How to Build a Good Strategy to Maximize the Power of Both Medium and Substack

Also, I'm offering a video Q&A to paid subscribers today at noon CST!

Hello Friends,

First off, I want to mention that I’ll be doing one of my Q&A sessions today at noon. I had to move it to noon because of a conflicting obligation. This is an opportunity for paid subscribers to ask me writing related questions.

Again, here’s all the important information:

Jan 16, 2025 12:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

I’ll send the link later today through the group chat, so you’ll find it in your Substack app. If launch time is approaching and you haven’t found the link, just respond to this email and I’ll send it. I’d love to see all of you.

If you’re not a paid subscriber and you want to get in on the Q&A, there’s still time to upgrade. Remember, I have payment tiers starting at as little as twenty dollars a year. Your sponsorship keeps this newsletter going. I think the annual plan is the way to go because it’s better for budgeting. According to the Substack help center, you will renew at the discounted rate (in case you were wondering about that).

I’m very appreciative of those of you who are willing to pay more in order to keep this newsletter going. You can find the complete “tree” of sponsorship levels down at the bottom of this post. I’d love to get a few more of you to sign up at the basic levels because I suspect it will bring me more visibility within Substack’s algorithm. Again, the discount code is above, but here’s the standard subscription button:

Getting the most out of Medium and Substack

Honestly, quite a lot of my day is spent figuring out how to get the most out of the various writing platforms that are out there. Whenever I run out of ideas, I seek out my writer friends and I pose questions to my readers.

Believe me I learn just as much from your questions as you learn when I try to answer them (so come to the Q&A).

I’ve been doing a lot more with video and audio over the last few weeks. I have

Kristina God

to thank for that. She’s been encouraging me to experiment with those features. I’ve been dabbling with it for a few months, but it feels like it’s about to become a bigger part of what I do here.

Last week, I did a movie podcast with

Ben Ulansey

. We plan to keep doing those every Friday. I’m also thinking of scheduling a regular writing discussion that will likely feature Ben,

Robin Wilding

and maybe

Jason Provencio

. I’m still working out the details, but these wonderful people offer a wealth of insight and whenever I talk with them I become inspired.

I’m finding that I’m doing so much audio/video stuff lately that I’m running out of time for plain, old-fashioned writing. So, yesterday, I pushed everything aside and wrote a piece for The Narrative Arc on Medium. I’m pleased to say it was Boosted. You can read it here:

Harvest Made Me Wish For the Torments of School

I wanted to bring this up because I’ve seen three different styles of article get Boosted lately.

• Poetic style writing

• Academic style writing

• A hybrid between the two

Poetic

The example above would be what I call “poetic” style writing. It still contains a unique viewpoint that you probably won’t get anywhere else, but it isn’t supported by a bunch of sources.

Academic

For an example of the academic style article, look at this one from

Allison Wiltz

.

How Popular Brands Capitalize on Slavery Loophole for Profit

Allison’s work is wonderful and it is always supported as if she’s writing an academic paper. She hyperlinks the sources at the relevant space in the text and also includes a works cited list.

I’ve been having discussions with several other Boost nominators about the works cited list and we didn’t really achieve a consensus. There is some speculation that too much “extra” information at the end of an article can hurt its chances of being Boosted. I think I’ll advise people to hyperlink in the future, but not include detailed works cited lists.

Hybrid

For an example of a hybrid style, I’d offer another article of mine that recently got Boosted.

A Question on the US Citizenship Test Changed my Perspective on History and Humility

If you scroll through that one, you’ll see it contains 4-5 links that support various claims in the text. I did not include a works cited list. This is clearly not an academic style article. It starts with a personal narrative and then transitions into a discussion of history.

Find a formula that works for you

I’ve been doing this a long time. Even so, when I submit an article I often receive a lot of notes from the editors. The editor who looked at the “Harvest” article found 6 different issues to address. His comments made the article better, and it likely wouldn’t have been Boosted without that insight.

I say this because it’s tempting to get in a rush. I feel the same urgency, and I can get frustrated when something isn’t accepted, published, and Boosted right away. The problem is that if you’re in too much of a rush, you end up leaving issues unattended that can hurt the success of the story.

My goal is to help all of you develop a quality formula that ensures your articles will succeed. I always remind people that if you challenge yourself to get a Boost, the article will likely earn well for you even if it isn’t Boosted on Medium.

For example, the article that I published on Tuesday about “Wicked” was originally published on Medium:

I wrote this one for Fanfare, which is a movie publication with a Boost nominator. Here’s how it performed on Medium (not Boosted):

Here’s how it performed on Substack:

Keep in mind that Medium’s been dealing with an issue that has been affecting writer earnings. They’ve dealt with problems like that in the past and I expect they’ll get this one handled soon. I’ve often had articles earn well even when they aren’t Boosted. Usually, it just takes them longer. So, an article earning $6 after a couple weeks isn’t out of the ordinary.

I haven’t yet been able to see if the issue they’re working through is affecting Boosted stories, but now that I’ve just had one Boosted I’ll have some first hand data on that soon.

There are a lot of takeaways here:

• Boosted stories tend to show big returns during the first few days

• Non-Boosted stories can still earn well over the long term, but show lower immediate earnings

• You can repurpose your work on other platforms and see them perform well

Don’t be too quick to think an article has “failed.” The way I look at it, getting Boosted on Medium is just the first leg of the journey. You publish there and see how the article does, then go to the next stop and see how it performs there.

Keep creating quality content and apply what you learn from both your failures and your successes. Listen to your editors, even if a story isn’t Boosted when you implement their advice. Keep challenging yourself and good things will happen.

“I'd rather Be Writing” exists because of your generous support. If you have the means please consider upgrading to a paid sponsorship. I have payment tiers starting at as little as twenty dollars a year. I'm so happy you're here, and I'm looking forward to sharing more thoughts with you tomorrow.

Upgrade at 30% off

Upgrade at 40% off

Upgrade at 50% off

Upgrade at 60% off

My CoSchedule referral link

Here’s my referral link to my preferred headline analyzer tool. If you sign up through this, it’s another way to support this newsletter (thank you).