Happy Friday
The best read rate I’ve had on Medium is 94%. My worst is 21%. Same with email. Writing email copy is part of what I do for clients, and I’ve had open rates as high as 64% and as bad as 20%.
Getting 64% of people to open an email feels great. Having 94% of people who click a post and then read the entire thing is wild!
Problem is, it doesn’t happen very often.
You can’t hit it out of the park every time, but you don’t need to.
When you get a great response, or go viral, it’s exciting. People are clapping or commenting or sharing and it feels like you’re finally doing it right. Like you finally cracked the code. You got it right.
Until you suck again. And you will. Like a big old plate of misery.
That’s a promise.
It’s like a roller coaster, or a ball pitched straight up.
What goes up must come down. It’s inevitable.
Even all those people who write about how to get more clicks, more views, more money, better titles — they have duds, too.
We all do.
You can’t hit it out of the park every time. Not on your blog, not in emails or Facebook or LinkedIn, and not on Medium, either.
The good news is, you don’t need to. That’s not what it’s about.
It’s not the point.
When your response rates suck, don’t let it get to you.
Don’t get discouraged. It’s not about that.
It never was.
It is not about trying to hit it out of the park more often.
It’s about finding the needles in the haystack.
Also known as your people. Your true fans.
The theory of 1000 true fans
In 2008, the co-editor of Wired magazine, Kevin Kelley, wrote an article called 1000 true fans.
The premise is that if you have 1000 loyal fans that spend $100 per year on stuff you sell, you’ll have an income of $100K per year. It’s just math, so you can woggle the numbers. 500 true fans who spend $200 will do, too.
But the whole point of the article isn’t to get you to start juggling crazy numbers. A lot of people who quote the article forget what the point was.
The point was that success isn’t just for people with a zillion fans.
You don’t have to be famous. You don’t have to be in the top 1%.
You just need to find your people. That was the point.
Because a lot of people see “success” as something so far out of their reach that they doubt it’s even possible. The point is that it is possible. Without a zillion followers. Without being one of the popular kids.
Those “true fans” as he calls them?
They’re the needle in the haystack you’re looking for.
Read time is like poker chips...
Here’s the part you might not have thought of. That theory of true fans? It applies here, too. Doesn’t much matter if those loyal fans are paying you in actual dollars, or in read time.
Read time on Medium is like poker chips. You trade it in for cash.
You don’t need 30K followers or 50K followers. You just need a handful of true fans that read your writing consistently.
The ones that click because they saw your name, not because you nailed the title. Nailing the title gets you new readers, for sure. But it’s the handful that read because you’re the writer — those are the people you want to focus on.
Fantastic titles do bring new readers, no doubt about that. But maybe you just hit on a topic that pushed their buttons. Maybe you wrote about something that’s trending. You went “viral” and got a lot of views.
But you don’t learn much from that.
You don’t learn who “your people” are.
What you can learn from the duds…
Those people who read everything because you wrote it? Your people? They read the duds, too. Because you wrote them.
They like your take on stuff.
That’s what makes them your people.
It’s much easier to find your people by looking at the duds than by looking at the hits. The hits have a lot of one-time readers that clicked because of the topic or the title. They didn’t click simply because it’s you.
So instead of getting lost in misery because a story flopped, look to see who read and clapped and commented. And then watch.
Watch to see how often those same people read your writing. Start paying less attention to “how many” and more attention to “who.”
Respond to their comments. Thank them.
You know — show appreciation.
A small number of raving fans can make a big difference… like, a Pulitzer kind of difference.
When Paul Harding won the Pulitzer Prize, his book hadn’t even sold 7,000 copies. It hadn’t even sold enough to make any bestseller lists.
Royalties on 7,000 copies don’t amount to much.
But the small number of people who liked it didn’t just like it — they loved it. They contacted book stores. They contacted librarians. They yelled their kudos so long and loud that word of his book reached the Pulitzer team. And he won.
His sales happened after the win, not before it.
His advice for writers inspired this post. You know what he said?
He said don’t worry about writing to please readers who like something different than what you write. Just write what you need to write.
If your response rates aren’t great, don’t be discouraged.
Keep doing you. That’s the only way you’ll ever find the people who will become your true fans. Yes, they’re the needle in the haystack. But they’re out there.
“Self-leaders do not look for followers because they are busily pursuing their influential dreams. Followers look for influence and that can be obtained from self-leaders.” ― Israelmore Ayivor
This week’s reading:
Hearts on substack are like claps on Medium. If you enjoyed this, please click the heart so I know what to write more of. And less of.
Also? If you’re reading this in email, click the title and you’ll be able to leave a comment.
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.
:)
Linda
It was just what I needed. I am publishing on medium since 2 months. Some days are good, some days not so much. But still I am publishing though. Keeping it consistent. Thank You for writing this article.
Another well-written and interesting article, Linda. Thanks.