Hi,

you're reading Medium Mondays. In this newsletter, I share with you the in-depth lessons I learn by writing on Medium, studying articles and constantly talking with writers, editors and Boost nominators.

This week, what I learned from multiple authors making $1000+ each month with very few (or no) Boosts.

Enjoy!

Gone are the days when you could earn thousands of dollars every month on Medium. Today, you can be proud if you make $1,000.

Boosted articles on Medium earn between 4 to 10 times more than non-Boosted articles. That’s why I've talked a lot in this newsletter about how to get Boosted.

However, I've also mentioned how Boosts are still too random. There are just about 130 nominators. Subjectivity skews results a lot. And your article might simply be ignored because no nominator notices it.

If you aim to get Boosted, you have to spend more time on your articles. The randomness makes it a risky bet.

I studied dozens of Medium authors. Some of them are succeeding, both in terms of reads and earnings, even ignoring the Boost. Their work shares some key points.

I'll describe them and point you to some examples.

You would have never guessed this

Medium critics say it’s a content mill. They have a point.

If you want to earn 4 figures, you have to publish a lot. At least 4 times per week, possibly more. If you write articles under 4 minutes, one per day is mandatory.

Does this rule seem impossible to follow? Absolutely.

However, there are shortcuts. If you disregard the Boost, you can publish less refined articles, or use formats that nominators almost ignore, like listicles. This way, you can write a 1000-word article in less than two hours. Many authors have confirmed this to me privately.

Additionally, you should focus on ideas that you can cover in 4-5 minute articles. These are still long enough to be satisfying but don’t aim to create the ultimate guide on a topic. Instead, give a single important tip, or a quick list, or tell a story, and then extract a lesson.

Focus on the right topic

The strongest topics on Medium have always been the same. They are also very strong topics in online content in general.

Here they are:

• Writing - Many Medium readers are also writers or aspiring writers. Meta topics work on every platform.
• Making money - This means talking about business, careers, or investing.
• Personal growth - It fortunately has a billion branches, including relationships. So, you can find your sub-niche and still have a large potential audience.
• Technology - There’s always some exploding tech trend. Currently, it’s AI. You can catch the tailwind and amplify your reach.
• Culture, news, politics and so on - Share your interesting and possibly provocative opinions and your personal stories.

Talk to beginners

If your articles cover too advanced topics in your field, you inevitably reduce the number of potential readers.

For example, I wrote an article about pricing digital products for creators. It didn’t do well. Most creators are focused on creating content and growing their audience. Just a tiny fraction is thinking about launching a product.

This usually means being a bit repetitive. But if you take a look at the articles of most top writers, you’ll notice a lot of repetition. Your followers rarely read all of your articles. And everyone needs to hear the same thing a lot of times before really absorbing it.

Now, let’s look at 3 meaningful examples

Derek Hughes

Derek is an online friend. In April he earned more than $1000 for the first time. But when I first knew him, he had less than 3000 followers. I had a front row seat to watch his rise to success.

Around the end of 2023, Derek made a few winning strategic changes:

• writing only about writing,
• writing mostly articles for beginner,
• writing 4 times per week, at least.

He received very few boosts, especially in proportion to the number of articles he published.

His focus on a every popular niche on the platform created a flywheel:

• more articles created more entry points for his readers,
• a focused topic allowed the algorithm to show more on-topic recommendations at the bottom of every article,
• so readers read more of his articles,
• the algorithm showed more of his articles in the feed,
• and so on.

Lea Bardot

She’s an example of extreme publication frequency. She recently reached her first $1,000 months. As she told me in a conversation, she sometimes writes even two articles a day!

Many of these articles get very few views, no more than a few dozen. But others reach double or even triple-digit earnings. Since there are so many, the total sum makes a good level.

Eve Arnold

No surprise here, right? Eve is an incredible writer. Her personal essays are always distillations of sensitivity and awareness. But she also fits perfectly within the rules I've given above.

Her articles are around 4 minutes long. She published daily for at least two years in obscurity. Now that she’s one of the top authors on Medium, she still publishes almost daily.

She doesn't write for the Boost. Looking at her articles claps, I don't think she received many Boosts proportionally. Yet, she has been reporting for months now that she earns around $2,000 a month.

She attributes her success to choosing a specific niche: part-time creators. But I think her incredible volume and the authenticity and quality of her writing play a larger role. Many of his articles don’t even mention her audience.

I hope you found this helpful. What will you implement from what you've just read?

If you need help to grow on Medium, for a limited time I'm providing free 30-minute calls to find the best strategy for you. Click here to book yours.

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See you soon!

Alberto