How you feel when you post your first article and no one even read it after a week. Credit: Unsplash.

👶 Beginners: How To Start Building an Audience on Medium (From Scratch)?

What you write is legit. And you want to be read. I will help you with that!

There are different kind of writers on Medium.

From the curious ones (who just come here to write a post and leave),
to the hardcore ones (who write one post each day).

If you read this, you probably see yourself in between.

Great! This article is for you.

Who am I and why you can trust me? (skip it if you don’t care)

I’m Thomas, a 25 years old french traveler. I’m working as a freelance writer and web designer. From wherever I stop around the planet (actually writing this post from Bali, Indonesia).

My first post ever on Medium was in October 31, 2014.
→ Only 1 recommendation (probably my mom).

As I was cycling across Europe and USA for 18 months, I wasn’t focused on building an audience. At all. I was also writing on a personal blog at the same time.

I won’t do this same mistake ever.

I have published 80+ articles so far.
→ Most of them are totally invisible.

I never published the kind of hits you see on your Medium feed (1k+ rec). But I eventually started to have more and more people following me.

Today, I wrote a few articles hitting more than 100 recommendations and my top 1 is above 500.

I’m on my way to get my first 1000 followers.

So, I won’t teach you how to become famous and make tons of $$$ on Medium.

But I will guide you through the first steps!

This article will NOT help you to become the new Gary Vaynerchuk or Thomas Oppong (two of the top writers I really love).

It will help you to get started on Medium.

→To get your first views
→To get your first followers
→To get your first recommendations

#1 — What are you writing about?

People don’t know you. You’re a total stranger to them. You are one more writer amongst millions.

Ask yourself: why should anyone follow you?

Readers won’t follow you because of who you are.
Even if you’re the nicest person on earth.

Readers will follow you because of what you write.
It’s all about the value you give to them.

Pick a topic, and stick to it

Imagine you follow someone who share travel stories. Suddenly he posts CEO’s interviews. The next week he write a motivational post.

You’ll stop following him. It happened to me.
I didn’t find my voice.

Keep this in mind when you’re writing your first articles.

But, don’t panic! It’s totally ok to be random in the beginning.
You need to find your voice.

The main point when you get started is to:

#2 — Write! Again and again.

There is no magic trick. Whatever you feel like writing, write it anyway.
This is how to find your voice. This is how to make things happen.

Just. Write.

There are 2 rules I apply to prevent my brain from stopping my creative process:

If you think about it, write it.
If you write it, post it anyway.

Those are guidelines. It doesn’t mean that anything which pop in my mind end up in a Medium post.

If I think about something again and again, I’ll write about it.
If I’m not really proud of my article, I’ll post it anyway.

We usually put too much pressure on ourselves concerning what we write. Because what we write come from our mind. It’s a part of ourself.

What if people don’t like it?
What if it’s crap?
What if you get judged?

Well, no one knows who you are. You have no reputation yet.
And even if you have one, no one really cares but you.

Your article is a whole piece of crap? So, what? Who will ever remember it. Just write another one. And another one. And another one

Do you have any memory about shitty articles you read? Probably not.
And I guess you care even less about who wrote them.

Just keep writing.

#3 — Get discovered

It’s probably your main question.

You can write.
You can publish.

Now, how anyone will find your content?

Hashtags

The first people who will find your content are your followers.
But, remember? No one’s following you yet.

So you have to tag your posts.

How?

When you’re done writing.
When your article is beautiful, polished and proof read.
Hit the publish button.

Then you see a small box where Medium offers you to
choose 5 tags related to what you wrote.

When you start writing the name of a tag, you can see how popular it is.

Please, do NOT use tags only because they are popular, but
because they are accurate!

Publications

This is REALLY important.

A publication is a group of articles related to a same theme.
Different authors can write in the same publication.
Readers can follow a publication to receive curated content.

What does that mean?
Publications are the best way to get discovered.

You can find publications about any kind of theme on Medium, or you can create your own one.

Advantages are:
- Publications have more audience than you
- They usually send weekly letters to their followers with the new articles
- You can apply to publish your content there and get discovered

What you want is to be part of one (or a few) so you can spread your content to their audience.

You will usually find my content posted in
The Coffeelicious and Startups & Venture Capital.

External Readers

Because you publish on Medium doesn’t mean that all of your readers are supposed to come from Medium directly.

Especially when you’re starting.

Those are a few places where you can share your articles according to the audience you already have there:

• Facebook (perso/page/groups)
• Twitter/LinkedIn
• Reddit

Basically wherever there are people who may be interested in the value you provide in your article.

Highlight the value of your post.

Don’t spam.
Don’t co-paste your article everywhere just to grab some views.
This is counter productive.

#4 — Keep your first readers

This is what we call an audience.
People finally come and read your post.
And what you want them to do is to come again and again!

There are different ways to do it. As Medium is a social media, people will usually follow you if they like what they read.

But you can also ask them to do so.

In the end of the post, write a 3 lines paragraphs to tell more about you.

Add a link to your medium profile and ask them to follow you if they like what you write.

Another way to keep your readers is to engage with them. Ask them to give their opinion in the comments, and take some time to reply them.

Some people followed me because of conversations we had in the comments.

It feels human. You usually want to keep in touch with people you have a great conversation with, right?

#5 — Write with your heart

This is the last point. And probably the most important for me.

I’ve read tons of articles talking about being disciplined and rigorous in the way we should write great articles.

Well. I don’t give a shit.

The best way to touch people’s heart is to write with yours.

I’m not a native english speaker and I still make tons of mistakes
Sometimes my words are a bit too sharp, agressive or patronizing
It often happens that I’m not proud of what I wrote when I click on Publish

I know some people will stop reading me because of this. It’s fine.

As a writer, you don’t want your content to be loved by everyone.
You want to touch the heart of the ones who could love it.

Don’t overthink your writing.

Internet is full of super-qualified-academic-styled-writers who will tell about any kind of topic properly. It’s fine if it’s your goal.

But if you want to share a story, inspire or send a message.
If you want to touch people deep inside with your words, then

Write with your ❤

I know there are many others ways to build an audience on Medium.
This post is a starting point.

It will help the beginners who want to be read and have their first followers.

If you have more ideas,
If you agree, or disagree,
If you want to add something,

Please, reach me in the comment and let’s talk about
how YOU manage to build your audience on Medium.

This is really exciting and valuable for everyone :)

You can also follow me on Medium to discover my other articles

→ Press the ❤ below if you liked this story. It means a lot to me. Plus, it helps other people to discover it :)

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