What Happened To Medium Traffic and Income?
By: Jim Woods
Tags: Content Strategy, Content Marketing, Writer, Ｍedium, Writing

The numbers have seriously dropped. What can we do as writers?

Photo by Bermix Studio on Unsplash

If you haven’t looked recently at your stats, it’s worth taking a look today. I bet there’s been a serious drop in both traffic and revenue.

A writing friend recently told me something interesting. “Medium is dead. My numbers have tanked. I’m making less now per post than at any point.”

Wow. But I have to admit, this didn’t shock me. I can completely confirm the same thing.

In November, I was making 5.1 cents per minute for this post in read time. (Similar in October too.)

But get this: during the month of December, I’m making 2.6 cents per minute for this post in read time.

And this post WAS chosen for curation.

What. The. Heck. So…. what changed? Nothing that I know of. While I’m not expecting the numbers to stay the same EVERY month, the rate shouldn’t drop by close to 50%.

Medium stated recently that the number of people joining Medium went up by 125%, so that means more people joined.

The income has to be up, just from the numbers of that. Maybe it’s just as simple as cutting expenses (aka cutting the rates that writers get paid).

It appears that Medium has massively cut what it pays to writers by at least 50% or More! (This specific post has seen a 75% drop!)

And that just sucks, doesn’t it? The cold, hard fact is that the majority writers on Medium won’t make $100 a month on this platform.

Sure, there are a few outliers here and there, but for the rest of us, Medium is dead as a direct income source.

Right now, trying to make money directly on Medium is a lot like trying to beat the casino. You might be up on one occasion, but the longer you play, the house always wins. In addition, a lot of us are addicted to Medium. I know the gambling analogy seems a bit extreme, but it could actually be very true.

Bringing Medium Back To Life

I’ve got a solution for this problem. And it’s not to just leave Medium. Rather, it’s to readjust how you think of Medium.

Medium is just another platform where you post content. And let’s be honest, it’s the best one out there for writers, despite all of these challenges and struggles.

So what on earth can you do?

First, Build Up Your Long-Term Assets.

Focus on your own website. Write a book. Do more on YouTube. Podcasts are HUGE and still the best way to make an impact. The barrier of entry for “good audio” is much lower than the barrier for “good video.” And let’s be completely honest: if you have a zit on your nose, you know you want to podcast much more than you want to shoot a video, right? :)

Step 2. Continue To Post On Medium.

Don’t let the income on Medium distract you from anything. Ignoring the numbers is probably a great idea. Reading my numbers was a lot like a Stephen King novel — really scary. Don’t do that yourself. Just focus on making great content and that’s it.

Just don’t make Medium your homebase or your number one destination for content, or you’re thinking really short-sided.

Step 3. Limit The Amount Of Time You Spend on Medium.

If you know you’re only getting paid pennies on the dollar for the time you spend on Medium, you need to keep that time you spend here — as well as the energy you invest too — in check. Just one freelance client can pay you more than you’ll make all month writing on Medium every single day.

I even hired a writing friend over the pastweekend to help me with something. This writer told me, “Wow, that’s a lot more than I’ll make on Medium.”

So do not assume that doubling down or tripling down on Medium is the right way to go. That’s long been the popular approach on Medium. It’s not good advice. It’s actually the worst advice you could follow today.

The Takeaway For You

Yes, Medium has changed. It’s always changing. And this time it definitely doesn’t seem to be an improvement. That’s okay. Now is a great time to Try out NewsBreak. Write more on LinkedIn. Create a podcast. Make some Instagram Story videos (the great thing is they disappear after 24 hours and everyone is using their phone, so they don’t have to be fancy).

Consider reevaluating how you look at content and how you create content altogether. Now is an amazing time to shake things up and start a new content strategy, as I lay out in this post.

Don’t settle. Become a content creation machine that keeps trying new things and telling stories in new ways.