Renown writer and humorist Kurt Vonnegut once wrote:
“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”
I think that, as a creative person, his quote is as accurate as it gets in this industry. We’re always trying to find out how to fly as we plummet to our death in slow motion, and it’s taxing. There are just so many damned talented people online, writing and creating beautiful work, and being rightfully fruitful in that endeavour.
It’s hard to find a place among the giants.
To be one of them, we all know what we should do, of course. Write well. Think big. Hook your audience. Blah blah blah.
Well-meaning yet underwhelming advice is everywhere — even on Medium. Here, you’ll find countless articles claiming to tell us all exactly how they, the magical unicorn writer who’s “just like you,” managed to make $8,394 a month last year. Or something to that effect.
The trouble with all that advice is that we really don’t know which articles we pour ourselves into are going to take off, and which are going to bomb miserably. It takes time and experimentation, and it’s hard to find our way in the fog.
But what we can all learn is what not to do. We can learn what boneheaded moves we’re making now that are setting us up for failure in the future.
And that, friends, is the most tangible advice there is in this industry if you ask me. In order for us to succeed and become one of the world’s best creators, we need to know what it is that those creators would never, ever do, first.
Publish Sporadically
The best content writers and creators never publish sporadically.
If we don’t follow a schedule or, at the very least, aim for a goal of a certain number of articles a week or month, we’ll start to see a drop in engagement. That’s because our audiences prefer consistency — everywhere. From your blog to newsletter to social media marketing, they’ll be looking to see how much content you put out in order to make it all worth their while.
If you are a YouTuber and you publish great content, you’ll grow your followers. If those followers are anything like me, though, they’ll probably check out your channel; they’ll likely look to see how frequently you put out this amazing content.
And if you put out one video once a year? Twice a year? Or worse, randomly? I’m definitely not following you and I’m not the only one.
You simply can’t be relied upon.
The top content creators and writers create frequently, and they know how to produce quality content that their audience will love so much, they’ll subscribe the very first time. If they’re doing it right (see my comment about “quality content”) those followers will never have a reason to click that ‘unfollow’ button.
Produce Clickbait
The top creators keep their followers because, on top of their consistency, they don’t create clickbait.
Clickbait is the worst. I’ve fallen for this so many times — the guiltiest party for this is, in my opinion, YouTubers and their misleading thumbnails.
I hate it when you see a thumbnail and it has a quote, for example, from a celebrity or prominent person in our society, and you think, “what? He said what??”
So you click the link. And he never said a single thing. It’s just an opportunity for a YouTuber to get clicks and you end up watching — and accidentally supporting — a lie of a video that says absolutely nothing of interest.
That just plain sucks.
There is no reason that you can’t get creative, write amazing content, and conjure up a clickable headline or thumbnail that stands on its own merit — and is not clickbait. The difference between great content and clickbait is whether or not your story actually delivers what is promised.
In short, don’t try to scam people for clicks. You’ll end up making us all angry and we’ll avoid you like the plague.
Copy Other Creators
I’ve heard of Medium authors straight up copying other writers’ work and profiting from it.
Truthfully, if you have to copy another person’s work to succeed, the profits you gain in doing so will not last.
It’s everywhere though, especially since there are so many AI writers out there that can help copycats avoid plagiarism with their rephrasing tools (which are not, by the way, what they were developed for, you criminals, you.)
The best writers and creators don’t copy others — they create.
They hone their skills, carve out a place for themselves in the saturated writing world, and write in their own, unique voices. The best creators are the best because they’re interesting, rare, and exceedingly creative.
It would be easy to copy another’s work and call it your own. The best creators don’t do that because, integrity aside, they’re the ones doing all the heavy lifting. They’re the brains behind their own operations.
They don’t need to copy anyone.
Write What They Know Nothing About
There is nothing worse than reading something somebody wrote and catching factual errors and blatant misinformation on a subject you know and love dearly.
No; wait. There is something worse. It’s worse when the writer claims to be an expert on a subject that they clearly are not an expert in. That’s the worst.
You don’t have to be an expert to write about what you love, of course. But there is one thing you must do well at; one thing you need to continually practice. One thing that will make it so that your own ignorance on a topic you’re writing about is countered by the genius of others.
