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Find A Quick Way To Write in Medium
My list of techniques, tricks, and tools to help you write your stories on Medium faster and more efficiently.
Writing is a form of communication, but it also is a form of art and a creativity exercise. It is a way of transmitting knowledge. Each format has its rules and also its moment. The way we document what surrounds us is influenced by multiple cultural factors. Like any form of expression, there is room for innovation. The generation of written content is also a form of paid work. It is also an indispensable part of many other jobs.
Today we will talk about some shortcuts to achieve this more efficiently. Some of these techniques are based on artificial intelligence, always as a support and not the ultimate goal.
A distraction-free environment
I believe this is the basic recipe for all forms of creative writing. We may be writing a lengthy manifesto, a short blog post, or a simple email. Still, the essay will demand our attention and focus. I still like pen and paper. I have a notebook just for drafts of medium articles. As soon as I have an idea, I write a title that briefly summarizes what I want to talk about and briefly jot down the thoughts I want to address. Sometimes I do this exercise on a story draft. Still, I like paper because it allows me to put lines, underlines, and other complementary indications that turn the page into a mind map. It has the disadvantage that it is not always easy to carry, but it is an indispensable piece of paper. It’s not a strict rule either; it’s more the process of creating a draft that documents the idea as it occurs and developing it briefly.
Style Review
The idea is to read the text several times, have a second opinion, let the text rest and read it the next day. However, this is not always possible. So an automatic proofreading and formatting tool serves to simplify the process considerably. I am lucky to have someone close to me to help me with essential writing. Still, time is short, and for other things, I turn to services like Grammarly, which does the job in an automated way.
Titles with hooks, not baits
I have always been an advocate of very creative and groundbreaking titles. Still, at this moment, we find it necessary to be very competitive to get the attention of our readers. It can go unnoticed if the title is hidden behind a very strong or funny metaphor. So with much regret, I resort to simple titles that express in a few words the content of the entry and generate interest with some power-word. There are automatic generators, formatting conventions, etc., but the truth is that I don’t have any favourite; I try until I find one that I like and adapt it to the case. The problem I usually find is that I look for catchy titles using a context and an objective, e.g. Costs in AWS. This requirement does not usually fit with generators like How I Improved My [IDEA] In One Easy Lesson.
Format and Aesthetics
It seems like a Medium requirement, but on many other sites on the Internet, it is also a requirement. An eye-catching title photo must accompany a story. This type of thumbnail is a requirement that makes us resort to free-royalty image banks to try to give a professional look to our story. What happens is that the number of photographs related to specific topics is relatively scarce. We all end up putting the complacent white robot, the heart of zeros and ones, or the classic office background with the same four girls talking in front of a laptop. Here I don’t have much of a recipe other than trying not to use the images we’ve already seen posted on Unsplash and Pexels. However, I will throw out an exciting proposition I am currently exploring: automatic image generators like DALL-E 2. These tools allow you to generate synthetic images from free text. I have seen several articles about this topic. Still, they always resort to the same thing: <MAINSTREAM_TOPIC> imagined by AI, however, recently, an article suggested its use in this direction, and it seemed to me a perfect idea.
On the other hand, stories should respect some conventions about formatting, text structure, and hierarchy of information. There is a lot of material on this subject; however, I think they are well summarized in one idea: the structure and form of the content should make you want to read it, so this is the idea I am pursuing.
Automatic text generators
Synthetically generated texts can help us to complete a paragraph, create introductions, etc. There are undoubtedly excellent implementations out there. Some have a vast knowledge base and a great capacity to generate coherent text that completes or supports our speech. My experience is that although they are helpful, they don’t always row in the same direction as the rest of the boat. Perhaps I have not found a way to take advantage of their potential. They help me to generate small paragraphs in those articles of a descriptive nature: a list of X technologies, a gentle introduction to X topic, etc. But in other types of less general articles, I do not use this resource.
bonus track: Language translator
If English is not your native language, it is convenient to use a translator. Still, sometimes you can try to write it in your native language (Spanish) and translate it. I also sometimes do it the other way; I write in English and see if the translation goes in the same direction as what I want to express. I have tried several translators, but I think DeepL is undoubtedly the best translator I have come across.
I hope these tools, along with the rationale and shared experience, will help you write faster. According to my short experience on Medium, consistency is vital to generate community and engagement.
Do you like them?
Do you have a surefire tool?
The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.
Sir Terry Pratchett
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