A few weeks ago, I wrote a post called “5 Important Things to Do When Starting On Medium” with tips for Mediumbeginners. It was well-received. So today, I’m going to share 5 pro tips for Medium beginners. These are more advanced suggestions for your success on Medium.
#1 Boost your bio
For tip 1 of my last post, I explicitly excluded the Medium bio from the list of things to do at first as a newbie. Because there are more important steps to take in the beginning. But now, as you have become more and more comfortable with Medium, it’s time to beef up that bio in your Medium profile.
You want your bio to be short and sweet but stacked with good information and maybe a link to something important. Choose a short intro that describes yourself as a writer. Try to include some keywords, for example in form of topics that your write about. Add a link to your newsletter — the majority of popular Medium writers do that. Or to your Linktree overview, to your website, etc. Something that you want people to find quickly.
Next, choose a fine and high-quality profile picture. Too often, I see low-quality images that don’t even show the author. It’s not a requirement, of course, but I believe it builds trust to see a high-quality picture of the person writing the content. At least, don’t have it be a blurry or a fake one.
Another tip: You can actually add two separate bios, kind of. The first one is the one, you create via the settings page on Medium. This appears on your main profile page and on the side of your individual posts. But there’s also the “About” page for every author. There you can add a different text. So make use of that and write something new.
#2 Create a publication
Tip #2 is concerning publications. In my previous posts, I advised you to get your posts into a great publication. Medium has tons of fabulous ones. Names like Start it up, Better Humans, Better Marketing, Curious, and many more. You don’t always need to go for the biggest publications, smaller publications that perfectly fit your niche might work out even better.
In this post, however, I’m going to talk about the possibility of creating and promoting your own publication. Every author on Medium has the option to create as many publications as they want. It’s easy too. Just visit the publications page and click “New publication”. How to set up and style your own pub is a topic for another day as this would go beyond the scope of this article.
But let’s quickly talk about the advantages of your own publication. First of all, it’s yours, so you decide what you want to write about. Secondly, you can invite other writers to submit stories to your publication. That’s how the big ones started. Thirdly, you have the opportunity to start your own newsletter via Medium. That’s a biggie. You might know how important email lists and newsletters are nowadays. Followers can sign up for your publication’s newsletter. With that, you can grow your email list. All within Medium. Even if you don’t know what to do with a newsletter now, it might come in handy in the future.
There are more reasons to create and maintain your own publications. I might write another post just about that in the future.
#3 Use a custom domain
Another pro tip — also a little nerdy — is to set up a custom domain for your Medium profile. You can connect your domain name of choice with your Medium profile and it will then be found under that domain name. So instead of using “acoolwriter.medium.com” it could be “acoolwriter.com”. You’ll find that option in the Medium settings. It’s not hard to do, but you need a registered domain with a domain provider and you must be a paying Medium member. So it’s not free.
#4 Add a pinned post to your profile
Another cool tip: Create a pinned post with a longer, more detailed about-section and with links to your most popular posts, the ones you’re most proud of, or both. You can also use that pinned post to divide your stories up into categories. That’s handy for people who write about various topics, not just one niche. I have pinned a fairly simple post that has a short bio and my 10 most popular posts which I update regularly.
There’s also a Medium publication that tailors specifically to this pinned “About” post sections. It’s called “About Me Stories” and it’s worth a look.
#5 Revisit old posts
The last tip — certainly not the least — is about your old posts. It’s extremely important to revisit previous articles for a couple of reasons:
- First of all, you may want to change a thing here and there. I always find something I want to change.
- Links: Think about how many stories you have already written. It’s very likely that you can link between them. Take a look at older posts to find a good place for a link to a newer but related story. Back- and crosslinking is incredibly valuable. That way, more people will find your content.
- Check the comments! Reply to the ones you missed earlier. Engagement keeps a platform like Medium going. And it is vital for your growth as a part of this community.
Parting words
These are my 5 pro tips for Medium beginners. If you haven’t already, do read my previous post “5 Important Things to Do When Starting On Medium”. It covers the basics. When you’re done with those, give these 5 pro tips a try. And please, tell or show me! I love to see new ideas. Until then, happy writing!
