine my craft is an ideal way to work on my writing skills. There’s ample feedback and encouragement from the community here. And if I ask, valuable advice from those who travelled before me.
So I will continue to write here on Medium but I will write more articles that I can repurpose for promoting my writing as a service.
Working with Social Media
Social Media is here to stay, so we might as well learn to use it effectively. Depending on your writing, you can and should use social media to promote it.
Write to sell. If, like me, you are going down the path of copywriting, then certainly LinkedIn is the place to be. There are several LinkedIn experts on Medium that we can learn from. Write posts that apply to businesses trying to create awareness and generate sales. Businesses that will need articles that explain their products or services clearly. Write to persuade. Write to sell.
Write to teach. For those who write “How-to” articles, you can also help businesses to do just that. Or you can compile these into a book, eventually. Instead of beginning with a book from scratch, write articles that can eventually make the book. Publish them, chapter by chapter, article by article, on Medium. You should be able to know what appeals to an audience and what they like. Ask for feedback. And when you have enough to make a book, compile and publish it. There are also many articles here on self-publishing and traditional publishing.
Write to share. I have benefitted and enjoyed all the wonderful journals here on Medium. They are my favourite type of articles to read. These have helped me weaned off silly computer games and mindless scrolling on Instagram. I have felt emotions that came through the words of the many generous writers who open their hearts and souls. Thank you all for sharing. But there is no reason these published articles cannot eventually go into a journal on Amazon.
Write to create. For the storyteller…
My Grand Plan
This will be my plan going forward. I think Medium is a wonderful platform and stepping stone for those of us who want to pursue a career in writing. And while we wait for the Medium algorithm to pick up on our stories, we can use it to practise our craft and launch our writing career forward.
Please share your thoughts in the comments below:
- Promote Medium. We need to grow the paid audience pie or we may end up cannibalising each other. I will use Medium to practise and refine my craft. I will write and share on social media to encourage my friends to become members of Medium. As a copywriter, I will write to sell.
- Sell my services. I will work on a series of articles targeted at businesses and use LinkedIn as a platform to promote my services. I guess the idea is to show how I can help them achieve their goals. I hope that this approach will attract new gigs that will help pay some bills.
- Make more friends. Connect with prospective clients when the opportunity arises. Eventually, I will need to pitch my services and make it risk-free for them to try me out. I am not keen to return to regular 9–5 but would like to have several clients to work with regularly.
Not so grand after all. But I guess the acid test will be the ability to make a liveable income through writing.
I understand that to get paid, I can’t always just write what I want to write. I have to write what YOU, the audience, want to read. Like the advertisements that I wrote years ago, I have often reminded clients we are writing to their customers, not them.
We are writing to achieve specific objectives, be it building their brand, getting customers to call, or making a sale. We are not writing to win awards or please the boss.
Keeping these in mind, we should be able to build a career while waiting for the Medium algorithm to pick up our thousand-dollar story.
