A Big Thank You, Some Advice, A Few Notes On Writing on Medium, and Some Humble Gratitude: (Can I Get An Amen?)
I returned to Medium on December 17th, with a poem that almost no one read, Christmas In My House Of Dada. I think it was a good poem, but without an audience, only twelve people saw it, which remained the case with quite a few of my earliest posts.
Today I woke up to 1,500 followers. In just the last thirty days, I have had over 37,000 reads and 5,000 recommends. That’s more than I ever expected in such a short time, both in followers and activity. I want very much to thank all of you who have read and followed me. Poetry is a hard sell these days. I genuinely appreciate it. I have also had many pieces placed on the Medium Homepage. Very gratifying.
My advice to those who want to grow a Medium audience is simple. Produce good work, first of all. Then, use existing Medium publications. If you publish in a publication that has a large following (say over 10,000 readers), you get your works in front of many more people than you can on your own, giving them the opportunity to follow you directly. This isn’t rocket science and it requires no algorithm, just common sense. Anyway, that’s all I did.
(Oh, yeah. Unless you are into politics, avoid politics ((and political comments)) like the plague it is.)
According to Medium, I am now a Top Writer in Poetry, Reading, Humor, Writing, Creativity, History, Life and, as of today, Relationships. Thanks, Medium. I’m 65. If I’d known I was this gifted, I might have had a more successful life. Wish we’d met earlier.
The Top Writer designation that most astounds me is Relationships. I got divorced eleven years ago. That divorce (completely due to my own actions) led to involuntary commitment, jail, a year of probation, a record, estrangement from my children, and grinding poverty. Since then, I have known many women (though I gave them up six years ago), but I have never been in any relationship that lasted more than ten months. Now I am basically a solitary monk. But, I am a Top Writer on Relationships. Curiouser and curiouser.
Apparently, Medium is a place where anything, however unlikely, can happen. For me it has been a good place. Again, thanks to my readers, the publications that have presented my work, and Medium itself.
Not to jinx it, but I hope for more to come.
