The way I look at it, there are people who like Poe and there are people who like Hemingway. If Hemingway submits an article on the day the curator who likes Poe is on duty, it's not getting Boosted. It's pretty difficult to write something that is going to be universally seen as brilliant. Some people don't like chocolate remember. I look at it all a bit like playing poker. You have to adopt sound practices (like folding an inside flush draw), even if there are instances where the sound practices seem to fail (you fold and the next card is the one you needed). Usually when I write something I feel is good and it doesn't get Boosted, I direct my frustration into writing something else. That's served me well.
I will never understand the people who don't like chocolate. 😂 But yeah I love Poe but don't fancy Hemingway. That's a great analogy to explain it. Sometimes there is luck involved, even if that's unpleasant to hear!
Luck can also work against people. I was talking to one person who had a story Boosted which I thought would be a rejection. He insisted that his "good practices" were accurate because of that one data point, even though he never got a Boost after that.
That's a great point! I even saw some stories with a typo in the title that got boosted... A friend who got many boosted stories, had a long list of links to his other stories at the bottom. I don't know how he got boosted, but hopefully he doesn't see that as a green light to always use so many CTAs!
BUT if the booster was selected as a subject matter expert for Hemingway, then the Hemingway curator should read the piece. AND have some knowledge of Hemingway when doing so. To submit a great piece on Hemingway to have just the next person on the role pick it up isn't fair to those of us writing and submitting.
100%. I was spoiled and being boosted three to five times a month. Lately though, my stories are being nominated, but rejected by the overlords. One rejected story is currently at 21,000 views and nearly 300 comments. Yes, it's made a decent amount, but I can't help thinking that my return would have been several thousand if it had been boosted. I'm discouraged. I really do write for the love of writing. I try to improve with each story, but I also need the additional income. Until I discovered Medium a year ago I was living on $950 a month. I thought I'd found the thing that would turn my life around, but the returns are chaotic. I'm not giving up.
Yeah it sucks! I also learned the hard way not to rely on Medium boosts for income, since it's so unreliable. I'm a boost nominator, and I see that the past two months have been more difficult than usual to get nominations accepted. :( And I'm not the only nominator who has had a much lower acceptance rate lately for our nominations. At least it's not personal, but income-wise, it hurts.
Interesting that you mention it's been more difficult to get your nominations accepted! Its kind of reassuring in a weird way: "it's not me, it's them" 🤣
I clap 50 times for every comment, but only respond when inspired to do so. You right; it's not logistically possible to respond to everything. I sometimes write some political and religious things that have generated the occasional troll. I don't feed the trolls.
An internet troll is a mean spirited person that anonymously sends cruel messages or stalks the author. It can get a bit scary. They are the exception of course. The vast majority of people are kind, even if they present another way of looking at things. Trolls get a creepy dopamine hit from the thought that they have frightened or intimidated the author. The only solution is to block them and to be careful about personal info posted on social media.
Let’s face it – sometimes they get it wrong. At least it’s better than pure algos, even though some crap still creeps in. But that doesn’t mean “getting some wrong” is…wrong. A limited number of humans are making decisions amongst an impossible sea of bad/good/incredible writing that physically cannot all be seen, much less evaluated. Plus, humans are not capable of making decisions that are not biased. Ever. Sometimes that’s favorable, other times tragic, but hopefully a suitable balance is struck that benefits the platform and those who use it. I look at boosts as a random treat, like finding a twenty in your jacket pocket. I go months without one, and I know in my little black heart some of the shite I put up during those stretches was eminently boostable, but it was never seen/wrong genre/bad timing/someone’s bad day/never nominated, or victim of a hundred other buttons that didn’t get pushed. Shoulder shrug and move on, content with knowing they got it wrong.
As you know, I've been quite butthurt at some of the pieces that have been declined. Some of them have had dazzling results here on Substack! I do agree that Medium has lots of high-quality writing. I'm actually kind of wondering when the rest of the world is going to realize what a goldmine of goodies is available there -- certainly Medium has more high-quality writing than a lot of literary magazines. Perhaps it will just take time for people to realize how high the standards have become.
I'm slowly learning there is no rhyme or reason to what gets liked or boosted or appreciated. I just turn up every time and try and give my best work. Once it's written and posted I have to let it go, it's now released into the wild. Because yes everytime I think that this piece is my best work yet it falls flat 😅
Wonderful post Linda, and so accurate. I think many of us have a story like that. I've got one where I refused to change a kickass title for a boost. The nominator still nominated it, it was denied, then went on to get 25,000 views at an 82% read rate and 14K claps. So in a way, posts like the one in your article today are a good reminder that posts can sometimes still succeed without the boost (albeit paid irritatingly less hehe).
