35 Actionable Tips to Grow Your Medium Blog
1.
T I M I N G
Publish on a Saturday morning to increase your chances of standing out. You will quickly notice you will even be able to make it to the Medium Top 20 during some weekends with just a few recommendations.
2.
P U S H
Bring your first audience from outside. It is way easier for your story to get noticed on Medium after some initial exposure. Email your close friends and also share your article on your social media accounts.
3.
B A C K L I N K
Place links back to your website (or CTAs) at the end, or integrate them smoothly into your story. Use Google’s free UTM tool to track links to see which posts drive the most traffic back to your website.
4.
B R A N D I N G
Getting your author or brand name noticed can be difficult on Medium’s minimal design. You can insert your name and link it to your website, as I did at the top of this article. Or, Paul also does it in a smart way as below:
5.
I M A G E S
Link images. Click on an image in the editor and press Ctrl+K or ⌘+K to insert your link. (You can also drag and drop an image.) Also optimize your images using a free website like www.compressor.io
6.
G R I D
Upload two or more images at the same time and you have a beautiful image grid. Below is an example with my Instagram pictures linked:
7.
F O L L O W I N G
If you want to build a social media following, you can insert “Follow me” images as a grid at the end of your stories and link them to your social media accounts. Like these images below (you can use them if you need to):
8.
S H A R E
Medium share buttons are also subtle. With the same logic above, you can also insert your own obvious share buttons by using grid images. (You can generate share links on sites like www.sharelinkgenerator.com)
9.
R E S P O N S E S
Write a creative response to popular stories on Medium. When recommended by the author, you will appear right below the end of the article and you will be exposed to a huge audience.
10.
T W E E T
If you want your readers to tweet a certain sentence of your story, you can add “Tweet this” text next to that specific sentence. (Again, you can generate the tweet link on tools like clicktotweet.com) Here is an example:
Medium is the MVP of your blog — Tweet this
11.
T A G S
Tag your articles as a growing audience on Medium follows tags (I follow 47 tags). Start typing the initial letters of your tag and you will see the level of competition (i.e., number of articles using that tag).
12.
U S E F U L
In case you need tactics to grow your audience, you can also read my guide about how I grew an audience on Medium. Quite a few people made it to Medium top 20 list after reading it.
13.
7 M I N
Medium’s data team found that 7-minute posts capture the most total reading time on average.
14.
4 0 0 W O R D S
The Medium team also found that stories of 400 words and up have generally been the most popular.
15.
H E A D L I N E
Kevan from Buffer took a look at Medium’s Top 100 list and found that the average headline length is 42 characters.
16.
E D I T I N G
Listen to your audience and keep editing even after you publish your story. If you see a certain section of your story getting more attention, turn it into a bigger text to make it evident using the quote tool on Medium editor:
17.
C O M M E N T S
Make notes public. I’ve noticed your audience engages more with your more content when they see proof of other people already being engaged.
18.
E M B E D
Embed tweets in your Medium story to increase your Twitter followers. (This feature supports content from YouTube, Vine, Instagram, Kickstarter, etc.)
19.
H I G H L I G H T
If you want to draw your followers’ attention to a particular section of your story, use the ‘highlight’ feature to highlight that sentence yourself as the author or insert a note next to it to explain it a little further.
20.
P U B L I C A T I O N
Start a publication from day one. I’ve noticed that some people who don’t follow me instead follow my publication. You can also contact big publications and try getting published there. However, I highly recommend investing in growing your own publication if you are serious about blogging.
21.
N E X T
If you want to control what your readers read next, you can insert a simple banner at the end of your article, like this one below:
or you can send them to your other articles with a text like this:
Side Project Marketing Is the New King ← P R E V I O U S
N E X T → The Consumer Isn’t A Moron
22.
( G ) O L D I E S
Once you publish a new article, go back to your old articles and direct traffic to the new article by inserting a banner like in the above tip. Or, insert a text like, “If you enjoyed this piece, you might also like…”
23.
N E W S L E T T E R
It is not possible to collect email addresses on Medium. However, you can direct your readers to your email signup page by placing a linked image at the end of your articles like this one I could use below:
24.
T W I T T E R
Go to your Medium stats and click on ‘Referrers’ on a specific story. Click ‘Twitter’ on the list if you have it. You will now see all tweets about your story. Engage with those people. Since they also have a Medium account, if they follow you on Twitter they also automatically follow you on Medium.
25.
S H O T S
Share your story on Twitter using text shots. Medium team found that stories shared with text shots have been shown to have 3–5× more engagement than stories without them.
26.
S P E E D
Improve your writing speed by getting the most out of Medium editor. Press Ctrl+? or ⌘+? to see keyboard shortcuts. Also keep track of your word count by selecting the entire story (Ctrl+A or ⌘+A) and you will see the word count at the top of your draft.
27.
U S E
I brought together the links to some of the most useful Medium features in case you are not making use of them:
✓ Send a letter to the inboxes of all the people who follow your publication. ✓ Try getting a custom domain for your publication (just like you are reading this post on my own domain) ✓ Get feedback before publishing your story ✓ Feature a story on your Medium profile ✓ Import any of your writing into Medium ✓ Embed Medium anywhere
8 MORE QUICK TACTICS:
28.
Click on the ‘quote’ icon on Medium editor twice and you have a new title font style like the one I used for ‘8 More Quick Tactics’ right above.
29.
Define your goal on Medium and test new articles to achieve that goal. Even though some people blog here only when they have something to say, there is an increasing number of people who use Medium to draw attention to their businesses. I have used Medium to find freelance clients and I have tested things like documenting a side project, the longest guide ever, the longest listicle ever, a personal story, etc. Each comes with unique learnings.
30.
Make your stories stand out with an eye-catching hero image for your story. If you need stock photo websites, here I’ve listed over 50 free resources.
31.
Place links to your website on your Medium profile bio. Your bio is important as it also appears at the bottom of your stories.
32.
Read Medium Top Stories everyday. The list doesn’t change that often, so you read only a few new articles every day. But the things you learn are life-changing when it comes to improving your writing skills.
33.
Connect and engage with all the people who recommended your story.
34.
Customize title and subtitle of your story by clicking on the “…” button and selecting “Title/subtitle.” Subtitle is optional.
35.
Use images to customize your post. Below is an example full-width divider line which is actually an image:
