Why I Abandoned My WordPress Blog for Writing on Medium
I self-reflected and found 5 reasons for my recent shift
Lately, I found myself being more here on Medium, as a reader but, more importantly — as a writer. The shift seemed more powerful than me, so I tried to self-reflect and figure out why. Some of the reasons are platform-related, but others are different.
I discovered why I’ve been spending more time on Medium. So here are five reasons I’m here and not on my WordPress blog.
I’ve Heard About the New AI Search Feature
ChatGPT has changed content creation and consumption immensely. Like many other bloggers, I was concerned about our role in the new AI era and devoted two stories to that:
However, things changed more rapidly than I expected. Microsoft now goes all in and changes the game once again. They will add dedicated ChatGPT assistance to the Bing search engine, making it more convenient to find what you are looking for. This chat is supposed to be faster and more accurate than the original ChatGPT of Open AI¹.
Google, on their side, would announce their AI upgrade to the search engine very soon. So, everything will change, and the reliance on AI will extend to search engines too. It might already be a reality by the time you read this story.
With that in mind, I might be affected by the fear of being irrelevant on my blog. This was partly a subconscious thought, as I’m aware that human real-life-based information is still valuable these days both on Medium and the SERP.
The big plus of Medium is that it is not only search-based, and it relies extensively on writers, publications, and editors. Moreover, I’ve noticed that several publication guidelines have become explicitly against AI-generated content.
Anyway, subconsciously or not, I moved to write on Medium more due to this issue.
I Can Succeed with Short Stories
You need long-form, helpful blog posts to rank on Google in English. The optimum post length for most keywords should be 2,250 to 2,500 words². You can still make it with even 1000 words but only for very niched, long-tail keywords. For the most part, you must write many words for each blog post.
That can be debilitating at times.
On Medium, on the other hand, I can freely convey my ideas right away with a 400–1000 words story. I still need to think about the reader and construct it accordingly. Yet, I don’t need to consider ranking factors while publishing here. Even though it’s possible to rank stories on Google, this is not the main reason to write on Medium.
On top of that, psychologically, I feel more satisfied when I finish writing and publishing more stories. Let’s face it. Part of the fun of blogging is pressing that publish button and checking the stats multiple times. That holds on Medium and our blogs using Search Console and Google Analytics.
For most people, writing short stories is easier and more appealing than putting together a definitive how-to guide for Google.
Faster Feedback from the Reader
Another great thing about Medium is the relatively quick feedback you get from the readers. You can see your progress through their claps, comments, and highlights and communicate with them directly.
While WordPress used to be the same years back, it has become less common to comment on a blog post. That’s a pity, but at the same time, this is where Medium takes off.
When writing on my blog, I feel lonelier. This is because it takes time until Google crawls my post, and only if I do well — it ranks it high and rolls the traffic to my blog.
I’ve learned from the productivity book “Atomic Habits” that we tend to stick with habits that have an instant reward. That can explain why I’ve become more productive here on Medium with all these immediate feedback features.
Free Spirit
This is the most delightful aspect of being here. I spent more time on Medium as it allowed me to write on different topics. I primarily write about self-discovery, blogging, and productivity, but also on unrelated issues, like why a rubber hot water bottle is so handy.
This shouldn’t be done with a blog designed to rank on Google, especially after the recent “helpful content” Google update. Instead, your blog should be helpful to the reader so that anything and everything on it plays a role in solving the main problem of the reader.
Let’s say your blog is about learning to play the guitar; you shouldn’t include unrelated things on your blog but only matters about guitars and learning skills. Of course, you can still have a personal brand site covering different hobbies and interests, but getting traffic to such a site will be more complicated.
While your blog site should align with your niche keywords, you can play around and write on different topics on Medium. The two algorithms — Google and Medium — work differently. The first is search related, and the latter relies on internal readership factors.
A Distraction from My Primary Project
Finally, a hidden yet significant reason I’m here lately is avoiding what I should work on — my blog. It took me some time to realize that, but now it hit me.
My WordPress blog about self-discovery is where I have published 25 posts and planned 67 more articles. I develop my ideas through in-depth keyword research bearing in mind building a topical authority, categories, and helpfulness. This is my prime side hustling in which I plan to earn passive income through ads and email marketing. However, for some reason, I’m here and not there.
I don’t know why it is the way it is. Since publishing the first 25 posts over there and the initial traffic I get from Google, I have stopped. I know I should have kept the momentum and written there again, yet here I am — writing you the story of why I write on Medium.
Maybe I should stay here and maybe not. Either way, it looks like an excuse I tell myself. I don’t know now. I will try writing back there, too, and see how I balance the work on both platforms. I promise to update you on that.
That’s it. I hope you took something from my experiences on both platforms to your blogging journey. You are welcome to comment and share your experiences with writing on Medium compared to your blog.