Wow I'm always so impressed by your stats, Robin! We can't tell whether your post is boosted or not unless we ask you. XD But yeah even if the engagement and views are great, the income still sucks. On a much humbler scale for me, my In Defense of Tim Denning article, got way more views than my latest boosted articles. But it made way less money since it's not boosted.
I assure you that post is not indicative of my normal numbers in the slightest 😆. I wish. I liked the Defending Denning article, I can see why it garnered so much traffic Sieran!
I'm confused. Do "views" count for making money? Do "claps" count? I was under the impression that only "reads" counted. I can't even imagine getting 25,000 views or 14K claps. And yet I've been fortunate enough to have been boosted quite a few times. I'm not quitting my day job though.
Hey Linda, yeah, I feel tempted to message some of our writers to not get discouraged. It's not that their writing is bad, but because it's been extra hard to get our nominations accepted these past couple of months, especially for poetry (which is what I mainly nom these days.)
But I think you're onto something that there's not enough space for ALL great pieces. So they have to choose WHICH great pieces to feature. It can feel like a lucky draw, which sucks, since the human brain wants clear reasons, not unpredictability, haha. But it's too bad! It's definitely too unreliable for income.
It's like what happened even before the boost. People who used to make many thousand a month, suddenly made only a little over a thousand a month. So they realized they had relied too much on Medium. It's sadly not a place most people can make a full time income on anymore, even if that's a bitter pill to swallow.
Why not? If only 2% of writing even gets boosted then there should be plenty of room for all of them to be approved. We boosters are not submitting crap. Again, we're the subject matter experts up until we disagree with a denial. I was spending hours and hours a month hunting pieces to nominate. Not any more. If I see them, I send them.
I think what Linda meant, was that there are only so many slots on the homepage to feature boosted stories. The other slots are for other recommendations for the reader based on their reading history. In theory, the boosted stories should be shown only to readers who followed those tag topics, the pub, or the author. But from what others have shown me, the same stories get shown even to people who aren't interested in those topics / pubs/ authors. I don't know why. I think a big issue is that the discovery feed is not targeted enough, for some reason.
Maybe. Then make a section just for boosted pieces where readers can go check out what is posted. Don't penalize us because your programming is inefficient.
I've submitted the same problem to support for months (maybe a year?). Still not resolved. Hire more programmers. Don't penalize us.
I've never been boosted on Medium, but I believe the boosted system now allows everyone to have their articles boosted.
I heard only 2% of Medium articles get boosted. The stats sound grim, but at least it’s not based on who has more followers, who was on Medium longer, or who could rig the algorithm.
It’s great for the writers who have their articles boosted. It means they are doing something right.
While I have accepted the boost process is somewhat fluid, the payment on a boosted article is beyond my comprehension. I had an article boosted a few days ago, it hasn’t done much but a little better than most of mine will unboosted:
684 views, 238 reads, payment 20.08
Yet, this morning I got an email from Mehmet Yidiz, who runs the behemoth Illumination and has over 100K followers. In it he posted an almost identical distribution of a recent article of his as an example of how bad things have become:
652 views, 283 reads, payment 94.68
I can't shed light on his distribution, but I was struck that while he has a few more reads, his payment is more than 400% higher than mine. I realize the machinations of the inner world at Medium are mysterious and secret, but is this type of imbalance commonplace? Bad enough to worry about boost selection, but shouldn’t we peons at least have hope there’s some sort of equity in the distribution of funds if you ARE boosted? Or perhaps I’m just being naïve.
Curators are just humans who bring their own set of opinions, biases, and tastes to their judgments. I’ve felt the same about a few of my pieces. The boost program is so unpredictable, I never count on being boosted. I’m grateful for the 14 I have and try to write my best each time knowing it’s all a toss up when it’s published. ☺️
I’m have been in that editor’s shoes so many times. I’ve wanted to write someone and say “this was so f’ing good. It stuck with me for days. I have no idea why it didn’t get Boosted, but wanted you to know I tried and to keep swinging for the fences.”
As far as I know, that was the impetus for its creation. Now it's about the writers. Your key phrase, "used to happen." It's not happening any more.
I've been on the receiving end of getting turned down, too. I have the same reactions you do whether it's my piece or someone else's. I want good writing boosted regardless of who wrote it. It makes me sad and angry to see it turned down.
The way I look at it, there are people who like Poe and there are people who like Hemingway. If Hemingway submits an article on the day the curator who likes Poe is on duty, it's not getting Boosted. It's pretty difficult to write something that is going to be universally seen as brilliant. Some people don't like chocolate remember. I look at it all a bit like playing poker. You have to adopt sound practices (like folding an inside flush draw), even if there are instances where the sound practices seem to fail (you fold and the next card is the one you needed). Usually when I write something I feel is good and it doesn't get Boosted, I direct my frustration into writing something else. That's served me well.
