As with all platforms, you should consider safeguarding your content
I started writing just over half a year ago. That was when I still lived in Denmark. At first, it was on my own WordPress blog about education and pedagogy. Then I started writing on Medium as well. This means I effectively run 2 blogs.
Between both platforms, I have produced well over 100 articles since then. That is an achievement in and of itself. Writing has been a wonderful personal journey.
I also joined the Partner program in January 2022. Yes, I am getting some income from it. But I am not gonna lie to you. It is very meager. Nowhere near anything that would enable me to quit my day job (I don’t want to either.)
Sometimes, you find writers that proclaim that everyone can make four-figure incomes on Medium. My experience is that it is more realistic to expect 2 figures if you have not been on the platform for many years. My best month brought me around 200$. I have never been near that ever since. I attribute it to sheer luck.
My main motivation for writing here is to have a place to share my thoughts, considerations, and sometimes personal stuff. As I said, all this hustling means that I now have produced more than 100 posts. I am proud of it. But it also made me realize something.
To Play the Long Game, You Need to Do What Is Sustainable for You
Post regularly. Preferably every day. That is the most common advice everyone will read.
I tried. But with 2 blogs, that do not always overlap thematically, it is unsustainable for me. Especially after starting to do classroom teaching again. In the last couple of weeks, I have mostly been posting on Medium and totally neglecting the other blog. Even then, I at best manage to post 2–3 times per week.
I have decided, that I am okay with that. Writing is a hobby for me. I don’t want it to feel like a job. At least not at this point. I do not want to lose the joy of doing it. So I accept, that the current frequency of posts is what I can muster.
The fact, that most of the posts I have written are on Medium, I realized something else.
It Is Time to Think About Safekeeping My Content. Medium Is a Third-Party Platform, After All.
What happens, if I get booted off the platform? It is not an impossible scenario. Writers who write about social and political issues easily can get on the wrong side of people, and platform algorithms. We have seen this plenty of times on Social Media platforms.
That is not the only risk factor. What if Medium goes bankrupt? Not an impossible scenario either. I have no idea, how financially sound Medium’s business model is in the long term.
Both of these scenarios would lead to the same outcome for me. I would lose whatever small income I get. More importantly, I would lose all the content, which I produced over the past months with my sweat and tears. And which provided the basis for the income in the first place.
That is why I took a decision on my behalf today.
I Will Need to Streamline My Writing Activities on Medium and My Own Blog
I will redesign the WordPress blog. And I will start moving my older articles from Medium. The blog, will thus not be a niche blog about education any longer. It will contain the same content as here on Medium. There will be some kind of membership system on the blog. However, education and pedagogy are still some of the areas that I write in.
I will continue writing on Medium, though. You will be able to find all my work in both places. People can sign up for memberships on my blog to get full access to all content. Or they can read it all here if they are paying for a Medium subscription.
This helps me mitigate both risks. I am in full control of my content. And I have the potential to still generate income from my writing, even if Medium shuts down or I get booted off. It also provides another advantage. My posting frequency will be at a balanced level. I no longer need to feel bad about neglecting one platform or the other.
I am not the first writer to do this. So I am just copying the model. It serves me best right now.
But it is important to keep an open mind. It is possible, that I need to adjust my strategy in the future again.
I am not going to try and turn this into a lesson or formula you should follow. Take from it what you will. I just wanted to share my considerations with you.