Research.
The best content writers are either professionals on the topics they write about, or they’ve done a lot of genuine, proper research. It’s probably one of the most important parts of being a writer, actually. Without research, you’re taking flight with your own opinions, and while opinions are fine — great, even, if they’re properly cited as such — they are often not fact-based. And you’re going to get caught.
The world’s best creators know the difference, and they know that if they don’t research, they’re going to sound foolish.
Ignore Analytics (and Their Audience)
I’m on Tim Denning’s mail list (and you should be too, but I digress.)
In one of his latest newsletters, he talked about his audience and the audience of one of his subscribers. His subscriber made an assumption about her audience and to help her out, he showed his own hand.
His audience is not what you would expect for a young writer with a background in finance.
I won’t go into it further because it’s his newsletter and I’d hate to be a spoilsport (also you should just go check out his work for yourself and see why he’s one of the top writers on Medium) but the point stands — it’s important to know a few things about who’s reading your work.
While Medium’s analytics information is relatively limited, you can still see what articles attract the most eyeballs, as well as from where those eyeballs came from:
What’s more, if your article has enough views to pull additional data, Medium will show you your readers’ interests:
So helpful, and so stupid to ignore. The best creators know who’s reading their work, and because of that, they garner loyal fans who know where they can find the kind of content they want.
And those fans will follow them anywhere.
Forget About Engagement
You know when you write an article and you are pleasantly surprised to get a bunch of likes, as well as comments complimenting your work?
If you want to lose subscribers, ignore those happy engagements.
The best content creators engage with their audience. Even criticism — and how it’s handled — means that your work is being read, so engage in friendly disagreements and discussions with not only your fans, but with the commenters who are unconvinced by your obvious genius.
Even top creators find the time to answer their fans, whether it’s on the platform they’ve posted to, emails, or other social sites. Engagement is important — failing to do so could cause some unwanted consequences.
Like your career, for example.
Suck at Social Media Marketing
Along with failing to engage with your readers, failing to market your work online will guarantee that you won’t be seen by very many people.
It makes a lot of sense — the more places your readers can discover and return to your work, the better. A basic understanding of keywords and how algorithms work are extremely helpful if you want to reach and grow an audience.
Especially as a self-employed creator.
Learning how different social media networks (namely Twitter and Linkedin) operate, and posting your content there regularly and when applicable, will absolutely draw more views. I’ve started branching out to other platforms, too, such as Pinterest and eventually, Instagram, but new places to promote your work are cropping up every day and you should keep on top of that.
Medium, for example, now has a home on Mastodon, which is kinda cool. Social media platforms will likely continue to multiply and evolve, so it would behoove us all to keep on top of this burgeoning industry.
Produce Boring Content
There is no end to the content online that is yawn AF.
You know what I’m talking about. Often these articles will follow a clickbait headline — you scan the article looking for the “amazing information” that was promised in the headline only to be disappointed. Before you know it, you’ve wasted 2.7 minutes of your time and have nothing to show for it.
I’m not saying that your piece about knitting sweaters is going to be boring to everyone, but if you’re going to write about knitting, you’d better make sure that article is at least thrilling for those who knit.
That might mean including pictures or even videos. Maybe you break it up into a series so that it’s not a long-winded explanation of the history of knitting. Maybe you make sure it’s published and advertised in places where it will be seen by the right people and not, I dunno…snowboard enthusiasts (although I’m sure that somewhere in the world, you’d find a crossover.)
Whatever you do, and whatever you write about, make sure it’s interesting. Make it worth a read and hopefully a share, especially in this overly saturated online world in which a Google search for “articles about knitting sweaters” garners more than 12 million results.
. . .
I’m sure there are many more “don’ts” that the world’s best creators avoid, but for the sake of brevity, I believe this is a good place to start. The world is full of creators these days, and multitudes who wish they could be creators. Bridging that gap is vital to your ultimate success.
Knowledge is power, as they say. Now that you know what not to do, figuring out what you should do is going to be cake, comparatively. So go create. Join the other giants.
That’s where you belong, right?
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This post was previously published on Lauren Hall’s blog.
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