I will never understand the people who don't like chocolate. 😂 But yeah I love Poe but don't fancy Hemingway. That's a great analogy to explain it. Sometimes there is luck involved, even if that's unpleasant to hear!
The luck piece is important to remember. So much of "the process" is based in luck, established when we don't know our audience.
Luck can also work against people. I was talking to one person who had a story Boosted which I thought would be a rejection. He insisted that his "good practices" were accurate because of that one data point, even though he never got a Boost after that.
That's a great point! I even saw some stories with a typo in the title that got boosted... A friend who got many boosted stories, had a long list of links to his other stories at the bottom. I don't know how he got boosted, but hopefully he doesn't see that as a green light to always use so many CTAs!
I request that writers remove their CTAs now.
BUT if the booster was selected as a subject matter expert for Hemingway, then the Hemingway curator should read the piece. AND have some knowledge of Hemingway when doing so. To submit a great piece on Hemingway to have just the next person on the role pick it up isn't fair to those of us writing and submitting.
100%. I was spoiled and being boosted three to five times a month. Lately though, my stories are being nominated, but rejected by the overlords. One rejected story is currently at 21,000 views and nearly 300 comments. Yes, it's made a decent amount, but I can't help thinking that my return would have been several thousand if it had been boosted. I'm discouraged. I really do write for the love of writing. I try to improve with each story, but I also need the additional income. Until I discovered Medium a year ago I was living on $950 a month. I thought I'd found the thing that would turn my life around, but the returns are chaotic. I'm not giving up.
Yeah it sucks! I also learned the hard way not to rely on Medium boosts for income, since it's so unreliable. I'm a boost nominator, and I see that the past two months have been more difficult than usual to get nominations accepted. :( And I'm not the only nominator who has had a much lower acceptance rate lately for our nominations. At least it's not personal, but income-wise, it hurts.
Interesting that you mention it's been more difficult to get your nominations accepted! Its kind of reassuring in a weird way: "it's not me, it's them" 🤣
Yeah never take it personally, haha. Even if it feels personal sometimes. It's never just you!
Sieran's right, Sophie. It's not you.
Do you respond to every comment? It would scare me to get 300 comments because I respond to each one!
I clap 50 times for every comment, but only respond when inspired to do so. You right; it's not logistically possible to respond to everything. I sometimes write some political and religious things that have generated the occasional troll. I don't feed the trolls.
Forgive my ignorance, but I've heard that term "troll" used before but don't know what it means.
An internet troll is a mean spirited person that anonymously sends cruel messages or stalks the author. It can get a bit scary. They are the exception of course. The vast majority of people are kind, even if they present another way of looking at things. Trolls get a creepy dopamine hit from the thought that they have frightened or intimidated the author. The only solution is to block them and to be careful about personal info posted on social media.
Thanks so much Sophia!
Let’s face it – sometimes they get it wrong. At least it’s better than pure algos, even though some crap still creeps in. But that doesn’t mean “getting some wrong” is…wrong. A limited number of humans are making decisions amongst an impossible sea of bad/good/incredible writing that physically cannot all be seen, much less evaluated. Plus, humans are not capable of making decisions that are not biased. Ever. Sometimes that’s favorable, other times tragic, but hopefully a suitable balance is struck that benefits the platform and those who use it. I look at boosts as a random treat, like finding a twenty in your jacket pocket. I go months without one, and I know in my little black heart some of the shite I put up during those stretches was eminently boostable, but it was never seen/wrong genre/bad timing/someone’s bad day/never nominated, or victim of a hundred other buttons that didn’t get pushed. Shoulder shrug and move on, content with knowing they got it wrong.
This is a good point. It's all past of the wheel.
As you know, I've been quite butthurt at some of the pieces that have been declined. Some of them have had dazzling results here on Substack! I do agree that Medium has lots of high-quality writing. I'm actually kind of wondering when the rest of the world is going to realize what a goldmine of goodies is available there -- certainly Medium has more high-quality writing than a lot of literary magazines. Perhaps it will just take time for people to realize how high the standards have become.
I'm slowly learning there is no rhyme or reason to what gets liked or boosted or appreciated. I just turn up every time and try and give my best work. Once it's written and posted I have to let it go, it's now released into the wild. Because yes everytime I think that this piece is my best work yet it falls flat 😅
My policy exactly. Fortunately, I don't have to rely on what I make on Medium to support myself.
Yes true me neither, I think that makes a big difference in how easy or difficult it is to let go!
Wonderful post Linda, and so accurate. I think many of us have a story like that. I've got one where I refused to change a kickass title for a boost. The nominator still nominated it, it was denied, then went on to get 25,000 views at an 82% read rate and 14K claps. So in a way, posts like the one in your article today are a good reminder that posts can sometimes still succeed without the boost (albeit paid irritatingly less hehe).
Wow I'm always so impressed by your stats, Robin! We can't tell whether your post is boosted or not unless we ask you. XD But yeah even if the engagement and views are great, the income still sucks. On a much humbler scale for me, my In Defense of Tim Denning article, got way more views than my latest boosted articles. But it made way less money since it's not boosted.
I assure you that post is not indicative of my normal numbers in the slightest 😆. I wish. I liked the Defending Denning article, I can see why it garnered so much traffic Sieran!
I did not like the Tim Denning article. But. It was excellent writing.
Thanks so much for your kind words, Robin! Aw well, even when it's not in those numbers, your regular numbers still look fabulous to me, haha.
I'm confused. Do "views" count for making money? Do "claps" count? I was under the impression that only "reads" counted. I can't even imagine getting 25,000 views or 14K claps. And yet I've been fortunate enough to have been boosted quite a few times. I'm not quitting my day job though.
Hey Linda, yeah, I feel tempted to message some of our writers to not get discouraged. It's not that their writing is bad, but because it's been extra hard to get our nominations accepted these past couple of months, especially for poetry (which is what I mainly nom these days.)
But I think you're onto something that there's not enough space for ALL great pieces. So they have to choose WHICH great pieces to feature. It can feel like a lucky draw, which sucks, since the human brain wants clear reasons, not unpredictability, haha. But it's too bad! It's definitely too unreliable for income.
It's like what happened even before the boost. People who used to make many thousand a month, suddenly made only a little over a thousand a month. So they realized they had relied too much on Medium. It's sadly not a place most people can make a full time income on anymore, even if that's a bitter pill to swallow.
"there's not enough space for ALL great pieces."
Why not? If only 2% of writing even gets boosted then there should be plenty of room for all of them to be approved. We boosters are not submitting crap. Again, we're the subject matter experts up until we disagree with a denial. I was spending hours and hours a month hunting pieces to nominate. Not any more. If I see them, I send them.
I think what Linda meant, was that there are only so many slots on the homepage to feature boosted stories. The other slots are for other recommendations for the reader based on their reading history. In theory, the boosted stories should be shown only to readers who followed those tag topics, the pub, or the author. But from what others have shown me, the same stories get shown even to people who aren't interested in those topics / pubs/ authors. I don't know why. I think a big issue is that the discovery feed is not targeted enough, for some reason.
Maybe. Then make a section just for boosted pieces where readers can go check out what is posted. Don't penalize us because your programming is inefficient.
I've submitted the same problem to support for months (maybe a year?). Still not resolved. Hire more programmers. Don't penalize us.
I've never been boosted on Medium, but I believe the boosted system now allows everyone to have their articles boosted.
I heard only 2% of Medium articles get boosted. The stats sound grim, but at least it’s not based on who has more followers, who was on Medium longer, or who could rig the algorithm.
It’s great for the writers who have their articles boosted. It means they are doing something right.
While I have accepted the boost process is somewhat fluid, the payment on a boosted article is beyond my comprehension. I had an article boosted a few days ago, it hasn’t done much but a little better than most of mine will unboosted:
684 views, 238 reads, payment 20.08
Yet, this morning I got an email from Mehmet Yidiz, who runs the behemoth Illumination and has over 100K followers. In it he posted an almost identical distribution of a recent article of his as an example of how bad things have become:
652 views, 283 reads, payment 94.68
I can't shed light on his distribution, but I was struck that while he has a few more reads, his payment is more than 400% higher than mine. I realize the machinations of the inner world at Medium are mysterious and secret, but is this type of imbalance commonplace? Bad enough to worry about boost selection, but shouldn’t we peons at least have hope there’s some sort of equity in the distribution of funds if you ARE boosted? Or perhaps I’m just being naïve.
Curators are just humans who bring their own set of opinions, biases, and tastes to their judgments. I’ve felt the same about a few of my pieces. The boost program is so unpredictable, I never count on being boosted. I’m grateful for the 14 I have and try to write my best each time knowing it’s all a toss up when it’s published. ☺️
I’m have been in that editor’s shoes so many times. I’ve wanted to write someone and say “this was so f’ing good. It stuck with me for days. I have no idea why it didn’t get Boosted, but wanted you to know I tried and to keep swinging for the fences.”
Kevin, I've done that once or twice, too. I want the writer to know that I tried because I loved it.
Nailed it. Thanks, Linda!
Linda, you had an article about using pictures and/or screenshots, and why we shouldn't do it. Do you know where it is? Been looking but no can find!
"Cleaning up what used to happen at Medium."
As far as I know, that was the impetus for its creation. Now it's about the writers. Your key phrase, "used to happen." It's not happening any more.
I've been on the receiving end of getting turned down, too. I have the same reactions you do whether it's my piece or someone else's. I want good writing boosted regardless of who wrote it. It makes me sad and angry to see it turned down.